Break the BlackBerry and Laptop Addiction

eWeek.com recently reported on a recent poll by Reuters that determined that the use of BlackBerrys and laptops tend to blur the distinction between our work life and our home life.  We are always available and always checking email.  The survey found "Nearly 30 percent were so attached to them they only switched them off while sleeping."

This shouldn't be a surprise to anyone.  To use the technical IT acronym this is a BFO - a Blinding Flash of the Obvious.  This sounds like one of those multi-million dollar research studies funded by our tax dollars that discover such breakthroughs discoveries as: "most people like chocolate".

It's no accident that BlackBerrys have earned the nickname "CrackBerry".  Being always accessible and connected to email can be an addictive habit.  Has your family ever gotten upset because you just had to check email 20 times per day while you were on vacation?  If so, maybe you're ready for a 12-step program.  The good news is that there are some things you can do to get your BlackBerry use under control without completely giving up on email entirely.

Two useful techniques are:

1. Take action to reduce the number of un-necessary emails that you receive
2. Prioritize your actions - take control of when you check and respond to email

Tim Sanders in his "Sander Says" blog suggests that you "Make your emails CLEAR compliant" as a way to reduce the email glut.  When someone is sending you too many emails most of which you don't really need he suggests that you send them a note asking them only to send you emails that are CLEAR compliant, CLEAR being an acronym the criteria that the email should meet before they send it to you.  Sanders reports that he got this from Bill Jensen's book Simplicity and that it reduced his email load by one-half almost immediately.  That's pretty impressive and it can help reduce one of the main frustrations of email - too many that you don't really need to see.

The second tip is to realize that just because emails arrive just seconds after they are sent it doesn't mean you have to read them immediately.  Read them based on your schedule and priorities not the sender's.

Early in my career I worked at Lone Star Steel when W. Howard Beasley was CEO.  I always recall Howard relating a story from early in his career when he was an assistant to Treasury Secretary John Connally.  Keep in mind as I relate this story that Connally is one of those larger-than-life Texans.  Beasley and Connally were out golfing one weekend when a Secret Service agent came running up to Connally and breathlessly announced that the Commerce Secretary wanted him to call immediately, it "was an emergency".  Connally politely thanked the Secret Service agent and then calmly went back to his golf game.  Perplexed, the Secret Service agent said,  "Mr. Secretary, you don't understand - it's an emergency."  At this point Connally turned to the agent and replied (I don't know how to type with a Texas accent so please use your imagination), "Son, I'm afraid you're the one that doesn't understand - it's not my emergency." and then went back to his golf game.

Connally had his priorities set and wasn't about to let someone else take control of them.  I doubt that if he had lived at a later time that Connally would have been a "crackberry" addict.  The point of all this is that just because someone would like us to read their email and respond immediately it doesn't mean we have to disrupt our activities to meet their needs.  Constantly being interrupted by emails lowers our productivity and effectiveness especially if the email wasn't really necessary.

Get in the habit of checking your email at regular set intervals rather than as they come in.  Use the time between checking email to concentrate on your other tasks.  I think you'll find your productivity goes up.  If your an "addict", start out with small email checking intervals, every 15 minutes for example and work your way up to ever longer intervals.   After awhile you'll discover that you are using email rather than email is using you.

Tip: Go into your laptop and BlackBerry and set the new email notification to "off" or "none".  This will remove the temptation to check email everytime a new email arrives.

Remember laptops and BlackBerrys are not your job.  They're simply tools to help you in your job.  It's never to early or too late to get these tools under control.

Top BlackBerry photo by Lance McCord, Baby with BlackBerry photo by wood_tang

If this topic was of interest, you might also like these:

• Making Your Email More Effective; A Lesson From Lincoln
• Email Disclaimers and the Road to Hell
• Looking Back - Lessons of the Antikythera Mechanism
• 99 Email Security, Netiquette and Productivity Tips
• Or the posts in the "PCs & Email" category

Comments

[Daniel Johnson, Jr.]

You hit a nerve in me with this one, Mike, on a couple of levels.

1) I am totally for getting information when it's convenient for me. I consume most of my media on-demand these days. The idea of watching a program at a specific time is something I'm growing out of. The same with online media (blogs, podcasting, and the like). I'm learning to consume it on my schedule.

2) Having said that, I'm also a guy who checks every email that comes in and who also spends so much of my time lately watching what's going on with Twitter (http://twitter.com).

I have recently found out how to change the notifications for Outlook and GMail, but I could do a lot better with Twitter.

[JibberJobber Guy]

Mike, this is an excellent post, and one I needed to read. I have started to close my Twitter window just because it was a distraction (valuable, yet distracting!)... and am doing some kind of system (well, I can't describe it so maybe it isn't a system) to manage my e-mail.

One thing you didn't touch on here is the why. For me, one of the "why I'm addicted to e-mail, etc." is because it's easy. And I feel productive to be so responsive. But I often neglect things I need to do in order to be responsive, and that is bad (going back to Covey's quadrant).

Thanks for the reminder :)

Jason Alba
CEO - JibberJobber.com

[Mike]

Daniel,

I think this issue strikes a nerve with many people. We have a love-hate relationship with this technology. We can't live without it and we can't live with it. But I guess it is like any habit or "addiction" you have to really want to change and have an incentive to follow through.

Mike

[Mike]

Jason,

Great to hear from you again. The designer of this technology have done an excellent job in making it easy. So easy we have to manage it properly. I agree that we need to be responsive but "responsive" doesn't necessarily mean we have to respond immediately.

Mike

[Raj]

There is this anecdoter about a famous Indian Movie star named RaajKumar - now deceased. A Producer came to his house and complained that he was trying to reach him to talk about a potential offer for the last one week and though the phone kept ringing no one answered, so he wasn't sure if the phone was working. The movie star responding in his typical style told the Producer "Friend, The phone at my home is for my convenience and not for your convenience".

I read this anecdote several years back and somehow it stayed in my memory and everytime someone calls and tells me that I have been trying to reach you...this somehow pops up in my memory!

Cheers

[Mike]

Raj,

Thanks for the comment. It sounds like RaajKumar knew how to use the tools rather than letting them use him. I like that story. Thanks for sharing with us.

Mike