Scattered Engagement

[David Zinger]

To me, engagement is about something specific. To talk about employee engagement is too vague most of the time. At times employees are engaged at other times they are disengaged. We must be careful putting broad categories over the dynamic days of employees.

Having said that, I am very engaged in WEB 2.0 and social media. I think it is a wonderful approach to the Internet and will only grow and develop over time. I see a double whammy of engagement here.

In many ways the media is quite engaging so it draws you in. The dilemma is that you can get drawn in and lose sight about what you mostly want to engage in. You can link away to where you wonder where the heck you are and how did you end up here.

My questions: Do you experience any challenges in online engagement? How do you focus your online engagement? What purpose does your time online serve?

[Deri Latimer]

You are so skilled in this area, David! I admire that - and am inspired by it! I am becoming far more engaged in online pursuits and am focused on doing more each week. I am an extravert, and I see huge opportunity to be fully engaged and also respect my personal preference for interaction by being involved in social networks such as this one. I am drawn to connect with others from around the world, and to stay current in my areas of interest.
Thanks for engaging me!

[David Zinger]

Deri,

Having spent much time with you in person I know what an engaging spirit you have and it seems to also be expressed well on-line.

I am starting to bracket my online time. Here are the periods otherwise online can start to seep into other work.

The other thing I am playing with is strategic intention: What is my purpose of being online at this time? What that is achieved, log off.

David

[Deri Latimer]

Thank you for that comment, David! Again, you inspire me to think!! I like the idea of blocking time to be online...now that I am online a little more, I find myself dreaming of things I want to write (blog, EE Network)... can be a good thing, and not so good, I suppose!!
Cheers, D

[Stephen Randall]

David, you wrote: "To me, engagement is about something specific. To talk about employee engagement is too vague most of the time. At times employees are engaged at other times they are disengaged. We must be careful putting broad categories over the dynamic days of employees."

David, I agree that talk about engagement is usually too vague. But this includes statements like "At times employees are engaged at other times they are disengaged." It seems there are many, many shades of engagement, not just black and white. So in an effort to clarify things, here's a real, specific, dynamic example of my past increasing engagement/involvement:

I'm preparing a speech. I am really into it, very involved. The structure of experience is very simple: just the flowing energy of work with a very clear awareness of the task at hand. I write down a few key ideas that I want to present, then visualize giving the speech.
Then I feel a little puzzled about the order of the ideas. The energy of the scenario starts to split: there's some momentum to just write more ideas down, and there's also some motivation to feel the confusion. Awareness is no longer clear: I am stuck and don't know how to proceed. I look at the clock and wonder if I should take a break. I feel my involvement in the task decreasing, and consider ways to completely avoid the task.
I've reached what I call a transition point, where there’s a choice about whether to follow the tendency to fragment the scenario’s energy and awareness further, or to really focus on the confusion. At this point, depending on my action, my productivity, energy, and confidence can either decrease, continue gradually, or improve. I know that taking a break now would waste time. I'd still have to face things when I came back.
So I drop my distracting thinking about escapes and concentrate on the task again. I remember being confused about the order of ideas, and then realize it was actually the confusion that I wanted to avoid. This time I let myself get confused. My thoughts go back and forth about how to proceed, and then finally I get some insight on rearranging the ideas to be presented.
Now I'm really involved again. The work's flow picks up again and gradually accelerates beyond my productivity before the confusion arose. The scenario’s structure has become simpler, more coherent and integrated.
What facilitated the improvement in productivity? Wasn't it to feel the confusion and see how I had decreased my involvement and pulled away from the task? Wasn't it necessary to distinguish productive directions from counterproductive directions, then choose a productive direction and gradually become even more involved than I was before getting confused?

Now to generalize, at the risk of getting 'vague', could we say that increasing productivity resulted from noticing the transition point where my involvement could either increase or decrease, making the scenario’s structure either more simple/integrated or complicated/fragmented, and then choosing a direction of increasing involvement? Isn't this the natural way that we improve engagement and productivity without even thinking about it?

At work you can periodically recall your recent experience as if you were viewing a videotape replay, and look for ways in which you weren't completely involved, just as tennis players look for ways to improve their stroke. A high degree of involvement implies a melding or identification of worker and objects worked on, a timeless and effortless flow of events, and an unrestricted sense of openness pervading the entire scenario. If you felt any separation from work or the objects being worked on, if you and time's ordinary flow weren't completely swept up in the energy of work, or if your work space felt a bit emotional or heavy, you have identified a key to improving your work game. This way of noticing your level of involvement provides self-actualizing feedback useful in directly approaching peak performance.