This week is International Men's Health Week - a time to encourage supportive thought and discussion around men’s health and wellbeing.

In Australia, Men's Health Week provides a platform for challenging and debating key issues in men's health, while encouraging conversation around what it means to be healthy - both physically and mentally. 

As a Go1 customer, you’re no doubt familiar with many of our professional development and compliance training providers by now. But did you know the Go1 library also includes online learning around the important topic of mental health?

Discussion around men’s mental health is an important factor in providing men with opportunities for connection, support, and education to enhance their health and wellbeing. 

Looking for training content in this space? We encourage you to check out some of our providers and their content below.

The Mental Health Movement focuses on driving change by altering society’s perception of mental health issues and those struggling with them. 

Using an evidence-based framework, they specialise in providing workplace training to organisations wanting to better support their staff and create a culture where it is ok to not be ok, and it is ok to ask for help.

📣 * Building Mental Health Resilience: Through Mindset

Mindset is a very effective and powerful tool when building mental health resilience. This topic will provide you with the Mental Health Movement’s four P’s to Mindset: Proactive, Perception, Positive Self-Talk, Process. These mindsets are tried and tested and will improve your mental health through COVID-19.

You might also like to check out our 'Tackling mental health: a conversation on resilience' webinar, featuring Dan Hunt, founder of The Mental Health Movement.

Mentally Well Workplaces aims to help all Australian businesses to create a “mentally well workplace” allowing individuals, teams and workplaces to flourish. Using evidence-based health inductions and training, their content educates employees about mental health and its impact in the workplace.

📣    Workplace Mental Health Induction For Employees - Australia

Australia's first evidence-based online Workplace Mental Health Induction for every employee, no matter what their title or role.

iAM Learning use the art of storytelling to bring content to life and to engage learners throughout their bitesize courses. With stunning animation and interactive courses, they are making learning accessible to businesses of all sizes, shapes and across all sectors. 

This course will guide you through all you need to know about mental health and what to do if a problem develops.

📣    How to Have a Conversation about Mental Health

A key learning outcome from this course is a deeper understanding of the complexity of mental health and how to start conversations with those who need help.

Additional resources you might be interested in, accessible to everyone:

According to research, the two main threats to male mental health, outside of seeking for help, is loneliness and depression. 

Kurzgesagt uses their passion for knowledge and storytelling to bring awareness to a variety of topics, including mental health. 

Everybody feels lonely sometimes. But only few of us are aware how important this feeling was for our ancestors - and that our modern world can turn it into something that really hurts us. Why do we feel this way and what can we do about it?

Everybody is familiar with the feeling that things are not as they should be. That you are not successful enough, your relationships not satisfying enough. That you don’t have the things you crave.

This video talks about one of the strongest predictors of how happy people are, how easily they make friends and how good they are at dealing with hardship. 

We hope that these resources help to encourage supportive thought and conversation around some of the key issues affecting the lives of men. 

Having clear, open discussions around mental health can be an important step forward in providing men with opportunities for connection, support, and education to enhance their health and wellbeing. 

🌎 * - available without a Go1 subscription

For more insights, be sure to subscribe to the Go1 newsletter to stay on top of all the latest L&D trends. Or, you can book a demo today to find out how Go1 can help with your team’s learning needs.

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Online training to support Men’s Health Week 2020

Most people have words they don’t like. For me, it’s office jargon like ‘bandwidth, ‘blue sky thinking’ or ‘pinging’ emails. Eurgh.

For my brother, the most irritating word in the world is ‘delightful’. Years ago, he worked at an estate agency where ‘delightful’ was seriously overused; it featured in every advert and every property description. It even trickled down into normal conversation - delightful coffees, lunches, dates and holidays were had by all. Because of this experience, there are few things less delightful for him than the word itself.

Why am I telling you this? There’s no chance I’d have remembered such a trivial fact if my brother had just said “I hate that” and moved on. Because of the story, I still remember his disdain for ‘delightful’ more than a decade after he told me. Translate this into a more useful setting (like workplace training), and you’ll find that any information can be cemented in memory if it’s part of an engaging story.

There are three key elements that make great eLearning content. Firstly, it has to engage learners and get their attention (best achieved through dynamic visuals, witty voiceover and a good dose of humour). Next, the content has to deliver information in a way that makes sense of all the facts and figures – tricky when you consider the different ways individuals prefer to learn. Finally, it has to be memorable.

According to Paul Smith, a successful corporate trainer and author, around 40% of people are ‘visual learners’ who learn best from videos, diagrams and illustrations. Of the rest, 40% are ‘auditory learners’ (think lectures and discussions) and 20% are ‘kinaesthetic learners’ who understand through doing, experiencing or feeling. Storytelling is an unusual teaching method because it contains elements that work for all three.

As you might expect, those who learn through listening do well when they hear a story. Visual learners do too - because the descriptive element allows them to picture the scene and visualise information/scenarios in a way they aren’t able to when presented with lists of facts and figures.

Here’s what’s really interesting though - when listening to a story, our brains allow us to feel the same as we would if we were experiencing the subject for ourselves. This makes storytelling an ideal teaching tool for kinaesthetic learners because they still gain the ‘doing’ experience without actually being hands-on. Sound like something I just made up? I can back this up…

A Princeton neuroscientist called Uri Hasson delivered a fascinating TED Talk in 2016 called this is your brain on communication. If you don’t have ten minutes to watch the video, here’s the gist;

As a story is being told, activity in both speaker and listener brains align. On fMRI scans, you can actually see the same reactors light up in both as the story progresses.

“When she [the speaker] had activity in her insula, an emotional brain region, the listeners did too. When her frontal cortex lit up, so did theirs.”

Basically, the minds of listeners react the same way upon hearing a story as they would if they were recalling an experience of their own. This means that lessons told through stories can implant ideas, feelings and experiences into the minds of learners. You don’t get much more engaged than that!

Training is pointless if it isn’t memorable. The last thing you want after investing in a learning and development programme is a bunch of employees who can’t remember enough to make use of the courses they take. That’s another great thing about learning through storytelling – it helps us to recall information long after it’s delivered.

 A great example of this theory in action can be found in a study by Stanford professors Gordon H. Bower and Michal C. Clark. Their experiment saw two groups of students tasked with memorising sets of ten, unrelated words. The control group were given their sets and told to remember the words in whatever order they chose. The second group were asked to embed those words into stories and remember them this way. When tested later, the students who constructed stories were able to recall six to seven times as many words as those in the control group.

 Now, imagine those words were facts about health and safety, sales strategy, marketing practices or whatever subject you want to teach. By conveying information through storytelling, it’s up to 7 times more memorable. That’s a huge difference - one that significantly impacts the ROI of eLearning content. 

Holly Helps (yes, that is her real name) is part of the innovative team at iAM Learning - creators of engaging animated eLearning content that improves performance and encourages professional development.

The iAM Learning library features high-end animation, likeable characters and captivating stories that make even the most serious subjects appealing and unforgettable. You can access the library free for seven days with a no-obligation free trial. 

Start exploring content from iAM Learning!

Engagement and retention: the power of storytelling in eLearning

In the beginning, eLearning courses were longwinded, text-heavy and hard to digest. They weren’t designed with the user in mind (you know, the people actually taking courses), and didn’t always offer the best learning outcomes.

As with all successful digital products and services, eLearning has developed and improved with time. Nowadays, successful courses incorporate a masterful blend of design, UX and psychology to deliver lasting outcomes and real professional development for learners.

“But what about the ones that don’t do this?”

eLearning is just like any other product or service on the market; if it isn’t doing what a user needs, it isn’t good enough. Perhaps that sounds harsh but hiding from progress won’t help anyone.

For modern learners, it isn’t enough to reel off facts and figures, drone on for hours with dull PowerPoint slides, and then expect users to thank you for the experience. To deliver eLearning content that works, you need to have it all - high production values, engaging content, interesting scripts, snappy delivery and extensive, ongoing research into learning behaviour.

“Isn’t it enough just to give them the facts and tell them to remember?”

Absolutely not. For a start, that approach is really, really boring. But - beyond simply making courses more enjoyable - understanding the way people perceive, process and recall information is essential for providing training that sticks.

When designing effective content for eLearning courses, you need to consider learner experience, behaviour, cognitive process and other factors. This should include real thought about various factors including typography, use of colour, tone of voice/point of view, emphasis and more.

For many, typography is an afterthought (if a thought at all), but this can have an enormous impact on the success of a course. Keep your audience in mind when choosing a typeface - after all, they’re the ones who need to read and retain this information.

The simplicity and readability of a sans-serif font ensures the bulk of your content is clear and easy to read. Think Futura, Helvetica, Calibri and Verdana.

Conversely, a serif font will include little flourishes and decorative details that draw the eye and work really well for titles and/or CTAs. Examples of serif fonts include Georgia, Palatino, Times New Roman and Baskerville.

NOTE: Sans serif fonts tend to be easier for dyslexic people to read and understand. Find out more about this by visiting https://www.dyslexic.com/fonts/ 

Putting emphasis on certain words or phrases using different font size, weight, colour or italics will help you to highlight critical information and is a great way to draw attention to any calls to action (CTAs).

The colours you use in your course are more important than simply making it look pretty. There is a wealth of information about colour symbolism out there and, unfortunately, much of this includes more opinion than fact. There is no denying however that many colours come with common associations and emotional triggers. A few examples to consider include;

Blue:  Associated with calmness, stability, integrity and trust (that’s why so many banks use it)

Green: Widely associated with health, nature, safety and calm

Black: This can feel foreboding, but also sophisticated, elegant and powerful depending on context

Purple: Inspires thoughts of luxury, royalty, wisdom and opulence

Red: Danger, violence and aggression can come to mind but also power, energy and passion

Orange: Associations include creativity, joy and success

Yellow: Invokes thoughts of happiness, sunshine, confidence and optimism

Pink: Love, compassion, sympathy and beauty are common associations 

NOTE: Be sure to consider your learner’s background when selecting colours for your course. For example, some westerners perceive red as angry or dangerous while, in Chinese culture, this is a popular colour that symbolises luck, joy and happiness.

The narrative perspective you choose when writing your script (first, second or third person) will have a major impact on learning outcomes. For example, using the second person perspective puts the learner at the centre of the action. It focuses the reader’s attention by making them feel like they are being addressed personally. 

Unless you have an eidetic memory, you probably don’t remember everything you have ever read or been told. Nobody does. We do, however, tend to recall the first and last parts of a story, list or lesson. This psychological phenomenon is known as the serial position effect or, separately, as the primacy effect and recency effect. 

If you take advantage of this tendency, you will help learners to recall critical information long after your course has been completed. The best way to do this is with a summary at the beginning and end of a course, along with a few strategically placed recap quizzes throughout.

There is much to think about when designing an eLearning course, and considerations about both user experience and behaviour will go beyond the items covered here. It's all about engaging learners and creating an experience they enjoy, understand and remember. If you keep this objective in the front of your mind as you design and build your course, you will be on your way to making something truly great.

Tom Moore is the Chief Operating Officer for iAM Learning, the bitesize animated eLearning library. He's a leader, parent and expert storyteller. Tom is passionate about leaving the learning landscape better than when he found it. He was an integral player at Learning Heroes, SAP and two of the UK's largest transformation programmes. iAM Learning is his latest adventure!

When designing effective content for eLearning courses, you need to consider learner experience, behaviour, cognitive process and other factors. Here's how.

Great eLearning demands more from creators, and does more for learners

In the modern era, increased productivity is on the mind of every employee and business leader. There are thousands of tips out there claiming to help us rattle through the most critical tasks. But do they work? Or are they creating more distractions? 

Here, we explore two popular systems for productivity and explain why they are useful. Ultimately, the goal is to understand what helps you to get motivated and focused on your tasks. 

It is important to note here that there are several tools dedicated to team productivity and project management. These guidelines focus on productivity for individuals, rather than teams. 

Former U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower had to make tough decisions every day about which of the many tasks he had to do was most critical. To make this process easier, he came up with an accessible system known as the Eisenhower Matrix. 

This diagram explains how to set the matrix up. On one axis, you consider whether your tasks are important or not. On the second axis, you think about whether the tasks are urgent or not. This system helps you to place tasks on the grid and identify which you need to prioritize: 

Rather than have a long list of items circling in your head, the matrix organizes tasks into categories to identify which are the most pressing. The tasks that need to be done first are those that are both important and urgent. Using this system can both reduce stress and increase focus. 

This is a time management trick developed by Francesco Cirillo in the late 1980s. The idea is to tackle a piece of work you need to get done in 25-minute intervals, followed by a short break. Follow these steps to get started:

Focus solely on tackling the task (don’t get distracted by anything else)

Towards the end of the session, review your progress

Repeat three more times, followed by a more extended break

Repeat this as many times as it takes to get a particular piece of work done. At the end of each session, record what you achieved, and your next goal. 

Why does it work? One reason is our reward systems. If we promise ourselves a reward at the end of completing a section of work, such as a break, we are more extrinsically motivated to complete the task. Extrinsic motivation can help us get started, particularly with tasks that are not interesting. Awareness of how you are spending your time also helps you to become more focused. 

This article also includes an extensive list of helpful suggestions for boosting productivity.

Whether or not productivity hacks will work depends entirely on your personality. If you are easily distracted, tools that help you to remain focused will make all the difference. If you are naturally diligent and conscientious, you might be able to forgo them altogether. The most important thing is that you tailor systems. These tips might help you to form strategies that work for you:

Your personality plays a huge role in your ability to be productive and how best to overcome slowed output. 

There are certain traits in our personalities that remain fixed throughout life. The ‘Big Five’ personality traits are currently the most accurate measure we have of our characters. The five-factor model is organized into extraversion-introversion, openness to experience, conscientiousness, agreeableness, and neuroticism.  

Research shows that where you sit on this scale remains relatively consistent throughout life, but you can take action to balance or accentuate certain traits when you need to. 

Knowing where your personality sits can be hugely helpful and relevant to your ability to be productive. If you are introverted and work best in quiet environments, your focus will be dependent on being alone. Communicating with others often could be overwhelming, and you could quickly lose momentum.

When testing out a new productivity hack, it is essential to build in time for reflection. If you don’t, you won’t know whether the system you’re using is working for you, or if you need to personalize it. 

If you are using a time management technique like Pomodoro, be sure to include a minute or so for reflection at the end of each session. Record what you got done, and whether or not that met your target.

If your targets are consistently higher than what you can achieve, you might need to adjust your expectations for what you can get done in a given amount of time.

The American Psychological Association explains that growing your attention span is one of the most effective ways to boost productivity. 

Many productivity hacks are designed to improve focus on a single task. When you are testing out a new tool, reflect on whether it helps you reach a state of deep concentration.  

If you can be aware of what you are doing at any given time, rather than lost in thought, you will be more productive and happier. The brain is only capable of doing one task at a time, and you risk reaching cognitive overload if you attempt too much at once. 

4. Communicate your priorities to your team

One of the biggest distractions at work is instant messaging, emails, and notifications. Sometimes, messages will be both important and urgent, but you can’t set up your entire day waiting for a task like this to come in.  

Trust that, in most cases, if you switch your notifications off while you are focusing on a particular task that the world won’t fall apart! This attitude can be challenging if you are in a position of responsibility. Ultimately, if you can focus on urgent tasks when you need to, you will be a better leader and provide better support to your team. 

Sophia is a freelance writer who specialises in thought leadership, opinion pieces and content creation for learning publications. Her work focuses on the latest research in learning theory and practice. She regularly contributes articles on workplace learning and personal development to the Go1 blog. You can connect with her on LinkedIn. 

How to make productivity hacks work for you 

Giving your employees the opportunity to upskill at work has never been so important. In the current climate of economic uncertainty, broadening your team’s skillset will allow them to easily adapt to evolving roles, offer them new challenges, and improve your company’s employee retention levels. 

However, upskilling should be a priority year-round - a recent Hays survey of 1253 employees found that 96% considered upskilling as ‘important’ or ‘very important’. 84% wouldn’t consider a role without skill development opportunities, and 47% would not want to join a company that didn’t provide opportunities for training.

The good news is that implementing a programme to offer learning opportunities to your staff does not need to be costly or time-consuming.

COVID-19 social distancing measures have had a massive impact on large gatherings, live events, and face to face interaction on all but the smallest levels. It is highly likely you will have employees who are feeling displaced, especially if their roles involve regular person to person contact. 

Currently, there is no definite end date for this situation, so now is the ideal time to explore ways to upskill these employees. Providing them with an opportunity to learn new digital skills will help them to successfully pivot to changing demands in their role, and benefit other areas of your company.

Providing role-specific training for your employees is an attractive proposition that will both strengthen the skill set of your workforce, and increase staff engagement. However, it is also a worthy investment to offer your employees the chance to take on a personal learning project, whether it be improving their design skills, practising a new language, or learning to code. 

By encouraging your staff to extend their knowledge in an area of their choice, it will heighten their engagement during a time of distraction and change, and also provide them with new skills which can benefit your company long term.

Hiring new staff is a costly, time consuming and labour intensive process. Firstly you have the obvious costs of advertising the role and time spent assessing applications, whether that is done through an agency or your own HR staff. But on top of this, research by MIT Sloan found that new hires take between 8 and 26 weeks to start working at full productivity levels, and this drop in productivity reduces the company’s overall annual revenue by 1-2.5%

Upskilling current staff members will require an initial investment, however, the ability to transfer them into new roles will save your company huge amounts of time, money and effort which are inevitably required during the hiring and onboarding process. The MIT Sloan research also noted that internal transfers reach full productivity level in around half the time that new hires take.

There are many easy and cost-effective ways to implement upskilling opportunities at your company. Lengthy and expensive external courses are not always the best solution.  Here are a number of methods you can use:

Stretch opportunities are when an employee takes on a project or task outside of their usual role and skillset. This can be a fantastic method of on the job upskilling. An added bonus of this initiative is that your team will further develop their collaborative skills and problem-solving abilities.

Stretch opportunities generally require a staff member to shadow another colleague or be mentored by one. This learning experience can also be supplemented with online training modules. This assists the employee with developing the skills required for unfamiliar tasks and reduces the amount of time their colleague needs to spend on training them.

Offering self-led learning opportunities in the workplace gives your employees the chance to develop particular skills and knowledge that will benefit your company. 

A survey of Generation Z workers found that opportunities for growth were their number one priority when searching for a new job, ahead of generous pay, job security, flexible hours and healthcare benefits.

With the average employee having just 24 minutes per week to dedicate to learning, microlearning modules are an innovative method to incorporate into your company L&D. 

Microlearning breaks training down into small, bite-sized chunks, with lessons that generally include a short text or video element followed by a quick assessment. These can often be completed in 10-20 minutes, which makes them a very effective way to maximise the limited time your employees have for learning.

Providing upskilling opportunities for your employees is incredibly beneficial to both individual staff members, and your company as a whole. Not only does it increase employee engagement and company loyalty, but it also makes your team more adaptable and well rounded, and drastically reduces your hiring and onboarding costs.

In the current economic situation, upskilling is particularly important, however, it should be a focus for your company year-round. 

Upskilling your team: why it should always be a priority, but especially now

With a significant increase in the number of people working from home, it is now more crucial than ever that employees understand how to make the most of their time. Most importantly, leaders need to communicate this without applying unnecessary pressure. 

When employees feel motivated to work, they will inherently become more productive. The good news is, it is possible to create both a desire to achieve goals and immersion in a task. In this article, we explore what your team can do to improve their motivation to boost productivity. 

While it may seem like a random occurrence, we can create moments of complete immersion and motivation. In the 1970s, psychologist, Mihaly Csikszentmihályi referred to this experience as ‘flow state.’

Csíkszentmihályi defines ‘flow state’ as an “optimal state of consciousness where we feel our best and perform our best.” 

He adds that the experience involves “being completely involved in an activity for its own sake. The ego falls away—time flies. Every action, movement, and thought follows inevitably from the previous one, like playing jazz. Your whole being is involved, and you’re using your skills to the utmost.” 

In a McKinsey study, executives reported being five times more productive when in flow. However, most of us spend around five percent of our working life in this state. According to the study, if leaders could increase this number to twenty percent, overall productivity would double. 

How to boost motivation and reach ‘flow state’

So how do we get into a flow state and boost productivity? Here are our top tips to help your employees get in the zone: 

When left unchecked, procrastination can become a chronic problem. When we don’t feel like completing a task, we are unable to see the impact of avoiding it long term, or how failing to do the work will stop us from reaching our goals. This thought pattern can create a negative downward spiral, which becomes difficult to reset.  

When you don’t enjoy a particular task and find yourself putting it off, it can be helpful to find a way to motivate yourself to do it extrinsically. To do this, start by building in a reward for completing the task, or a section of it. The reward then becomes the motivation, and you have created an incentive for getting the work done. Getting started is often the hardest part. 

Csíkszentmihályi explains that “flow also happens when a person’s skills are fully involved in overcoming a challenge that is just about manageable, so it acts as a magnet for learning new skills and increasing challenges. If challenges are too low, one gets back to flow by increasing them. If challenges are too great, one can return to the flow state by learning new skills.”

There are some tasks we are not interested in doing. Some are too easy and some too challenging. The most common problem is that they just aren’t that interesting, or they have become repetitive. 

If this applies to a task you are trying to complete, think about how you could make it more challenging. Find out if there is something additional you could be doing, or set yourself a personal goal within the task. If the task is too difficult, you could break it down into more manageable steps or ask for further clarification.

If you do find yourself drifting into a distracted state, it can be helpful to work on self-awareness. If you can identify the moment you start getting lost in thought, you have a far better chance of rescuing yourself when you need to return to the task at hand. 

Distraction could also signal that it’s time for a break. Continuing to work when your brain needs a rest is about the most unproductive thing you can do. Even if you take five minutes away from your desk to walk around, this can quickly replenish your energy and ability to focus.

Meditation can also help with awareness. The fundamental aim of the practice is to notice when you are getting distracted, and this can help you to know when you are no longer engaged in your work. 

4. Understand your strengths and weaknesses

If you already know what you are good at, you can use this information to reach flow. For example, if you are completing a writing task and you find writing fairly easy, you’ll need to find a way to challenge yourself to become fully immersed in the task. There is always something you can work on. Find out what you need to do to improve, and focus on that.  

Equally, if you know the areas you struggle with, you can decide whether it is easier to delegate the task and more efficient to avoid it altogether. Alternatively, you could break the task down into smaller parts to become more engaged with it. 

Thinking about the enormity of a task before starting it can also trigger procrastination and anxiety. These thoughts are the enemy of flow. To avoid overthinking, break the task down into smaller chunks. 

For example, if you have to write a report, aim to write the first 100 words and then have a short break. It might also be helpful to plan out the task first, with headings and bullet points to guide you through each step. 

Take a look at our Go1 Optimising Productivity pathway. You'll find a wide range of courses to help you boost motivation and stay productive when working remotely.

Using motivation to become more productive

Before the outbreak of COVID-19, productivity was the holy grail for employees and businesses. Everyone wanted to do more, in less time, and achieve optimal results.  

Now, for many companies, the focus is on survival. Those who are still able to work are doing so from home and may find themselves with a lot more time on their hands. There is time to reflect and to consider whether continually striving to achieve more is the best approach. While aiming high is crucial, it is equally important to maintain a balanced mindset. 

One of the best ways to improve productivity sustainably is to improve focus on the task at hand. Mastering attention can quickly improve both the quality and quantity of work produced.

In the modern workplace, the ability to hold attention on a task is becoming increasingly challenging. Author, Mark Manson, explains that we now live in an ‘attention economy.’ With endless knowledge now available at the click of a button, our attention is of high value to advertisers, companies, and organizations. 

While technology connects us to friends, family, and colleagues across the world, instant messaging is also making it difficult to remain focused.  

Unlike a computer, the brain is incapable of running too many complex tasks at once. It is impossible to chat to your colleagues and focus on work at the same time. Mental overload at work can also seriously affect productivity, wellbeing, and safety. 

26th president of the United States, Teddy Roosevelt, is said to have worked at the same time in the same place every day. He would work ignoring all other distractions that came his way. Although he would only spend a quarter of the average day working, he completed all of the tasks he needed to by using his time effectively.

In the 2016 book, Deep Work: Rules For Focused Success in a Distracted World, Georgetown professor and author, Cal Newport, explores Roosevelt’s ‘deep work’ ethic. He defines ‘deep work’ as:

“Professional activities performed in a state of distraction-free concentration that push your cognitive capabilities to their limit. These efforts create new value, improve your skill, and are hard to replicate.” 

Granted, Roosevelt lived in a world where fewer distractions were competing for his attention, but with discipline, it is possible to train your mind. 

When trying to improve productivity, many people focus on the outcome rather than the process. 

For example, you might set yourself the goal of responding to more emails in a certain amount of time. 

While this strategy creates a sense of urgency, it is outcome-based and, therefore, limited. Perhaps you are wasting time sifting through fifty junk emails every time you check your inbox. This part of the process needs to be streamlined if you are to see real results. 

Focusing on the task at hand can make it easier to improve your processes, save time, and get more done with less. 

Everyone is distracted by different things. It might be your thoughts, notifications, or particular people! You will know straight away what takes you away from your work. Finding a way to block out and manage these temptations isn’t easy, but the rewards will speak for themselves. 

Research also shows that every time your phone goes off, the distraction takes you away from the task. If possible, set aside specific times during the day to respond to emails and messages. 

Write a to-do list, but only for the day ahead. An endless list without any consideration for the time you have will not be useful. 

Try writing out what you aim to do for the day, and mark your top three priorities. If you manage to complete everything, you will have a greater sense of accomplishment, so make it achievable. Using a traditional to-do list can lead to procrastination and make you feel as though there is a vast, unmanageable mountain of work to do.

4. Use the Pomodoro technique to track your progress

This is a time management strategy developed by Francesco Cirillo in the late 1980s. The idea is to tackle a piece of work you need to get done in 25-minute intervals, followed by a short break.  

Why does it work? It fires up our reward circuits. If we promise ourselves a reward (or break) at the end of completing a section of work, we are extrinsically motivated to complete the task. This approach can help with getting started, particularly with tasks you are not intrinsically motivated to do.

The brain is plastic, meaning that at any point in life, we can teach it new things or learn healthier habits. Focus is a skill that we all can develop, and meditation is a fantastic way to practice it. 

Meditation involves training the mind to focus on the breath, and this focus can translate to your daily life long after you stop practicing. You will also be able to catch yourself when you are thinking about how cute your dog is or what you ate for breakfast, instead of writing up the report due at the end of the day. 

Why focus is the key to productivity in the attention economy 

Across the globe, social distancing measures are now in place to limit the spread of COVID-19. With these changes comes a substantial increase in the number of people working remotely. Leaders are now re-thinking their approach to management to maintain business as usual and minimize disruption.

To offer leadership teams support, we have explored the research on leading remote workers, and offer some tips to keep teams on board and engaged. 

Before the outbreak of COVID-19, one study found that 70% of workers globally were working remotely at least once per week. 

Leadership in a remote work setting was also a concern for many organizations. In the Deloitte Human Global Capital Trends 2019 report, “the ability to manage on a remote basis” was believed by 50 percent of respondents to be a unique requirement for 21st-century leaders. 

In an article for the MIT Sloan Management Review, Whitney Johnson explains that managers of remote teams need to be aware of the challenges involved. She summarises the potential pitfalls into the following categories:  

When members of your team work in different countries, communication can become complicated. Employees share information at a slower rate, and managers need to be aware of how this affects productivity. 

Text-based communications also limit the meaning we can derive from a conversation. According to research, 93 percent of communication occurs nonverbally through body language and tone of voice. We only receive seven percent of understanding through words. Managers need to be aware of the moments where a phone or video call would be more appropriate. 

There are many tools to support project management, but it can still be difficult for managers to know who is doing what. When workers are in the office, managers can wander through the room and check-in with employees, which isn’t possible remotely. 

In this case, leaders need to encourage employees to reach out to them more often and to highlight their achievements. 

When building a remote team, it can be tempting to seek out employees who are experienced and can deliver with little guidance or instruction. This approach has its benefits when employees are working remotely, but leaders do miss out on the energy and creativity of less experienced, but perhaps more enthusiastic employees. 

It is essential to keep a balance here and to accept that you may be in contact with new hires who work remotely more often than seasoned professionals. You will also need to develop a robust training system. 

When it comes to technology, managers must understand that not all employees have access to a high-speed internet connection or the latest technology. Even those who do might have technical difficulties. Be patient and understanding in these circumstances, and support your team members as best you can. 

Reflecting on this information, the following tips will help you to get your remote team operating successfully:

Working with others face-to-face has many benefits. We can collaborate more efficiently, connect with others, and their intentions become more transparent.

Instant messaging is undoubtedly useful, but it is crucial to be aware that much of what is said is lost when we communicate in this way. If there is conflict or tension, misunderstandings can happen quickly.

When communicating with your team, be aware that sometimes a call would be better to avoid misinterpretation. 

While it is relatively easy with modern technology to connect with a team member or a small group of people on a conference call, it can be harder to get the whole team together. Team members might be used to after-work drinks on a Friday night, or regular dinners with colleagues.

In this case, it might be worth putting it to a vote and seeing whether your staff would like to do an end of week call. Using video call software, everyone can dial in when they are ready. Employees who feel comfortable could take it in turns to lead the call. This strategy works well to connect the remote members of the team at Go1! 

Before employees can work efficiently in a remote setting, organization leaders need to develop the appropriate culture. This process includes building trust between team members at all levels.

Doing so can be challenging when you don’t see your employees on a day-to-day basis, but the work they deliver will give you an idea of how well they are performing. 

Focus on monitoring which team member is delivering what, and only chase up if they fail to meet their targets. 

Linked to building a culture of trust is encouraging your team members to become more autonomous. As a manager of a remote team, it can be hard to keep track of the different projects happening. The more employees can lead themselves and keep you informed, the better.

On a systemic level, independent thought can be challenging to manage, particularly in a large organization. Nevertheless, autonomous work is a necessary part of progress, and organizations need to embrace it to keep up with the pace of change. 

Autonomy also gives employees the headspace and confidence they need to make creative contributions - an essential skill in today’s work landscape. 

5. Ask your team for regular feedback on their experience

Although there is a growing bank of research on remote work, managing a team offsite is a relatively new concept. COVID-19 has also forced many unprepared organizations into remote settings. 

If your team is new to remote work, it is crucial to check in with them regularly at the beginning. Ask them about team cohesion, and whether they know what projects they are assigned to. If there are problems with communication, project management, or IT support, they will let you know, and you can make adjustments accordingly. 

Take a look at our Go1 Leading Remote Workers pathway, a curated pathway of courses to equip yourself to work comfortably from home, while maintaining productivity and supporting your team successfully.	