3 Types of Interruptions & How To Deal With Them

Interruptions are a fact of life. How we deal with them determines how well we get our things done. Today we will look at the three types of interruptions and how to deal with them.

I get interrupted a lot, both at work and home. Interruptions are deadly for programmer productivity, though. Once I lose my train of thought in the program, it can take fifteen minutes to trace back through my already-written code to get back to where I was. I had to develop methods that would allow me to get work done while still responding to the communications of those around me.

Types of Interruptions

Interruptions can come from any direction. Depending on the type, you have different methods for deflecting them. I have broken the interruptions down into three different categories, so we can talk about types of solutions. The three types are:

• In person
• In person via device (immediate)
• Internal

In addition, there are two types of solutions: *Preemptive*, in which you do something to try to keep the interruption from happening, and *reactive*, which is what to do when the interruption is occurring.

Dealing With The Interruptions

The methods for dealing with interruptions will depend on their source. While it is perfectly acceptable to deflect an incoming call to voice mail, how would you do that with a person at your elbow? We’ll look at the three types of interruptions and how to keep them from derailing you.

In Person

In-person interruptions come from…wait for it…other people. This is different from the next type (in person via device) because the other person is in your space at the moment the interruption occurs. There is no way to pretend you’re not there.

Preemptive strategies: To minimize person-to-person interruptions, you can block out time on your calendar. This might deter those who actually look at your calendar, but will not work on the person who wanders around. If you are lucky enough to have a door, close it. If you have a cube where your chair back is facing the opening, put a sign on the back of your chair that says, “Please send me an email…deep into tricky work.” (or something along those lines). Or the my tried-and-true favorite – pull out the over-the-ear headphones and put them on. You don’t even have to plug them in – when the person doesn’t get a response after speaking, they will go away.

Reactive strategies: If all preemptive strategies fail, you can do the following: make a point of writing down where you were (and make sure the other person sees you doing so); then give the person your full attention. If it is not something you can handle right then, ask them to send you an email so that you can get to it later.

In Person Via Device

This one is easier to ignore because there isn’t a physical body demanding your attention. Phones, texts, email and instant messages all fall into this category.

Preemptive strategies: Turn off all notifications, and redirect where possible. An instant messenger status could read: “Busy on the Sniffler Contract. Please send email.” Your voice mail greeting could indicate that you are busy, but you will get back to them; if they need a faster response, send an email. (See a pattern yet?) For texts, send them to email wherever possible.

Reactive strategies: if you do end up reacting to one of this type of interruption, you can keep it brief. Redirect them to email whenever possible. If you find yourself in email when you should be doing other work (and we’ll talk more about default activities in a later article), close the program.

Internal

Internal interruptions are often the hardest to deal with because they are not the result of anything other than what is going on in our own minds. We can take a random thought our minds feed us and go down a rabbit trail, completely derailing what we were working on.

Internal interruptions might take the form of, “Oh, I need to remember…” or “I wonder if…”
Preemptive strategies: one of the best strategies to minimize internal interruptions is to clear your mind as much as possible before starting what you need to concentrate on. This can involve doing a mini-brain dump on a piece of paper, or clearing your work surface of distractions

Reactive strategies: As a friend of mine once said, “You’re not responsible for the first thought. If you keep thinking it, it’s your responsibility.” So get those thoughts out of your head. Have a piece of paper that you can write these things down on, then get back to work.

Goal: Get Them All To One Place

In the end, the best way to handle interruptions is to get them to a place where you can deal with them all at once. Email is a great tool for that, because it holds the email until we are ready to view it. We can then send it to a calendar, or task list, or notes from there.

There is a caveat to sending things to email, though: if you don’t process it in a timely fashion, your interruptors will lose trust in you, and start to bug you for everything. So build trust by processing your email regularly.

Over To You

Do you have a way of dealing with interruptions that isn’t listed above? Share in the comment section below.

Image by shinealight. Licensed under Creative Commons. Text added.

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