Bob, in only two weeks, lost two weeks

Prior to the coronavirus pandemic, workplace productivity was a major issue.

Companies had already been bemoaning the decreasing employee engagement rate for two decades. Workplace inefficiencies were eating people’s time, team burnout had reached an all time high, and the financial impact on companies was in the hundreds of billions of dollars.

Careerbuilder’s study even showed that fifty percent of surveyed employees were less productive when their office was too cold. Udemy’s research also reported that seventy percent of workers said they felt distracted at work, averaging more than fifty disruptions on a daily basis.

Throw into the mix our cultural addiction to technology, and you’ve got one hell of productivity problem. Staying focused had officially become an exercise in futility.

Then the pandemic happened. And not only did it devastate the economy, it also transformed the face of modern business forever. Hundreds of millions of professionals were forced to work remotely. That is, if they were among the fortune ones to still have gainful employment.

But what’s interesting is, company leaders started wondering to themselves:

Well, maybe now without the hundred minutes of average daily commute time and limited office distractions, productivity and engagement will skyrocket. Maybe all those cumbersome management processes and procedures our team used to do out of rote will be less essential than once imagined. This is going to be great for business! Our team will finally have the time and space to focus on the work that matters.

Indeed, it sounds idyllic in theory. But as the working world saw during the pandemic, we realized there were just as many challenges at home as there were in the office.

Sure, coworkers no longer stopped by your desk with pointless chatter. But now your naked four year old doesn’t understand that mommy is at work and on a conference call.

Sure, many meetings that drained your schedule and energy were no longer needed. But now your lack of in person human contact was making you lonely and stir crazy.

Damned if you do, damned if you don’t.

I was talking to my philosophy professor friend about this recently. He had a fascinating theory that the workers who were already productive before the pandemic wouldn’t have a problem during quarantine. And conversely, those with a history of complaining about not getting their work done would soon find a new reason to justify the same problem.

Coronavirus is essentially calling bullshit on the world, he proclaimed.

Because that’s how crisis works. It rewards you for the good choices you’ve made, and punishes you for the bad ones.

How did your approach to work change during the pandemic? Did it completely throw you off course, or were you able to use your resilience to build new routines and keep yourself productive and sane?

Understandably, this pandemic was (and is) a devastation the likes of which none of us had ever seen. It’s important not to be tone deaf to the struggles of hundreds of millions.

At the same time, this period was a fascinating barometer of personal choices. Coronavirus was a reminder that there will always be distractions, obstacles and external forces for doing the work that matters.

Whether we’re working in an office with our team, in a spare bedroom with our dog, or walking the streets trying to figure out how to reinvent ourselves, resistance comes for us all.

But the sooner we accept that success is an inside job, the faster we can bounce back. As it says in my favorite pandemic meme:

“Bob, in only two weeks, lost two weeks. Guess not enough time wasn’t the problem.”

Are you finding a new reason to justify the same problem?