Jamie Madden at 37 signals just wrote a post today called Getting in too-much touch (interruption is not collaboration), and it really hit home. I can't speak with any real authority about productivity other than my own experience and intuition, but there's definitely something to the notion that increased "collaboration" is really just more interruption. Email, instant messengers, phone calls, voice mail, sms alerts on your phone. And there's always meetings, calendar reminders, co-workers, office noise. Blech.

When I'm being gently needled by small (or large) amounts of these individual distractions, it amounts to a single, giant hurdle between me and productivity. In fact, I tend to get most of my best work in the middle of the night when everyone else is offline/asleep.

Interruption is productivity's biggest enemy

The other thing that I've grown more aware of over time is the ability to recognize when I'm "in the zone". Whatever that really is, all I'm aware of is that it's a state of mind where I'm really focused and capable of being ultra-productive. When I'm in the zone, I get away from distractions and find that I can sit for hours and hours just cranking out big chunks of work. It's energizing and satisfying, and the only downside is that I'm unable to induce it on my own.

I've known a handful of people who were absolutely brilliant; like, way high on the IQ scale. Just so incredibly smart that they spend most of their waking hours frustrated and annoyed that the rest of the world is much dumber than they are. I imagine that for people like that, they're in a kind of perpetual "zone" of ultra-productivity and ultra-focus, because they seem to never get tired mentally and never wear out.