If your wife is like mine, every time my iPhone buzzes with a new email, she mumbles about my work-life balance (or rather lack of same). Technology has done a great job of making it possible for people to work and collaborate from almost anywhere—and unfortunately for my wife, we do.

According to the Huffington Post, if you live in Brazil a new law counts checking your smartphone for email after hours as work that qualifies for overtime pay. “Brazilian workers who find themselves answering work emails on their smartphones after the end of their shifts can qualify for overtime under a new law,” reports the HuffPost. “The new legislation was approved by President Dilma Rousseff last month [November].”

It would probably make my wife feel a lot better about the emails and text messages I answer and create during the time we sit together at a restaurant, watching a movie or otherwise spend time together if she knew I was going to receive extra compensation for it. In fairness, I have to accept most of the blame. I’ve become so accustomed to being tuned in to the technology that I can’t help myself—even if it’s something that can wait until tomorrow I’ll answer the email or respond to the text.

Last year I spent some time oversees—about a week with my colleagues in the UK in the spring and another week later that summer in Tokyo, and had my eyes opened. Although I thought I understood the ramifications of working in different time zones, I found myself thinking about what time it was in the U.S. and when the best time to send or answer an email might be. I came to appreciate that the email I send to the U.K. at 4:00 pm MST arrives there about 11:00 pm, making it an extra effort for them to respond, which they always do. In order to communicate with us in real time, they pretty much have to be “on” late into the night—long after their workday has come to an end. What’s more, it’s 2:00 pm or so in the afternoon before any of us are even awake should they need to reach out to us. And, while in Japan I made a number of 2:00 am local time phone calls to attend a meeting or otherwise communicate with my co-workers at home.

Maybe being connected all the time isn’t all it’s cracked up to be?

In Cisco’s second annual Connected to the World Technology Report, they suggest that 40 percent of college students and 45 percent of young professionals would accept lower-paying jobs if their use of social media wasn’t restricted, could choose the devices they wanted to work with and could have more flexibility in whether or not they worked at the office or someplace else. This almost certainly will continue to blur the lines between work and personal life as the technology we use makes us available almost 24/7.

My company provides me with an iPhone that I’m allowed to use for personal purposes, just like everyone else in our organization. Of course, that gives them access after hours—but there are very few employees who are ever required to take an after-hours phone call or answer an email. For most of the company, it’s simply a nice perk.

However, there are times when it’s easier for me to answer an email in the evening or take a phone call on Saturday afternoon than it is to put things off until Monday. In fact, my colleagues in London suggest that checking in before the end of the day means they won’t have to wait until the following afternoon to answer questions or otherwise contribute to a conversation. Obviously I’m not alone in suggesting that my professional life and my personal life are less compartmentalized than they were a few years ago—it’s just my life now.

Maintaining a healthy work/life balance is challenging in today’s world. I have friends who turn off their smartphones for a couple of hours while they spend time with their spouses and children before the put the kids to bed. Afterwards, they re-connect to the grid, answer a few emails and check in before their heads hit the pillow. One of my friends suggested that he and his wife designate specific times to be offline so they can spend uninterrupted time together. I tend to occasionally take a day off to decompress, ride the motorcycle or otherwise recharge the batteries.

Helping employees find the right work/life balance is important to a healthy, happy and productive workforce. For most of us, what happens at the office is not a matter of life and death. Unplugging from the network from time to time isn’t going to hurt the bottom line—it might actually help.

Abraham Lincoln once said, “Give me six hours to chop down a tree and I will spend the first four sharpening the axe.”

How much time do you take off the grid to makes sure your axe is sharp? And, how much time do you give the team to sharpen their axe?

Ouch.

Last spring at the Gartner PPM Summit in San Diego, keynote speaker Tom Peters suggested, “All failures are your fault.”

Hard as it was to hear, I’ve given this a lot of thought over the last several months, and have to agree. In the context of speaking to project leaders (the audience at that event), Peters hits the nail on the head. It’s seldom the technology that fails—failure is usually people failure. In fact, I think we need to accept the fact that success is all about people too. What’s more, I don’t think this applies exclusively to project teams.

Earlier this year I read Doris Kearns Goodwin’s book, Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln. Abraham Lincoln has long been a hero of mine; and this book had been on my reading list for several years. After reading, I’ve become even a bigger fan of the man from Illinois.

Lincoln successfully cobbled together a team of divergent (even opposing) opinions to form a cabinet composed of the men he defeated in the Republican primary, as well as a few Democrats, that ultimately helped him lead the country through one of the most difficult times in American history. Lincoln understood that in order to provide legitimate solutions to the problems facing the country at that time, he wanted to work with the best and brightest minds of the day—even if they disagreed with him. Maybe even because the disagreed with him.

Lincoln took complete responsibility for every decision he made. There were numerous occasions when cabinet members were blamed for his decisions, making it potentially easy for them to absorb the political fall-out. Mr. Lincoln would never allow it. In fact, he often put himself at great political risk to ensure that none of his cabinet ever took blame for something unpopular he did or advocated (we won’t see this any time during the current election cycle). It reminds me of President Harry Truman who famously said, “The buck stops here.”

President Lincoln also said, “I do not think much of a man who is not wiser today than he was yesterday.”

Several weeks ago, I spoke with Tom Cooper who asked “What’s your EvE (Entertainment vs. Education) ratio?.” He suggested that we should be investing more in our individual careers than the companies we work with invest. (At least, that’s his advice if we want to advance our careers and contribute to success rather than failure.) I couldn’t agree more. Additionally, there are books, inexpensive seminars, podcasts and webinars that cover a tremendous diversity of training options for little or no cost. If learning stops at a college degree, or the last book you finished was during your senior year of college, you aren’t investing in yourself or your career. And, you might just be selling yourself and your ability to contribute to success short.

I’m convinced that life-long learning is a critical component of success.

I also wonder if a little introspection is in order. Regardless of our leadership role within an organization, I wonder if we should be honestly evaluating whether or not we are part of the problem—or maybe even the problem. If all failures are our fault, I’m afraid that might be the case.

I once worked with a colleague who started his career working with Hewlett-Packard. He appreciated the HP Way and the opportunities he had to personally interact with the executives. They wanted his feedback and used what was learned by walking around and visiting with individual team members listening to what they had to to say, and using that information to inform decisions. Hewlett and Packard worked hard to makes sure they weren’t responsible for failure, but rather success.

When Walt Kelly, the creator of the Pogo comic strip, first shared his lament, “The enemy is us,” in 1970, he wasn’t talking about our success or failure, but he could have been. Walt also suggested that “Traces of nobility, gentleness and courage persist in all people, do what we will to stamp out the trend…”

If we can successfully channel those tendencies, maybe the successes will be “our fault”.

It’s probably unfair to blame social media specifically, but I think it’s safe to say that the 24/7 media barrage of soundbites we face every day could be taking its toll. Twitter users need to make their point in 140 characters or less, USA Today, Fox News and others have shortened stories to be quickly digested and even media outlets like CNN rely on the pretty faces of their news anchors to keep our attention. As a result any substantive conversation lasting over five minutes is met with glazed eyes and shuffling feet. “Didn’t my iPhone just ring?”

Verizon’s “Can you hear me now?” campaign should probably be replaced with, “Are you paying attention to me now?”

I’ll be the first to admit that if we really want the ears, eyes and attention of our audience we need to make sure that our message is relevant (and interesting). This is particularly true in the workplace. How many times have you sat in a meeting where three or four of the people attending open up their laptop, tap away on their iPad or distractedly thumb through emails or text messages on their smart phones? Although the problem may sometimes be the meeting, even in the midst of important discussions, I’ve watched colleagues allow themselves to be distracted by email and other work they perceive is more important—only to find out later that it wasn’t.

I’m reminded of a Seinfeld episode where George and his boss were having a discussion walking down the hall. As the boss stepped into the restroom, George waited outside. Unfortunately for George, his boss continued the discussion inside.Upon exiting, George received an assignment to follow up on items discussed inside the restroom. In a panic, having missed the entire discussion, and unwilling to admit that he wasn’t engaged in the first place, George spent the rest of the episode trying to figure out what he was supposed to do. I’ve watched this happen to people who were “in” the meeting yet distracted by something else, unaware they even have an assignment.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m a huge fan of social media and technology. I’m convinced that we should be leveraging all the potential technology tools at our disposal to create collaborative environments where people can contribute to something worthwhile and perform at a higher level. I’m not a fan of how technology seems to dumb-down our collective ability to focus on the things that are really important.

Step Away From the iPhone

I have to admit, my wife doesn’t have much patience for the way I check my iPhone every time it chirps or buzzes, nor my need to open up my laptop during a quiet Friday night in front of her favorite movie. Sometimes, in the middle of a conversation, she’ll simply stop talking to make sure I’m paying attention. How would your colleagues react should that happen in your next meeting. How long would it take to get everyone’s attention back. My sweet wife has actually left the room before—needless to say, my lack of attention didn’t go over very well.

Over the last year I’ve attended a few meetings that could unofficially be designated as technology free. To avoid the temptation to multitask (which studies have determined to be a pipe-dream, since we can’t focus on more than one thing at a time anyway), where laptops, smartphones and iPads were to remain out of sight and untouched during the course of the discussion. These meetings were strangely liberating as we were forced to ignore every chirp and buzz. We were able to focus on the discussion at hand, we accomplished the objectives of those meetings with minimal distraction and there was no question regarding follow-up items.

Although it might feel like it, keeping the technological soundbite barrage at bay long enough for people to have intelligent conversations about the things that really matter doesn’t require the earth to stop rotating on its axis. Here are a few suggestions:

1. Don’t let the immediacy of the medium dictate the quality of the conversation. I’m not a big fan of “text-speak” abbreviations. Even in my text messages, I try to communicate in complete sentences and thoughts. I do the same on Twitter and Facebook. It takes a little more work, but not much. It also takes the guesswork out of interpreting what I’m trying to say. Particularly in the workplace, if we have to dumb-down the level of dialog to suit any particular communication medium, maybe we should choose another outlet for the conversation. Maybe even a real conversation?
2. Listen more, speak less. Abraham Lincoln said, “It is better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to open one’s mouth and remove all doubt.” How much time do you spend listening verses speaking? In every conversation are you thinking more about what you are going to say next, or are you really listening to what’s being said? I’ve known far too many people who love the sound of their own voices. Listen more, speak less.
3. Technology is not a substitute for real relationships. Technology is intended to enhance our ability to collaborate, not replace the need for personal interaction. As valuable as these tools are, if we don’t foster real and productive relationships with people it will be difficult for organizations to achieve any measurable level of success. Leadership requires making a personal connection with people. Technology can’t do that.
4. Live in the moment. At the risk of sounding a little new-age-ie, if you’re in a meeting, be in the meeting. If you’re in a conversation, be in the conversation. Don’t let distractions pull you away from what’s happening right now. The phone chirping can wait—they’ll either leave a message or call you back. The email will still be there when the meeting’s over.
5. Never meet just to meet. I have often wondered how much time I’ve wasted over the last 30 years in standing meetings that had no real purpose. Regularly scheduled meetings are important, but if you are responsible for a regularly scheduled meeting and their is no real reason to meet, cancel that instance of the meeting and wait for another day.
6. Go low-tech once in a while. I will admit that I can type notes during a meeting faster than I can write them down. However, my Moleskine allows me to stay in the meeting, focus on the presentation or discussion and still capture any notes or thoughts I’ll want to refer back to later. Plus, whoever is leading the meeting doesn’t wonder if I’m really engaged—they can’t misinterpret my tapping on the keyboard as something it isn’t. It’s obvious that I’m engaged in the discussion.

Listening, paying attention and engaging fully in every conversation or communication creates an atmosphere where everyone can effectively collaborate, people can contribute to something meaningful and organizations can leverage the strengths of everyone in the organization toward a successful outcome.

“Are you paying attention to me now?”

If you’re like most people managing a work list, you depend on a To-Do list to keep you on track. The To-Do list has traditionally been a powerful tool. Pilots rely on a To-Do list (or Checklist) to make sure their planes are ready for takeoff; and NASA used the same method for sending men to the moon, putting the space shuttle into orbit and the construction of the space station. What’s more, a search on Google or the App Store will reveal hundreds of potential To-Do applications that can be downloaded and used for free or very little cost.

Unfortunately, the organisational need to facilitate more effective collaboration and have real-time visibility into projects and deliverables is relegating the To-Do list to Saturday projects and other non-critical endeavors for many.

What Am I Doing Now and What Should I Be Doing Next?

The answer to this question is critical for organisations that depend on people to execute projects and other initiatives. When team members aren’t sure about what they’re doing now and what’s next, they flounder and become less productive. An effective task list enables people to see the complete picture, allowing them to take ownership of what’s happening now as well as what’s in the queue. The To-Do list doesn’t do this very well.

Easy as this sounds, particularly for organisations that depend upon project-based work to get things done, it’s sometimes easier said than done. Managing the queue of tasks and projects in today’s organisation can be challenging with cross-functional teams stepping over organisational boundaries to make requests, ad hoc work that demands immediate attention and fewer people trying to get more and more done. I have sometimes felt like I wanted to put a fence around the team to insulate them from the constant barrage of requests that have nothing to do with the objectives they are held accountable for. A “just get-er done” mentality doesn’t work anymore either (if it ever really did)-adding more and more tasks to the To-Do list actually makes it more difficult to get work done.

Earlier this year Teresa M. Amabile and Steven J. Kramer in their book, The Progress Principle: Using Small Wins to Ignite Joy, Engagement, and Creativity at Work[1], suggest, “People need to know what goal they’re trying to reach, but they have to have autonomy in order to get there. It’s a delicate balance. You do want to make sure people understand what their mission is, but you don’t want to micro-manage them. If you do, their creative thinking shuts down and you lose the value of their unique talents, expertise, and perspectives.”

Are My Accomplishments Recognised?

Unfortunately, as important as the answer to this question may be, in most organisations, the answer is “no”. To-Do lists don’t do a very good job of capturing the accomplishments (or at very least the competed tasks) associated with a project or other work. In a study commissioned by AtTask[2] and conducted by Forrester Research, it was interesting to learn that 40 percent of knowledge workers surveyed didn’t believe that their managers understood the value of their contribution to the goals and objectives of the organisation. The number was even worse when they were asked about the executives. 60 percent answered that they didn’t believe the executives within their organisation understood their contributions either.

Most people take pride in what they do and want to contribute to something worthwhile-bigger than themselves. They want to feel as thought their contributions are of value; and that the organisation values them. Capturing accomplishments is important, but only part of the equation, facilitating an transparent environment where contributions are visible to both managers and peers is critical and something a To-Do list doesn’t do.

Do I Have the Tools I Need to Do My Work Right?

Simple as this may sound, it’s amasing how some of the tools we regularly take for granted can help or hinder teams. Sometimes it’s as simple as the right phone system or email client. It also includes the tools we use to manage work.

Collaboration is an important part of successful projects and other work. Regardless of your work management solution, if it doesn’t facilitate a collaborative environment, provide visibility into tasks, issues and projects to everyone on the team, and facilitate a means to recognise accomplishments, it falls short.

Empowering people to do what they do best requires we give them the right tools for the job-organisations that do that are able to increase efficiency, enable teams to better collaborate and ultimately become more successful.

For the next 24 hours, in protest to Congress’s Proposed Stop Online Piracy Act (SPOA), Wikipedia is blacking out its site.  With the petty politics of this SOPA legislation and the bitter infighting of the Republican Primaries this year it’s a wonder anything in Washington ever gets done.

In light of these instances, I’ve been thinking about the political nature of getting work done and the importance of paying attention to all the constituents that make projects and other work possible. It doesn’t matter if we’re talking about stakeholders and project leaders or the individual contributor on a project team, if everyone doesn’t successfully work together, nothing gets accomplished. Easier said than done.

Getting everyone to effectively work together involves engaging the entire group to play an active role. For members of the team, that might even mean making decisions about the work they do, how they do it and with whom they do it.

Over the course of my career, I’ve discovered that the team is more creative, more productive and arrives at solutions I might have never considered when they are engaged in making decisions about their work. This is probably counter-intuitive for many business leaders. And, it probably goes without saying that it would be naive to expect that engaging the team and building consensus is always possible. I have found those times when consensus-building is problematic to be fewer and farther between than I might have thought just a few years ago.

Creating an environment where the team can focus more on getting things done and less on the political infighting represented so well in Iowa and New Hampshire, requires a few changes in how we deal with the team:

Invite Everyone on the Team Into the Planning Process

It’s been said that people own what they help create. I’ve found this to be true, but it can sometimes be messy business as “Too many cooks can spoil the soup.” That being said, when everyone owns the plan, everyone owns the project. Last spring at the Gartner PPM Summit, Gartner Analyst Matt Light suggested, “Those closest to the work should be allowed to make decisions regarding what they do and how they do it.”

I agree. Those on the front line understand their work the best and organizations should be leveraging the expertise of those on the team as decisions are made and actions are taken. In so far as knowledge work is concerned, isn’t that why we hired them in the first place?

Encourage Real Dialog

Too many organizations give lip service to dialog, but don’t really encourage it. I really like the idea of making task or work “requests” rather than making “assignments.” The difference might be subtle, but the idea of a request encourages dialog and captures feedback from team members who can often provide a more complete view of what’s happening within the team—including resource availability and impediments to proposed timelines that might not otherwise be known.

Making informed decisions requires the real story (visibility into accurate and timely information). Organizations that encourage real dialog and utilize tools to help capture all that contextual information are better able to understand what’s really going on rather than relying on out-of-date and inaccurate data.

Foster an Environment of Problem Solving Rather than Problem Identifying