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DECEMBER 2015
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business
solutions
PAY ATTENTION TO THE
WORSENING CULTURE
OF DISTRACTION
“We are creating and encouraging
a culture of distraction where we are
increasingly disconnected from the people
and events around us, and increasingly
unable to engage in long-form thinking,”
says Joe Kraus, two-time entrepreneur and
current Google Ventures partner. “People
now feel anxious when their brains are
unstimulated.”
Kraus knows how to start and operate a
successful business, particularly in the tech-
nology space. He’s in demand as a speaker
and blogs at
joekraus.com,where he wrote
the following in 2012: “We are losing some
very important things by doing this. We
threaten the key ingredients behind creativ-
ity and insight by filling up all our ‘gap’ time
with stimulation. And we inhibit real human
connection when we prioritize our phones
over the people right in front of us.”
The effect of all of this, Kraus argues, is that
we’re increasingly distracted and less able
to pay attention to anything for a reason-
able length of time, and this distraction
is a “worsening condition.” When you
practice distraction (which is what multi-
tasking really is), you’re training your brain
to pay attention to distracting things. The
more you train your brain to pay attention
to distractions, the more you get distracted
and the less able you are to focus.
“It’s shown not only that we’re dumber
when we do this—an average of 10 IQ
points dumber—but that we’re also 40
percent less efficient at whatever it is we’re
doing,” writes Kraus.
“Business owners spend a lot of time conducting support work that, while critical,
takes them away from working with their customers and growing their business,”
says Kim Feil, Executive Vice President and Chief Marketing and Strategy Officer
of Office Max. “They want to refocus their time building their businesses, and they
want reliable partners who will address their specific needs.”
Common Distractions
What kinds of noncore tasks are pulling small business owners away from their primary
functions? It varies depending on the type of business, but some of the most common are:
Small business owners may think they can do it all—wear many hats—but this
approach can really stall sales and growth. In fact, business success depends in
part on management’s ability to wade through the distractions and focus on critical
business tasks. Every minute spent managing noncore tasks is a minute not focused
on core competencies, which are defined as skills at which an individual is especially
proficient, or a set of activities that a business performs better than other functions—
whether more efficiently, at lower cost, or at higher quality.
Look Into Outsourcing
To get help with noncore tasks, you may want to turn to outsourcing. This strategy
offers many valuable benefits, the first of which is freeing up time to focus on core
competencies. Everyone can concentrate on what they do best, allowing your business
to derive maximum benefit from each person’s talents.
Another benefit of outsourcing is that bringing in specialists often results in faster
completion of projects. After all, which makes more sense—having you struggle
through an IT challenge for days, or hiring an IT consultant who could complete the
project in a few hours? In addition, outsourcing allows your business to access people
with a high level of training, education, and experience in selected areas, which often
pays off in the long run. For example, an accountant may find little-known tax deduc-
tions or a human resources contractor may be able to recommend ways to save on
employee benefits. These specialists are also able to stay current with all the changes
in their fields, which is difficult (if not impossible) for you to do as a stretched-too-thin
small business owner.
At sba.gov, the U.S. Small Business Administration offers several suggestions for staffing
a growing business, including outsourcing business functions. The site notes, “Whether
you turn to a virtual assistant for help managing your calendar, voice mail, and perhaps
some basic bookkeeping, or you need help with core business functions such as account-
ing, marketing or HR, outsourcing can be a low-overhead option that lets you concen-
trate more on business growth and less on day-to-day distractions.”
• Information technology (IT)
• Telecommunications
• Marketing
• Web development
• Social media
• Bookkeeping and accounting
• Taxes and payroll
• Human resources
• Administrative support