|
Peter Cochrane's Hard Drive 2000 True productivity found at home TODAY I got up early, had breakfast with my kids, lunch with my wife, and dinner with the whole family. It was an exceptional day: I stayed at home, I didn't go anywhere, and I didn't do anything, and completed more work in 10 hours than I would normally expect to do in a week. Between breaks I worked solid with a dedicated concentration impossible to sustain in the face of the continual stream of interruptions at my office. Me, a pot of coffee, PC, internet, phone, and solitude are a formidable business partnership. Two phone calls, one conference call, 63 emails, a slide set, seven spreadsheets, and 21 documents constitute my output, and oh yes, I shredded two dozen or so paper documents, despatched even more to the bin, and scanned in four. Although I enjoy the company of people, I just have to get away now and again to shovel life's guano out of the way and get to the good stuff. After a few sessions of pheromonal communications in the office and on the road I just have to find a place to hide, think, formulate, plan and communicate. And while my kids use pop music to achieve the same objective, solitude and concentration, I come from a generation that increasingly needs quiet and isolation. Where is this all going? You would think from the media that information technology is in the business of increasingly isolating people as they focus solely on the screen at the workspace. It has always seemed to me that the reverse is true, and moreover, I can only see this becoming an accelerating trend for the foreseeable future. I now spend more time and do more work with people than ever before, as my creativity, network of relationships, and output, are increasingly amplified by ever-advancing technology. Just look at the boom in travel - more technology and telecommunication have naturally resulted in more physical interaction and travel. Britain and America have now seen the longest periods of economic growth in recorded history, and it is no accident - it is all down to the revolution of computers and resulting globalisation. One of my primary measures of the British economy is the state of the car park at my local railway station. Just 20 years ago there was always plenty of parking space, but for the past decade it has become increasingly difficult to find a space after 7.30am, to the point where the overflow car park is now full by 10. Meanwhile, on the trains there is often a shortage of seats and it is evident that people are starting their first meetings during the hour-long trip. Mobile phones, PDAs and laptops are in evidence as people get the day off to a flying start. I suppose someone somewhere is staying at home to work, after all we can't all be travelling at the same time. But it is evident that the numbers travelling are greater than ever before: business is definitely booming. I suspect that many of us are now rapidly approaching a peak of productivity that cannot be exceeded without the introduction of more technologies that go well beyond faster processing, more bandwidth and storage. Video conferencing that really works would be one advance, but I suspect that advanced artificial intelligence systems to organise and filter our lives and information would be an even greater benefit. The real danger is probably too much human interaction sorting out the trivia of life rather than being really productive. Peter Cochrane holds the Collier Chair for the Public Understanding of Science & Technology at the University of Bristol. His home page is: |
Telegraph Group Limited endeavours to ensure that the information is correct but does not accept any liability for error or omission.
Users are permitted to copy some material for their personal use, but may not republish any substantial part of the data either on another website or as part of any commercial service without the prior written permission of Telegraph Group Limited.