工作和生活中，難以決定優(yōu)先事項(xiàng)？

Overload is exacerbatedby the blurred division between work and home life. Julie Morgenstern, productivity expert and author of Never Check E-mail in the Morning, says her clients find they have barely tackled their to-do list by the end of the working day, and end up doing them at home facilitated by technology.

工作和家庭生活之間的界線模糊，加劇了超負(fù)荷現(xiàn)象。生產(chǎn)率專家、《永遠(yuǎn)別在早上查郵件》(Never Check E-mail in the Morning)一書(shū)的作者朱麗•摩根斯坦(Julie Morgenstern)說(shuō)，她的客戶發(fā)現(xiàn)，他們?cè)诠ぷ魅战Y(jié)束時(shí)根本做不完待辦事項(xiàng)，結(jié)果要在科技的協(xié)助下，在家里完成這些事項(xiàng)。

“They are so tired that their mornings are collapsed.” They might sneak in a few domestic tasks while in the office to make up for it, she adds.

“他們太累了，以至于早上什么都做不了。”她補(bǔ)充說(shuō)，他們可能會(huì)在辦公室偷偷做幾件私事，以此作為彌補(bǔ)。

This “blurriness” between home and work life is “very depleting”, says Ms Morgenstern, putting people in a perpetual state of catch-up and reaction mode.

摩根斯坦說(shuō)，家庭和工作之間的這種“界線模糊……非常耗人”，讓人們永久處于追趕和反應(yīng)狀態(tài)。

Flat structures and organisations’ lack of attention to employees’ ability to manage their workload can add to the overload. A report by McKinsey said that “the myth of infinite time is most painfully experienced through the proliferation of big strategic initiatives and special projects . . . The result is initiative overload: projects get heaped on top of day jobs”.

扁平結(jié)構(gòu)，以及組織對(duì)員工管理工作量的能力缺乏關(guān)注，可能會(huì)加劇超負(fù)荷現(xiàn)象。麥肯錫(McKinsey)的一份報(bào)告稱，“大型戰(zhàn)略舉措和特別項(xiàng)目的激增，讓人以最痛苦的方式體驗(yàn)到時(shí)間無(wú)窮盡的神話……結(jié)果是舉措超負(fù)荷：項(xiàng)目被壓到日常工作之上”。

In addition, many people are confused about their roles, says David Allen, author of Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity. When there is ambiguity about roles or strategy, it is easy to get lost in the weeds of distraction. He describes it as the “stress of opportunity”, pointing out that if you “caught on fire you would not have any problems deciding on your priorities”.

此外，《搞定：無(wú)壓力工作的藝術(shù)》(Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity)的作者戴維•艾倫(David Allen)說(shuō)，很多人對(duì)自己的角色感到困惑。當(dāng)人們對(duì)于角色或戰(zhàn)略意識(shí)模糊時(shí)，很容易迷失在分心的雜草中。他將其描述為“機(jī)會(huì)的壓力”，指出，如果你“身上著火了，你不會(huì)對(duì)決定自己的優(yōu)先事項(xiàng)猶豫不決”。

People prefer to do things rather than think about why they are doing them, says Chris Bailey, author of Hyperfocus: How to Work Less to Achieve More. “Busyness makes us feel important.” In fact, he says, regardless of your position in the hierarchy or job, very few tasks are “important”.

《極度專注：如何工作更少而成就更高》(Hyperfocus: How to Work Less to Achieve More)的作者克里斯•貝利(Chris Bailey)說(shuō)，人們更喜歡做事，而不是思考為什么要做它。“忙碌讓我們感覺(jué)重要。”事實(shí)上，他說(shuō)，無(wú)論你在組織等級(jí)或工作中的位置如何，沒(méi)幾件任務(wù)是“重要的”。

Like most other American companies with a rigid hierarchy, workers and managers had strictly defined duties.像大多數(shù)其他等級(jí)制度森嚴(yán)的美國(guó)公司一樣，工人和管理人員都有嚴(yán)格界定的職責(zé)。

Research into emergency doctors’ workload found that “under conditions of increased workload individuals may choose to complete easier tasks in order to manage their load”. The researchers called this task completion bias. In the short-term (one hospital shift), doctors seemed to be more productive, by seeing more patients. Yet they were more likely to put off harder tasks. Doctors with a less demanding workload were likely to take on more complicated cases.

針對(duì)急診醫(yī)生工作量的研究發(fā)現(xiàn)，“在工作量增加的情況下，個(gè)人會(huì)選擇完成比較輕松的任務(wù)，以管理自己的工作量”。研究者將此定義為任務(wù)完成偏見(jiàn)。在短期內(nèi)(一個(gè)醫(yī)院班次)，看更多病人讓醫(yī)生看起來(lái)更具成效。然而他們更有可能推遲比較艱巨的工作。工作量不那么嚴(yán)苛的醫(yī)生，更有可能接手比較復(fù)雜的病例。

Bradley Staats, associate professor of operations at the Kenan-Flagler Business School, University of North Carolina, says it is important to identify patterns in the way employees organise their work. “There may be a time when it really is better to take on the easier task, as we do need the break, and that will give us the boost we need to then do the harder work.”

北卡羅來(lái)納大學(xué)(University of North Carolina)凱南-弗拉格勒商學(xué)院(Kenan-Flagler Business School)的運(yùn)營(yíng)副教授布拉德利•斯塔茨(Bradley Staats)表示，重要的是要找到員工組織各自工作的規(guī)律。“可能在某個(gè)時(shí)候，先做較輕松的任務(wù)確實(shí)更好，因?yàn)槲覀兇_實(shí)需要休息，這將給我們必要的提振，讓我們之后投入更艱巨的工作。”

In another study he found that radiologists reorder their queue of tasks in unproductive ways. “The broader point here is that we often make suboptimal choices in how we do our work without realising it. As well as looking at the complexity and volume of tasks, systems [including IT tools] may be useful in making recommendations.”

在另一項(xiàng)研究中，他發(fā)現(xiàn)放射科醫(yī)師以不利于生產(chǎn)率的方式重新安排自己的任務(wù)順序。“廣義地說(shuō)，我們經(jīng)常在無(wú)意識(shí)的情況下，對(duì)自己如何完成工作做出次優(yōu)的選擇。除了看一看任務(wù)的復(fù)雜性和數(shù)量外，系統(tǒng)(包括IT工具)可能提供有用的建議。”