Introduction
Is there anything more complicated than trying to work with focus? Messages and meetings compete for our attention. Alerts and notifications take us away from the moment. And just when we think we can finally focus, forgetting a fact or losing a document is enough to break the spell of productive flow.
All this lost time as we search through folders, emails, and browser tabs for the answers we need to perform our jobs.
Such distractions cost us hundreds of hours annually. And it’s not just wasted time – it’s wasted potential as well. When we spend our limited time on repetitive and mundane tasks – working around work – that time could be spent achieving more meaningful, significant, and impactful goals.
But it doesn’t have to be that way. New research suggests that a combination of AI-powered tools, flexible work arrangements, and asynchronous communication strategies can help us achieve a more enlightened way of working – where technology enhances the power of our minds rather than wasting it.
The Cost of Lost Focus
We first collaborated with “Impact Economist” in 2020 to study the cost of lost focus in the United States. In our 2023 study, “Impact Economist” included knowledge workers globally – and found that regardless of where people work, there is a significant cost of lost focus worldwide.
In the United States, where salaries are higher, $468 billion is lost annually due to distractions. Achieving focus will not only benefit knowledge workers and their companies but will also contribute to the overall economic growth of their country. Increasing productivity could boost the economic output of knowledge workers in the ten studied countries by an average of 40% – with a potential growth estimated at nearly $1.4 trillion in the U.S. economy alone.
Finding Answers and Focus Using AI
Whether it’s about searching for files with obscure names, answering the same questions repeatedly, or summarizing yet another long meeting, one may sometimes feel that working around work leaves little time for our actual work.
“Impact Economist” found that knowledge workers are increasingly turning to automation tools – which can include AI – for help. Among those who participated in the study and reported using such tools, 79% said they are more productive, while nearly 75% of participants said the quality of their work and the time they spend on repetitive tasks had improved. Approximately 70% said they are more organized.
The study also found that 42% of participants said they typically do not spend more than an hour on productive work without interruption.
We also wanted to understand what people expect from AI in the future. After all, the more our tools can remove friction from our daily tasks, the more time we will have to spend on innovative, collaborative, and creative work. Unsurprisingly, automating repetitive tasks was at the forefront, favored by over 40% of participants. About 30% expressed a desire for tools that help them find, organize, and summarize information, while over 20% wanted tools that could answer questions – exactly the capabilities built into Dropbox Dash and Dropbox AI.
Meetings can particularly benefit from AI. According to recent internal findings gathered from deep interviews and surveys with Dropbox employees, led by the People Analytics team and external researchers, Dropbox employees also told us that there are hidden costs of meetings not accounted for in the calendar. There’s the time it takes to prepare, and the time spent thinking after the meeting. A series of back-to-back meetings can exacerbate the context-switching challenge. It’s not hard to imagine AI tools bearing some of this cognitive load – from transcribing and summarizing the meeting itself to gathering and organizing preparatory materials – leaving more time for focus and actual work.
In
is the prevailing opinion among participants in the study conducted by “Economics Impact” that artificial intelligence and automation will help knowledge workers perform their jobs better, smarter, and more efficiently — not put their jobs at risk. Among those who said they rely on AI and automation, 86% reported that such tools contributed to improving or had no effect on their job security feelings. This remained largely constant across generations, from Gen Z to baby boomers.
Not just the workplace, but the how as well
For some people, finding focus depends on when they work — for example, working whenever they feel most productive throughout the day, rather than working for eight continuous hours. According to “Economics Impact,” two-thirds of knowledge workers say they work flexible hours at home, and those who do are more likely to report improvements in focus time, work quality, and well-being.
For others, finding focus is influenced by the workspace. Among the participants in the study conducted by “Economics Impact,” remote knowledge workers find that their productivity and well-being are better when working from home, while office workers said the same about working in the office. This may suggest that knowledge workers are self-selecting the environment in which they feel most productive.
However, finding focus is not just about when or where you work but also how you work. For example, at Dropbox, we have adopted a set of intentional practices that are shared company-wide that help people use their time in the best way — regardless of when or where they choose to work. “Asynchronous communication by default” means attempting to solve problems using tools like Dropbox Dash or Dropbox Capture before scheduling an ad hoc meeting. Any remaining meetings are restricted to core collaboration hours — four-hour blocks each day for real-time communication and teamwork.
By engaging in these intentional behavioral shifts together, Dropbox employees can spend half their day on independent and focused work. In our recent employee survey, 76% of Dropbox employees reported having enough time to focus in the primary virtual workspace — but among knowledge workers in general, we know this is still an exception rather than the rule. 42% of participants in the study conducted by “Economics Impact” said they typically do not spend more than one hour on productive work without interruption.
Containing the flow of messages and notifications
Reducing the cognitive burden of working around work is key to reaching our full potential. However, from meetings to messages, it can seem like our attention is constantly being stolen from the task we are working on.
For example, chat applications and other collaboration tools have been key in enabling remote work but can also be a source of distraction and pressure. 60% of study participants said these tools make them feel pressured to respond quickly to incoming messages, and 63% feel they must be available at all times.
“Economics Impact” also found that unproductive meetings cost knowledge workers 79 hours annually, while another 157 hours are lost due to unproductive messages from workplace chat applications — the biggest cause of lost focus overall.
Dealing with unproductive work-related chat messages alone could lead to significant economic gains: $31,000 per knowledge worker in the U.S. ($360 billion nationwide, or 11% of annual economic output). If we could return some of this time to people, imagine what they could achieve.
And this
Without discussing the time it takes to recover from distractions like emails or meetings – 127 hours annually for the average American knowledge worker, nearly ten hours more than a previous study by “Economist Impact”. Things aren’t better elsewhere in the world either. The average Korean spent 112 hours of their year trying to regain focus after interruptions, while Australia and the UK topped the list with 131 hours.
We can’t eliminate all distractions, but we can adopt new tools to bring order to chaos. This could mean everything from finding answers using Dropbox Dash instead of firing off a Slack message or email, to using automated summaries and tips to make meetings more manageable. Whatever form these tools take for knowledge workers in practice, AI tools are likely to be key.
Our belief is that a enlightened way of working is also a non-distracted way of working. The easier it is for knowledge workers to find, share, and organize the information they need, the more likely any interruptions that remain will actually be worth their time. The easier it is to find focus, the more time can be spent on the most important work.
To read the full report, visit Economist Impact.
Disclaimer: The views expressed in this article are those of the authors. They represent an independent analysis of survey data produced by Economist Impact and do not reflect the views of Economist Impact.
Source: https://blog.dropbox.com/topics/work-culture/economist-impact-cost-of-lost-focus-research-study-2023
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