Be Happy – Concentrate at One Job at One Time.

Generally, we find our computer to hang out when we impatiently give a number of commands successively. Sometime, we feel that our computer is working slow or has stopped to work for a while. But it is not so. It continues to work and execute our commands, but one by one. When it feels overburdened, it stops to work and we have to re-start. It applies to our bodies too when we feel overwhelmed?

It's not just the number of hours we're working, but also the fact that we spend too many continuous hours juggling too many things at the same time. What we've lost, above all, are stopping points, finish lines and boundaries. Technology has blurred them beyond recognition. Wherever we go, our work follows us, on our digital devices, ever insistent and intrusive. It's like an itch we can't resist scratching, even though scratching invariably makes it worse.

Tell the truth: Do you answer email during conference calls (and sometimes even during calls with one other person)? Do you bring your laptop to meetings and then pretend you're taking notes while you surf the net? Do you eat lunch at your desk? Do you make calls while you're driving, and even send the occasional text, even though you know you shouldn't?

The biggest cost — assuming you don't crash — is to your productivity. In part, that's a simple consequence of splitting your attention, so that you're partially engaged in multiple activities but rarely fully engaged in any one. In part, it's because when you switch away from a primary task to do something else, you may enhance the time it takes to finish that task by an average of 25 per cent.

But most insidiously, it's because if you're always doing something, you're relentlessly burning down your available your own energy over the course of every day, so you have less available with every passing hour.

I know this from my own experience. I get two to three times as much writing accomplished when I focus without interruption for a designated period of time and then take a real break, away from my desk. The best way for an organization to fuel higher productivity and more innovative thinking is to strongly encourage finite periods of absorbed focus, as well as shorter periods of real renewal.

If you're a manager, here are three policies worth promoting:

1. You May Maintain Meeting Discipline. Schedule meetings for 45 minutes, rather than an hour or longer, so participants can stay focused, take time afterward to reflect on what's been discussed, and recover before the next obligation. Start all meetings at a precise time, end at a precise time, and insist that all digital devices be turned off throughout the meeting.

2. You Must Stop demanding or expecting instant responsiveness at every moment of the day. It forces your people into reactive mode, fractures their attention, and makes it difficult for them to sustain attention on their priorities. Let them turn off their email at certain times. If it's urgent, you can call them — but that won't happen very often.

3. You Should Encourage renewal. Create at least one time during the day when you encourage your people to stop working and take a break. Offer a mid-afternoon class in yoga, or meditation, organize a group walk or workout, or consider creating a renewal room where people can relax, or take a nap. 

It's also up to individuals to set their own boundaries. Consider these three behaviors for yourself:

1.  You May Do the most important thing first in the morning, preferably without interruption, for 60 to 90 minutes, with a clear start and stop time. If possible, work in a private space during this period, or with sound-reducing earphones. Finally, resist every impulse to distraction, knowing that you have a designated stopping point. The more absorbed you can get, the more productive you'll be. When you're done, take at least a few minutes to renew.

2. You Can Establish regular, scheduled times to think more long term, creatively, or strategically. If you don't, you'll constantly succumb to the tyranny of the urgent. Also, find a different environment in which to do this activity — preferably one that's relaxed and conducive to open-ended thinking.

3. You May Take real and regular vacations. Real means that when you're off, you're truly disconnecting from work. Regular means several times a year if possible, even if some are only two or three days added to a weekend. The research strongly suggests that you'll be far healthier if you enjoy your vacation period fully, and more productive overall.

A single principle lies at the heart of all these suggestions. When you're engaged at work, keep yourself fully engaged, for defined periods of time. When you're renewing, truly renew. Make waves. Stop living your life in the gray zone.

So you've got an idea for some business activity on a small scale to start with. Congratulations! Now, it's time to figure out how to make it one that survives and even thrives.

Many would-be entrepreneurs are held back by fears of failure due to the risks of starting a business. But there are ways to lessen those risks -- by taking a sane, step-by-step approach to getting ready to launch. 

Here are seven fundamental steps for planning a low-risk launch:

1. You Should Know how you'll fund it. There are many costs to starting a business, even if it's an online one. Do you have money saved up, or access to a credit line you could tap? Will you work a side job? Get relatives to help you? Have a strategy for meeting the preliminary and working expenses.

2. You Should Be realistic about ramp time. Even with a simple business idea, expect it will be at least six months to a year before the business starts throwing off enough cash to support you. Know how you will cover your living expenses until then.

3. You Should Keep overhead low. See how you could start getting sales before paying rent on a big retail store. Try a kiosk, direct sales, e-commerce or even renting space within an existing store.

4. You Must Have a business model. Just because a good venture is started without any idea how the business would make money doesn't mean you should do the same. The reality is the vast majority of businesses that begin this way will fail. Figure out a revenue model at the start.

5. You May Test your idea out on prospective customers. It's better to find out if nobody would buy your product before you invest time and money in launching it. You may get primary or secondary data about whether there is a real market for what you want to sell.

6. You Must Be ready to evolve your idea. Venture funders like founders who know how to "fail fast." Don't cling to what's not working. One key entrepreneurial skill is quickly recognizing problems and testing out new twists on an idea until you find the approach to which customers respond. 

7. You Must Build your network. You will not succeed at this alone. You must  search out other associates in business and similar industry, who will be a sounding board and share their experiences.

If you decide to go for it and start a business, be committed to it. If you're not passionate about what you're trying to do, you probably won't stick out the inevitable bumps in the road.

Be Happy - Concentrate at One Job at One Time.