Digital detox

Priority to the elephants!

15 June 2018

Vitamine R

To get there, together! That is where Realdolmen stands for. However, good cooperation is only sustainable if our balance of life is good and we have the energy and resilience to make each other better. To keep this balance healthy, it is important to deal with digital stimuli in a conscious way. 

In this context, Muriel Velu from Better Minds at Work came to inspire us about Digital Detox.

life balance

Our employees are our greatest asset so we like to respond to that. From the Employee Centricity framework, we organize co-creative workshops with our people during which we focus on themes that are close to everyone's hearts, such as the theme "life balance". Digital stimuli and their effects on our brain and behavior seemed, during the workshops, important points we want to pay attention to. We invited Muriel to explain what the "always on" mode does to our brain, why this drastically affects our performance and increases our stress experience.

Digital drugs

Muriel immediately impressed us with the facts: our smartphones... we cannot live without it. We have become addicted, or even totally addicted to it. We constantly and unconsciously check our mailbox, our social media channels and other messages. Every free moment is filled with digital stimuli. Our dopamine level rises with every new notification and every new "like" but, and that is where it becomes dangerous, drops again very quickly. What remains is a non-stop craving for more information and even more stimuli.

no wifi

Concentration capacity

We try to create an environment within our company offering room for peace and focus thus allowing us to fully develop ourselves. You can also help yourself with that in the morning, when your brain capacity is at its highest level, by focusing on your big "elephants" instead of on the "rabbits" that pass by. Rabbits are things like e-mails and small minor tasks that - everything taken together - take some time. Elephants are larger tasks that often require some thinking and full concentration.

Muriel adviced us to start every working day with an elephant task that needs at least half an hour to an hour full concentration. During this period you close your mailbox, ask your colleagues not to disturb you and put your mobile phone out of your reach. A challenge as it turns out, as we lift our mobile phone on average 150 times a day. Because of the endless flow of information that we get in this way, we create a brain overload. We start multitasking (quickly answering that text message during a meeting or liking that photo while making a quotation) and our productivity immediately drops by 40%.

Besides, did you already know that, when you are interrupted, it takes about 25 minutes before you are back in your full focus? Attention turns out to be the new gold, the new scarce good in the business world. So give these elephants not only priority, but also your full focus.

Working at Inetum-Realdolmen

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