A World Without Email

Newport coins what he calls the “Attention Capital Principle”. This states that productivity of the knowledge sector can be significantly increased if we identify workflows that better optimize the human brain’s ability to sustainably add value to information. That is to say that our job is to produce value by harnessing our skills to focus on a single task that provides value to the world. Our job is not to read and write emails.

In the first section of the book, Newport introduces what he calls the “hyperactive hive mind”. This is the workflow centered around constant communication fueled by unstructured and unscheduled messages delivered through digital communication channels like email or chat. The constant fracturing of our attention by incoming messages hampers our ability to focus and add value to our organizations. Studies have also shown that this type of workflow makes people tired, anxious, and prone to depression. He puts the introduction of email into the modern workplace in historical context by looking at the introduction of other tools and how they changed human behavior. This idea is known as technological determinism.

One of my favorite examples of technological determinism Newport shows is the introduction of the Like button in Facebook. The original intent of the button was to clean up the comments below users’ posts. Facebook engineers noticed most of the comments were one word acknowledgements like “cool” or “nice”. They figured if that could be captured by “liking” someone’s post, then the comments that remained would be more substantive. Unbeknownst to the engineers, the addition of the like button triggered a stream of social approval indicators in our brains - bits of evidence that someone else is thinking about you. Prior to the introduction of the button, people occasionally logged on to Facebook to see what their friends were up to. After its introduction, people logged on much more frequently to see how much approval their latest posts generated.

In the second half of the book, Newport examines ways to adapt our workflow to keep the advantages of the less friction involved in digital communication while attempting to tame the hyperactive hive mind. They are mainly suggestions rather than prescriptions, which makes sense considering the vast array of industries and types of work there are. The big workflow suggestion he has is to examine Agile methodologies of project management used by many software development companies. It provides a more structured way to coordinating work between multiple people instead of constantly living in your inbox.

Making a wholesale change in your organization’s workflow may be outside your control, but Newport has some tips on how to implement some tactics in your personal workflow to gain some of the benefits from calming the hyperactive hive mind.

This book is worth reading by any professional, especially by those who feel overwhelmed by constant digital communication from email and Slack. If we read thinkers like Cal Newport and Jason Fried (It Doesn’t Have to Be Crazy at Work), we can begin to unlock some of the trapped productivity in knowledge work and be calmer while working.