What is deep work?
Deep work is sustained, undistracted concentration on a cognitively demanding task. The term is Cal Newport's, and his distinction is the useful part: deep work creates new value and is hard to replicate, while shallow work (email, scheduling, admin) is necessary but could be done by almost anyone, often while distracted.
What counts and what does not
Writing, debugging, designing, analysing and studying are deep work. Clearing an inbox is not, however long it takes. The test is whether the task would suffer if you were interrupted every few minutes. If it would not, it is shallow.
Why interruptions cost more than they look
Attention does not resume instantly. After an interruption, part of your focus stays on the previous task, so the cost of a "quick question" is not the ninety seconds it took but the several minutes of degraded work that follow. A morning broken into six fragments can produce less than a single uninterrupted hour.
How to get some
- Book it. Deep work does not appear in gaps between meetings. It has to occupy a slot other things are scheduled around.
- Ninety minutes is a good unit. Long enough to get properly into a problem, short enough to hold.
- Remove the interrupt sources, not just the intention to ignore them. Notifications off, phone elsewhere, chat closed.
- Decide the task before you start. Deciding what to work on is itself a distraction if you do it at the desk.
Most people cannot sustain more than three or four hours of genuine deep work a day. That is normal, and planning for six is how you end up with none.
