Who will still work during the week that Putin declared a non-working week? Spoiler - almost everything

The working time regime is a certain procedure for the distribution of working time, which is established directly by the organization by internal regulations or by a collective agreement on the basis of the Labor Code of the Russian Federation and other federal laws. Work shift schedules are approved by the employer, taking into account the opinion of the representative body of employees and the nature of the work. For example, the working hours of communications and transport workers are regulated by Part 2 of Art. 100 of the Labor Code, the work schedule of rotation workers is determined by Ch. 47 of the Labor Code of the Russian Federation, and persons who have entered into an employment contract with an individual establish a work and rest schedule by mutual agreement of both parties (Article 305 of the Labor Code). Note that in the latter case, the length of the working week, as well as annual paid leave, cannot be more or less than the standards established by labor legislation. Working hours can be set individually for individual employees, be the same for all employees, or vary depending on the nature of the work of employees in different departments of the organization. This procedure provides for a working week, for example, a 5-day with two days off, a 6-day with one day off, or another work schedule, a working week in accordance with a shift schedule or days off on a sliding schedule (in case of continuous production). The working day in accordance with the working hours includes:

• the total duration of the daily work shift;
• start time and end time of work;
• time allotted for breaks;
• number of shifts set per day;
• order of working days and days off;
• list of employees working irregular working hours.

Working hours are a legal aspect strictly regulated by the laws of the Russian Federation, which, on the one hand, ensures proper labor protection for the employee, and, accordingly, on the other, the employee provides the required labor productivity.

An employer does not have the right to engage an employee to work for 2 shifts in a row, as well as to work on night shifts if the employee is prohibited from working at night.

Types of working hours

In accordance with Ch. 16 of the Labor Code in Russia there are general (applicable to all employees of the organization) and special working hours (differing in the length of the working day or non-standard distribution of working time throughout the entire calendar period), in particular:

• normal (single shift) operating mode;
• irregular working hours;
• flexible working hours;
• shift work hours;
• work on a rotational basis;
• split working time mode (shift divided into parts).

Let's take a closer look at some of them.

Personal effectiveness

Some recommendations on how to effectively organize your remote work.
Schedule

. Create a specific daily routine for yourself. It disciplines. It happens that when we don’t need to go anywhere, we can lie in bed until lunch, and then stay up late at work, although it’s better to spend the evening with our family. It’s good to divide the working day itself into time zones: “routine”, “work with colleagues”, “serious work”.

Border

. Draw a clear and understandable boundary between work and home. Organize a work area and work only in it. You can even change into work clothes. One of the 37signals employees uses separate work slippers for this.

In the morning at home, in the afternoon at the office.

This could be a very successful scheme. At home, you (maybe) can work on something serious in a more or less calm environment and wait out the morning traffic jams. And by the middle of the day you can go to the office and work there in communication with colleagues, if necessary.

Different computers.

Place one computer in your work area for work. And get a separate computer for entertainment. Let them be incompatible and you will not be able to work on a leisure computer. They may have different operating systems and different software. Do not install work tools on a non-working computer. This will help you avoid the temptation to “quickly check your email” or reply to a colleague’s message on Skype. Theoretically, you can make a design on an iPad, but they say it’s not very convenient.

When you don't want complete isolation

. You don't always want to sit alone and work at home. Sometimes there is a strange desire to see other people. Then get up and go to a cafe, coworking center, library or office. By the way, you can rent one or two tables in the office of another company. This, by the way, is useful in terms of changing the scenery. If you are very tired of doing the same thing every day in the same environment, change the scenery.

Motivation

. The only way to increase motivation is to encourage people to work on what they enjoy and only with people who excite them.

——— PS:

I started using remote work a few months ago, and I read the book quite recently. I suspect that this reading will not go unnoticed and will result in some positive changes. If similar shifts have already occurred to you and you have something to share, please comment.

Normal operation

The normal work schedule (in practice considered a single shift) is established taking into account working hours and can be daily, weekly or cumulative.

Any work performed in excess of the daily work schedule is overtime work (Article 99 of the Labor Code of the Russian Federation).

When recording working hours in aggregate, a total of a longer period of work is assumed, in particular, for a month, quarter or year. The main task of the summarized recording of working time is the correspondence of the working day norm to the duration of working time for the entire accounting period. This method of setting working hours is usually used when organizing work on a rotational basis, transport, communication services and others. Note that the summarized recording of working hours does not provide for restrictions on the duration of the work shift, but as a rule, it is 8-12 hours.

Excuses

Miracles happen when we are together.
The point is that when you gather at the same table or just in the same room, you can organize some kind of brainstorming and come up with some very cool idea. But the question is: how many of these brainstorming sessions do you conduct per year? It seems to me not very much. Besides, how many brilliant ideas can your company digest and implement? As a rule, there’s not much to do and wasting time on thinking in detail about something that you won’t be able to implement in the next year anyway doesn’t make any sense.

How can I tell if employees are working if I can't see them?

Here's what Chris Hoffman from IT Collective says about this: “If you stop trusting employees, then we made a mistake when hiring. We will not work with a person who is not able to produce good results, cannot maintain his own schedule and cannot cope with the workload. We hire only experienced professionals who can manage their time and make a significant contribution to the common cause, and we are not going to be their nannies.”

It's simple. The employee's work is evaluated based on the result. If it is not there, the employee must be fired.

People at home are constantly distracted

Indeed, there are much more temptations and opportunities for distraction at home. The whole question is in the organization. It is more difficult to work while sitting on the sofa than in a separate room with the door closed. If this is not possible or does not help, you can try working outside your home. Go to a cafe, park, library or coworking center. Most people want to work; it brings satisfaction. But if you are doing a hopeless business, you need to think not about how to work on it remotely, but about a new job.

Only in the office can security be ensured.

This is a serious matter, and 37signals has its own set of rules on this matter:

1. Encrypting data on hard drives
2. Disable automatic login, wake up using password
3. Enable safe mode on all sites, especially mission-critical ones like Gmail
4. Use a lock code on smartphones. + the ability to delete all data remotely.
5. Use different passwords on different sites and store them in a special program.
6. Enable two-factor authentication on Gmail or other critical services

Large companies don't do this. Why should we?

Many business giants are mired in inefficiency and bureaucracy. You shouldn't rely on this. But there are quite a few large companies that use remote work: IBM, eBay, Microsoft, Intel, CiscoMersedes-Benz.

Corporate culture

Culture is not table tennis tournaments or going out together to eat dead roast pigs. In reality, it is a set of stated and implied values ​​and corresponding actions of an organization. A couple of examples:

• How we talk to clients. Do we believe that the customer is always right?
• How do we feel about the quality of products? Do we strive for the ideal or are we content with the good?
• How do we talk to each other? Polite or tough?
• What kind of workload do we consider appropriate - do we reward workaholics or those who occasionally take a Friday off?
• How do we feel about risk? Do we prefer to take risks or try to grow slowly but surely?

I need the answer right now

When everyone is working in an office, it is easy to develop the bad habit of bothering each other at any time for any reason. This gives rise to the same division of the working day into a bunch of small 15-minute segments between distractions: telephone, a colleague’s question, an answer on Skype, a letter, lunch, another question from a colleague, a tea break, etc.

At a minimum, urgent questions can be avoided. It should be recognized that not every question requires an immediate answer. Yes, we may want to get an answer as soon as possible, but what happens if the answer is two hours later? You'll likely find that 80% of your questions can be asked via email and answered asynchronously. In cases of more important matters, you can ask a question on Skype. And when everything is completely falling apart, you can call.

This will not work for our company/industry.

Here is a small list of areas in which you can work well remotely: auditing, public services, design, film production, publishing, consulting, marketing, personnel selection, computer equipment production, software production, advertising, insurance, finance, legal services, translations. In fact, the matter is not limited to this list. There are many industries that benefit from remote work. Half of Fortune 100 company Aerna's 35,000 employees work remotely. At Intel, 82% of employees regularly work remotely.

Irregular working hours

The mode refers to a special mode of operation, which is regulated by Art. 101 of the Labor Code of the Russian Federation and involves the performance of labor functions by an employee outside the duration of the current working time schedule. The main distinctive feature of this work mode is that the employee, subject to the general work mode, can be engaged by the employer to carry out his work duties before the start or at the end of the work shift.

It is important to note that working with irregular working hours involves the employee performing, in additional time, only his job duties as specified in the employment contract. The employer does not have the right to require the employee to perform work that does not comply with the employment contract (Article 60 of the Labor Code of the Russian Federation).

The list of positions that may correspond to irregular working hours is determined by a collective agreement or the internal labor regulations of the enterprise. The irregular working hours regime can be applied to persons:

1. managerial, administrative, business or technical personnel;
2. working without working hours;
3. working according to a schedule with splitting working hours into parts of indefinite duration.

An employee working on an established irregular working day may be involved in performing his work outside of the schedule without his consent only occasionally, thereby excluding systematic overtime. At the same time, the employee does not have the right to refuse to perform such work outside the established standard working hours. Employees whose working hours are irregular receive annual paid leave (at least 3 calendar days), while they use weekends and holidays on a general basis. Also, on the basis of Art. 119 of the Labor Code of the Russian Federation, overtime beyond the normal working hours can be compensated with the written consent of the employee himself, as overtime work.

How to spell non-working or non-working

The word quot; (not) worker can be written both together with quot; notquot;, and separately. You need to look at the text in which it is used. If in the text it can be replaced with the synonym quot;unworkingquot;, quot;brokenquot;, quot;everydayquot;, quot;lack of opportunity to workquot;, then we will write this word together. For example: This week we have a non-working Saturday.

On holidays, it is allowed to perform work that cannot be suspended due to production and technical conditions (continuous production), as well as work related to the need to serve the population. Also on holidays, emergency repairs and loading and unloading work may be carried out. This is stated in Part 6 of Article 113 of the Labor Code of the Russian Federation.

Flexible working hours

This regime is a form of labor organization with self-regulation of the duration, beginning and end of the working day. However, even with a flexible work schedule, it is necessary to work out the number of working hours established by labor legislation for a certain period - day, week, month (Article 102 of the Labor Code of the Russian Federation). The flexible working time regime provides for a sliding work schedule, which is established by mutual agreement between the employee and the employer upon hiring or throughout the entire working life. This regime can be established for either a definite or an indefinite period, and is documented in an administrative document of the employer. Flexible working hours are most often used in cases where the use of regular schedules is ineffective or impossible. It is inappropriate to use flexible working hours in cases of continuous production, three-shift work schedules, as well as in types of production with special safety regulations. The use of a flexible work schedule does not affect wages, the calculation of seniority, or the provision of benefits. This mode of work is not entered into the employee’s work book. The main components of a flexible working mode are considered to be:

1. Flexible time is the beginning and end of a work shift, when an employee has the right to start and finish work at a time convenient for him.
2. Fixed time is a period of a work shift when an employee is required to be at the workplace.

The duration of the main components of a flexible working time regime is determined by the internal labor regulations of the organization. An accounting period can be considered a week, a month, a quarter, and other mode options that are more convenient for the employee and the organization.

Employees performing their work duties on a flexible schedule may be required to perform overtime work in the manner provided for in Art. 99 Labor Code of the Russian Federation.

Shift working hours, as a rule, are introduced in production in order to increase the efficiency of equipment use and increase the volume of products produced, while the working period of the production process is significantly higher than the permissible duration of the daily work schedule. The shift schedule distributes the working hours of workers who are involved in the production process, or for certain categories of workers. The work shift schedule determines the number of shifts, the start and end times of the shift, the order of rotation, and sets breaks for meals and rest. The shift work schedule must be approved by the employer, taking into account the opinion of the representative body of employees (for example, a trade union committee), which must be notified of this no later than 1 month before the start of work according to this schedule. Changing the shift work schedule is not possible. Based on Art. 110 of the Labor Code of the Russian Federation, all shift schedules are drawn up taking into account the provision of weekly uninterrupted rest to workers, the duration of which must be at least 42 hours. Rest between shifts must be no less than double the working time preceding the rest in the shift. Engaging an employee to perform labor duties for two shifts in a row is not permitted.

How to plan your day

You can work the standard eight hours if you divide this time into segments - sprints. Once you adjust your activities to natural energy surges, things will go much better. Here are four tips to help you get into that perfect rhythm.

Break your day into hourly intervals

We usually plan what needs to be completed by the end of the day, week or month. But we can become many times more effective if at each moment we concentrate only on what we can achieve right now.

So plan your day in short, hour-long chunks. This will allow you to set the right rhythm for your activities. Plus, you make complex tasks easier by breaking them down into small parts. If you want to stick to the most precise formula, you can use 52-minute intervals, but an hour is just as good.

During business hours - work

The sprint system is effective only because it correctly uses periods of peak energy. This way you can achieve maximum concentration in a relatively short time and quickly cope with tasks. But if you are irresponsible with the time allotted for work - sending SMS messages, checking email or social networks - the whole system collapses.

Really relax

The Draugiem Group found that employees who took breaks even more often than every hour were more productive than those who did not stop working at all. In addition, those who rested consciously felt better than those who, during the “rest,” could not disconnect from the tasks they had abandoned.

Taking a break from your computer, phone, and to-do list is essential to staying productive.

The most effective ways to recharge are walking, reading and simple communication. They can really distract us from work. On especially busy days, it feels like checking email or making phone calls can easily pass for a break. But this is not true, so avoid such holidays.

Don't wait for your body to force you to take a break.

Simply working until you're so tired that you want to rest is a bad idea. It's no use: you've already missed your peak performance window anyway.

Stick to a predetermined schedule: sticking to it will ensure that you work at your most productive times and rest during your least productive times. Remember that it is much more effective to take a short break and recover than to try to continue working when you are tired and cannot concentrate.

Shift working hours

It is a form of performance of labor activity by an employee without the possibility of daily return to his place of residence. This regime is usually used by employers during the construction or reconstruction of facilities in order to reduce the time frame for project implementation. Shift work involves providing employees with conditions for normal living, most often these are special mobile buildings and structures created by the employer, equipped with everything necessary. The duration of the shift is determined by labor legislation and is no more than 1 month (if the shift period is increased to 3 months, Article 299 of the Labor Code of the Russian Federation, the employee is paid additionally). The duration of a work shift during a shift should be no more than 12 hours. For the calculation, the summarized accounting of working hours for a month, quarter or 1 year is used. This accounting period includes total working time, time spent traveling to the collection point, place of work and back, rest time, which coincides with the calendar period. The shift work schedule is communicated to employees no later than 2 months in advance. This regime provides for a number of restrictions (Article 298 of the Labor Code of the Russian Federation), according to which the following cannot be hired to work on a rotational basis:

• workers under 18 years of age;
• pregnant women;
• women who are dependent on young children under 3 years of age;
• employees who have medical contraindications.

How to find and keep?

Just search around the world or country.
To hire an employee, all you need is for him to have professional skills in a given field, have a very good command of the language of communication and be able to express his thoughts in writing. Avoid tricks, deceptions and weird hiring practices. Just give a test task and pay for its completion. At the same time, the task must be practical, necessary and from real life. There is no need to invent vacuum horses for test tasks.

Pay employees what they need without geographic discrimination. After all, remote work is an opportunity to hire the best, not an opportunity to hire cheaper. Those. if you founded a company in Moscow, pay remote employees Moscow salaries. Your employee should not receive 25 thousand just because this is the average salary of a programmer in Uryupinsk.

If you decide to work with a specific person, arrange a personal meeting. Pay for his ticket, accommodation and meet him. If this is problematic, at least Skype.

Split working hours

This regime is regulated by Art. 105 of the Labor Code of the Russian Federation, and, as a rule, is applicable when performing work with unequal intensity throughout the entire work shift. For example, a fragmented operating mode is used by organizations providing transport services to the population, communication services and trade. The division of working time is carried out by the employer in accordance with the internal rules of the organization, drawn up taking into account the opinion of the trade union body. Russian labor legislation does not stipulate how many parts a working day can be divided into, but, as practice shows, a shift is divided into 2 or more parts, and the unpaid break between them can be no more than 2 hours.

“Non-working” or “not working”: together or separately?

These words can be nouns or adjectives.

1. The noun “worker” is written separately from “not”. You can say “who?” to him.

It was not a worker, but an accountant who proposed a new idea.

2. Adjectives can be written together or separately. They are written together if they carry an affirmation , and written separately if they carry a negation .

The engine is not working. (Asserted as defective or broken).

The engine is not working. (Efficiency is denied).

It was a non-working day. (It is stated that it was a day off).

It wasn't a work day. (It is denied that it was a work day).

Short working hours

In addition to normal working hours, Russian labor legislation provides for a reduced working time regime, the duration of which is less than 40 hours per week established by law. In accordance with Art. 92 of the Labor Code of the Russian Federation, this work schedule reduces working hours:

• for workers under 16 years of age – 16 hours per week;
• for disabled workers of groups I and II – 5 hours per week;
• for workers aged 16 to 18 years – 4 hours per week;
• for workers whose type of activity is associated with hazardous (harmful) working conditions.

It is important to remember that reduced working hours are the direct responsibility of the organization’s administration. This legal provision requires strict implementation.

How to correctly write a memo for employees to work on weekends

Some organizations have pre-printed forms for such applications that are easy for the employee to fill out. To the chief physician of the Federal State Health Institution "City Disinfection Station" G. L. Bodrov from the disinfector of the department of chamber disinfection and sanitary treatment Ivanova G.

Such an extension of labor relations with an employee contradicts the basic principles of legal regulation of labor relations established by Article 2 of the Labor Code of the Russian Federation, namely the principle of freedom of labor and the principle of prohibition of forced labor. Therefore, your WORK SCHEDULE or the norms of another local regulatory act that allow you to retain an employee after the expiration of the notice period for dismissal should be considered to worsen the situation of employees, and, therefore, not subject to application.

How to work during working hours: Rules for defeating office chaos (S. V. Bekhterev, 2018)

Chapter 1

Focus on the main thing: Principles of operational management

Imagine the situation: you have not slept for 36 hours. Day, night and another day. The desire to fall asleep will probably be very strong. And now you are given 24 hours to get enough sleep. Will you get some sleep? Most answer that they will have even less time. What if I take 5 minutes and give you 23 hours 55 minutes? The answer, of course, is the same – we’ll have time. Now imagine that I will divide these 5 minutes into 300 segments of 1 second each and wake you up “for one second” with a powerful fire siren every 5 minutes for the entire period of time? Will you be able to sleep in this case? After all, you will have a whole 23 hours and 55 minutes of pure time for this!

Typically, session participants claim that it is difficult to invent a more painful punishment. But why then do we inflict this torture on ourselves in office chaos? After all, the process of focused intellectual work is very similar to the process of sleep. And misunderstanding of the principles of our brain’s operation during intellectual work is one of the first operational management mistakes that we will overcome together.

All office employees are engaged in the production of intellectual work products. The input is introductory information, followed by the process of creating a product of intellectual labor, and the output is a finished intellectual product. This is reminiscent of the manufacturing process. Only in the office they use their brains instead of machines for production, often without understanding the principles of operation of this “machine”.

As you might have guessed, in this chapter we will consider the brain as a kind of “machine” that produces intellectual products. And let's borrow a few concepts from the practice of lean manufacturing (kaizen).

How does this “machine” work? Let us conventionally imagine it in the form of three parts: consciousness, preconscious and unconscious. In Fig. 7, these parts are presented graphically in the form of a sight, which best illustrates the focus of attention.

• Consciousness is the center of our attention, what we are currently working on. There can be only one element in our consciousness on which we are concentrated here and now. The number “1” in this case is very rigid - only one thought can be in the spotlight.

• The preconscious is the zone in which thoughts accompanying the focus of attention are located. It is generally accepted that this is no more than 7±2 thoughts, although there has long been debate in the scientific community about reducing this number. The number 7±2 is flexible and depends on the current state of a person’s energy. Conventionally, 9 elements in the preconscious zone can be considered the maximum number that allows you to concentrate on solving the most difficult problem.

• The unconscious is the zone in which all other thoughts are located that we are not currently thinking about. Let us conventionally assume that the number of these thoughts is so huge that it can be called infinite.

Elements in consciousness and preconscious constantly replace each other, thereby allowing us to concentrate and maintain attention on the object of production of an intellectual product. Hereinafter, by focus of attention we will understand the zone of consciousness and preconsciousness.

One of the simplest examples is driving a car. The focus is on elements that change very quickly: road markings, side mirrors, rear view mirror, surrounding cars, road signs, instrument indicators. If there is no one on the road, then you can find a resource of attention in order to admire the surrounding landscapes, talk with a fellow traveler on general topics, or listen to an audiobook (Fig. 8). If the traffic is heavy, you are constantly being cut off and overtaken, or you are driving in difficult weather conditions (heavy rain, ice), then many will even turn off the radio in order to fully concentrate on driving.

Now imagine: the evening of a difficult day, you are tired, sitting behind the wheel of a car, driving home in heavy traffic. We deliberately turned off the audiobook so that we could concentrate on driving. And then... a very important person calls you on your mobile phone (for example, a VIP client on whom 50% of the company's sales depend, or your boss's boss). “No problem,” you think, “I have a speakerphone in my car.” Of course, you need to answer the phone. And the conversation begins to be difficult... “Do you remember what we agreed on last week?!” Which contractors have you already involved in the project?! Tell me, what exactly has already been done?! Are you aware of what awaits you if tomorrow morning we don’t get what you promised us?” - and there are more and more such questions! What will you do in a situation where thoughts associated with one complex task crowd out thoughts associated with another complex task (Figure 9)?

Most people I've asked this question to say they would park or turn on their hazard lights to have a quiet conversation. And a minority answer that they will inform you that the phone’s charge level is 1% and that it is about to run out, but they will definitely call you back soon. After which they will turn off the phone and continue to drive the car without interference. Because we cannot simultaneously perform two tasks that require maximum focus from us [5].

Hereinafter, we will highlight the main operational management errors in red, and the rules that allow us to avoid these errors in green.

What are the work tasks that you usually do before the start of the working day, after it ends, and on weekends?

Usually they name such tasks as planning, preparing important texts, presentations, regulations, reading important documentation, writing new commercial proposals, thinking about an important situation to make a decision, etc. In general, this includes everything that requires our full concentration. Please note how the process of completing the listed tasks occurs. When we sit down to perform such a task, we do not immediately begin the production process because we need time to turn on (concentrate) or set up our “intelligent machine”.

For example, writing a new regulation. We sit down at the computer, determine the purpose of the regulations, the main errors that this regulation should correct, remember the structure, previous experience, the circle of executors and agreeors, specific actions and their order. At this moment, value is not produced - we are just focusing, or setting up our “intelligent machine”. And at some point the process of creating value begins - we begin to write and create a new intellectual product!

Imagine that we are trying to create a product that requires full concentration in the chaos of everyday life. As soon as we spent time turning on and focusing, we just began to create value, kaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa-here we are: they called us “for a second”, they came in “for a second”, they distracted us “for a second”.

But the process of focusing (setting up the “intelligent machine”) takes some time. The more complex the intellectual task, the more time it takes to concentrate. It’s like with a machine tool: the more complex the part produced on it, the more time it takes to configure and adjust it.

Imagine an automobile assembly line that first produces one Toyota Camry, then reconfigures the machines and assembles one Toyota Land Cruiser, then reconfigures the machines again and produces another Toyota Camry, then reconfigures the machines again and again assembles the Toyota Land Cruiser, and so on until until 1000 cars are produced. It’s hard to imagine this, because it’s much more productive to first assemble 1000 Toyota Camrys, then reconfigure the machines once and assemble 1000 Toyota Land Cruisers[6]. Unjustified reconfiguration of machines during kaizen is usually called one of the types of losses, or “muda” in Japanese, because while the machine is being reconfigured, production does not work.

Similar problems, now associated with intellectual production, are clearly demonstrated by the famous experiment (Fig. 11). Record how long it takes you to count from 1 to 25, first in the left table, then in the right. The resulting time difference is an example of wasting time and energy (!) on switching attention.

If we switch from one simple task that does not require full concentration to another equally simple one, then the switch takes a minimum of time, sometimes even an instant. The fastest switching occurs at the level of unconsciously performed tasks related to our skills. For example, why is it so difficult to drive a car for the first time? Because in addition to the above-mentioned objects such as markings, instruments, mirrors and the rest, we also have to try to keep in the zone of attention something that, after a dozen car lessons, we hardly pay attention to: shifting gears, the location of the gas, clutch and brake pedals, turning on the turn signals when performing maneuvers.

Switching from one complex task to another complex task already takes much longer. But we not only waste time, we also waste energy switching. Like an airplane that uses a significant portion of its fuel to take off and land. When we are focused on a task, we are in a state of flow[7], and significantly less energy is expended. Just like an airplane that rose to altitude and set course.

This is the second important feature of attention - the value of 7±2 very much depends on a person’s energy. Remember especially nervous, tense days, when in the first half of the day we were constantly “pulled”, switched from one thing to another, and constant force majeure disrupted our attention and forced us to do other things. Agree that in the second half of such days there is no energy and strength left for significant matters - you have to deal with tasks that do not require full concentration.

The topic of increasing energy is so important that we will devote a special section to it in Chapter 2, and in Appendix 2 we will talk about our approach to energy management.

But instead of uniformly spending the limited energy of employees on the focused implementation of priority tasks, most Russian organizations continue to waste it on numerous unnecessary distractions.

According to a study conducted by the Department of Computer Science and Engineering at the University of California, Irvine, in the United States, “ the average worker can devote 11 minutes to completing a task before being interrupted.”

. That's about 50 distractions a day. According to our research, in Russia, an office knowledge worker is distracted on average 122 times a day. The cost of such a number of distractions, bearing in mind the cost of switching (readjusting the “intelligent machine”), you can now easily calculate for yourself.

All types of such distractions can be divided into 2 categories: internal and external.

And if everything is clear with external factors, then I propose to look into the internal ones in more detail. Imagine that you are focused on a task. For example, on analyzing the current situation and planning for next year. We spent time turning it on and focusing. The process of value creation has begun. No one interrupts you, the phones are silent, notifications about receiving new mail do not appear in the right corner of the monitor screen. It would seem that you sit and work. But suddenly a new thought suddenly comes to mind. Any. For example:

• Yesterday I promised to send presentations to Ivanov. Forgot. It didn't work out well...

• Yesterday Petrov was supposed to send me the agreed upon agreement. And where is he?!

• Sidorov needs to be reminded about the payment to the counterparty. They called yesterday and said that they had not yet received payment, and without payment they would not start the project...

• Tomorrow there are important negotiations, and my presentation is not ready yet! We need to have time to sit with her.

• 4 days ago I sent Kuznetsov a letter with a request to send commercial proposal templates, but no response came from him. Didn't receive it, or what?!

• Don’t forget to call your wife and tell her that I’ll be late today...

Thoughts like these often come throughout the day, right? But we are busy with another task! Focused on it, spent time and, as it turns out, energy on focusing! And here is a new thought. And on the one hand, we are focused on planning the year, and on the other, we are thinking about a new task that has suddenly appeared. What will you do in such a situation? There are only 3 options.

1. The most obvious option is to deal with this new problem. Its disadvantages are clear - a waste of time and energy switching back and forth. In some cases, there is also such a disadvantage as simply forgetting what you did before the switch. We jokingly call this the “do it before I forget” state, when a person starts one thing, remembers the second, switches without completing the first, then suddenly something third appears, the person switches again without doing the first and second, and five minutes later can't remember what he needed to finish. True, in such cases a diary comes to the rescue.

2. The second option is to write down the new thought somewhere, for example on a sticky note, and attach it in a visible place. I’ll tell you a little secret - everything that we write down somewhere, we write down in order to continue doing what we are doing at the moment. If we are confident that we will see the recorded thought at the right moment, we will forget about it and continue to deal with the current task. But if our system of recording information (planning) is imperfect and there is no confidence that we will see the recorded thought at the right time in the right place, then this thought will remain in the preconscious zone. In this case, there is a third option.

3. Usually no one admits that they do this. We jokingly call it this: “Oh! It's great that I remembered about this! Now I won’t forget about it.” This refers to a situation when a new thought is so obvious, the concentration on the task is so strong, and the completion of the task is so close that you are simply too lazy to write it down, because “I won’t forget about it.” In this case, the new thought, in order not to go into the depths of the unconscious, is forced to occupy the attention span of the preconscious, which is limited by the number 7 ± 2. Since thoughts from the preconscious must come into the spotlight from time to time, we also remember about a new task from time to time. At the end of the task, there is a culmination, and therefore maximum focus. This ends with the repression of a new thought, and after completing the task we find ourselves in the familiar state of “I wanted to do something... just what?!” Several times (and actually hundreds of times) having found ourselves in such a state, we still begin to use the first and second options. However, from time to time allowing for a third option. After all, you must admit, it is very inconvenient to write down new thoughts while standing in the shower or taking a bath. And how many brilliant ideas come to our minds there!.. They come and go.

New thoughts visit everyone. Accordingly, the most productive course of action if they arise is very simple. If the new task is a higher priority, then we may decide to interrupt the current task. If the new task is of lower priority, it should be written down, but in such a way that it is guaranteed to be seen at the right time in the right place. Then we can calmly forget about it and continue to work on a higher priority task (we will learn this skill in Chapter 3). Losing new thoughts is a mistake. Because any thought that has gone into the depths of the unconscious has an interesting property: in most cases it comes back. But for some reason, almost always at the wrong time.

Please note that for now these errors and rules relate to the area of ​​personal effectiveness of employees. Unfortunately, time management skills are not taught at school and university. So this training function will have to be performed by the employer. And if 10 years ago at our trainings there were still debates about whether planning working time was the employee’s personal zone or the employer’s zone of interests, now such an issue is not on the agenda. If an employer wants his employees to be effective, he must teach them to effectively manage the time he bought from these employees. No one else, alas, will do this for him.

First of all, you need to create an understanding among employees that it is much more productive to perform a task until it is completed, instead of constantly switching. First, produce 1000 Toyota Camrys, then reconfigure the machine once and produce 1000 Toyota Land Cruisers[8].

End of introductory fragment.

Rule 7. Try not to go crazy and not make enemies in the family

Remote work requires discipline, and forced remote work also requires strong endurance. Repeat to yourself every day as a mantra that none of your loved ones and friends should suffer because of the current situation. The fact that something doesn’t work out for you, something doesn’t suit you, should not affect others in any way.

Regular physical activity will help with self-control; fortunately, the Internet is teeming with various video workouts for varying degrees of readiness and for different purposes. All you need to do is choose not the most difficult, not the longest physical program and allocate 30-40 minutes every day in the morning or afternoon to complete it. Breathing exercises and banal walks around the apartment also help.

Follow these simple rules, strictly follow the recommendations of doctors - and this crisis can even pass for you with benefit. By the way, has your company implemented remote work? And if so, how?

If your level of self-organization is so high that you could conduct not only your own work, but also someone else’s, remotely, we invite you to the Faculty of Project Management! Don't let your talent fade

Self-isolation due to coronavirus continues, which means you still have time to invest in your own future - learn a new profession and not be afraid of any economic disasters.
We want to help you with this and until June 11 , 2020 we are offering a 40% discount on almost all GeekBrains training . Be healthy and successful!