3 Reasons You Can't Focus And How You Might Overcome Them As a Developer

I consider myself a well-organized person.

With good communication, proactive planning, and reflection, I can generally get things done when looking at the macro level.

But it is still often hard for me to focus on the task at hand.

When sitting at the computer and trying to work on a feature, I would think about another bug I need to fix or lunch I need to order.

In my mind, no matter how important the issue at hand was, there were many more things that needed immediate attention. I couldn’t focus.

In an effort to overcome my lack of focus, I tried different approaches and attempted to break down the reasons that were holding me back.

Here are the top 3 reasons I identified over the past few years:

1. Confusion & Lack of Clarity
2. Relying on Willpower Only
3. Not utilizing Tools and Systems

1. Confusion & Lack of Clarity

One of my favorite quotes is by Jeff Hawkins

“Complexity is not a cause of confusion. It is a result of it.”

When I am confused and things are not clear to me, everything seems complex.

• Bugs
• Features
• My career path

As a result, it's hard to concentrate on a task or goal.

The main thing is to recognize the situation and take immediate steps to gain clarity:

• Talk to the product manager to better understand the requirements
• Talk to a colleague to better understand the code area I am working on
• Read the logs carefully to understand better how the bug is happening

And out of different options, the next tasks are clear:

1. Do the one thing to get more clarity
2. Decide on the next thing

Do them.

Now you are Back to Focus.

2. Relying on Willpower Only

For a long time, I thought that I needed to force myself to focus and tried to count the hours of "focused work" that I was doing.

Recently I came to believe (thanks to headspace) that focusing on a subject is just a matter of realizing when I am not focused anymore and just going back.

• Caught myself browsing? Just close the tab and go back to what I was doing → Back to Focus
• Started thinking about errands? Write it down and go back to what I was doing → Back to Focus  
• Feeling off lately with no direction lately? Reread my vision and goals → Back to Focus

3. Not Using Tools and Systems

Not being focused on something just means that I am focused (aka thinking or doing) on something else. Those other things are mainly the result of interruptions

• by myself (thinking about something else)
• from outside (phone call, notification, etc)

It is pretty easy to handle outside interruptions. The obvious things that you might find on the internet are:

• Using Focus/Do not disturb mode on computer/phone
• Noise-canceling headphones
• Focus stimulating music
• Putting on headphones in the office

Things that were not so obvious but work really well for me are the ideas to handle interruptions caused by myself.

1. One Monitor Only
2. Reminders for Quick Tasks
3. Reminders for the Long Game

One Monitor Only

I am a geek. When first setting up my workstation I ordered a two-monitor arm for my desk and a fancy laptop stand.

Experimenting with different setups my current setup is:

1. Laptop closed
2. One big monitor

Having too much space across multiple monitors turned out to be a distraction to me. Now, I only have one thing I can see at a time.

This one thing is the one I am working on:

• Writing code: Editor
• Browsing: Browser
• Communicating: Slack

But it's the only thing at any given moment.

Reminders for Quick Tasks

I am in love with Siri. Whenever I think of something I need to remember, I ask Siri to remind me:

• To order lunch in 2 lunch
• Tomorrow at 6:30 am to make sure we packed a white shirt for my son (the teacher asked to come prepared for some celebration tomorrow)
• To add mustard to the shopping list at 9 pm (when I will be shopping)

This is a quick way for me to get things out of my head and make sure they will pop up at the right moment.

Now I can back to what I wanted to focus on.

Reminders for The Long Game

Another great way to use reminders for check-ins with myself and reflecting.

You can use a spreadsheet with tabs for different questions you want to track your answers to:

• Monthly/Quarterly career review
• Expense tracking
• etc

When the reminder pops up, it has the direct link to the right tab

→ Boom, you can just add your answers and you're done!

That's it for today.

See you again next week.

Whenever you're ready, I'd like to help you Level Up personally:

1. Join my LinkedIn community (1468 followers) here
2. Schedule a free one-on-one with me here
3. Ask me anything via email here

Cheers,

Ilya