hello and welcome to the service Ducks podcast I am co-host James downs and I'm Rush here and we're here to chat about all things servicenow everyday life as a servicenow consultant new features implementation successes and perhaps more entertaining when it doesn't go quite so well [Applause] [Music] hello and welcome back to the service Ducks we are live please do not swear um yes so this is a episode 16 now um we'll be talking about a little bit more that we've been talking about recently actually around working from home we know a lot of people do work from home we talked about meetings recently this one's all about how do you actually stay productive working from home what are your strategies um are you actually more productive working from home compared to being in the office so yes we'll be talking through all those good kind of things the techniques and different things that we do from home we'll be discussing what we do as as uh obviously servicenow Architects and developers what we do working from home um and yeah debating it and seeing what works what doesn't work um so yeah but before we dig into that let's first about find out what Russ has been doing in the last couple of weeks yeah we've got our um 10 minutes standard obligatory waffle um so if you want to get to the topic just skip ahead 10 minutes um what have I been doing yes well well the one thing I was gonna pick you up actually he said please do not swear we can do whatever we like right well post pre-water shared or whatever yeah when this gets thousands of views in the future you know you don't get demonetized well right let me tell you let me tell you let me tell you so and I write stuff down see I come prepared oh so there has been so it all it's all kind of a plan that we talk about different topics that are you know kind of planned um one of the recent things I've been interested in if you listen to last week's episode is around 80 of us work from home now and what does that mean and the whole informal chat stuff right so it's like a lot of us um spend time because we're working from home we spend time in formal meetings structured meetings where there's some kind of uh set forth I can't think of a better phrase set forth outcome to those meetings right and then it comes into this question around what happens to those informal chats I mean you and I do this right so this is an informal chat I hope it comes across but this is an informal chat it's just a structured involved chapter anyway so um waffle waffle coming off the back of that I went into the office last week so I like most people 80 of those people work from home I went into the office um I kind of went in because I hadn't seen a few work colleagues um for a few months and I thought oh I'm gonna go for a couple of drinks afterwards do a bit of socializing but do you know what I think there's only about four of us in right but we managed to have myself and another architect had architect had a conversation for 20 minutes and it was uh oh have you got five minutes conversation with usually turned into 20 yeah yeah of course yep oh excuse me um and we had one of those conversations where I managed well we managed to answer a question he was debating and one that I was debating within 20 minutes it was if you're interested it was about at repo it was about yeah now we're supposed to be using we've done another podcast on this and now we're supposed to be using App repo as opposed to update sets how do you deliver two work streams so you BAU and your um Enterprise Project work stream yeah or velocity project works I'm sorry at the same time without taking someone else's config how does that work in the real world um so 20 minutes we managed to bash that out and disprove some stuff and then I had a number of conversations just outside perhaps having a beer while having lunch they're informal just general chaps that for me was so productive they were so productive and it was just I don't know it's just good fun so I've been doing that um that was in London of course I got my scooter in fact I will um I don't really see this right oh actually scooter gate so I do this and I send it to the kids um here you go hang on you can see me I don't know if you can see this right let's see if this works gone is he me there he is yeah nice I do that and I send it to the kids because I am a big child and my kids think it's funny um but that was the day that my children's scooters got stolen from mate those are the first two that went after that there's been about another four that have gone there's another so my plan is I'm tempt I said I'm tempted to go and buy a secondhand scooter right for like five quid 10 quid that's the DPS tracker on it yeah you can watch it um anyway so yes I got my scooter um in London um we had um a couple of beers one this was interesting actually so the the office that I work in downstairs they've got a kind of swanky Barn is quite Swanky right it's nice it's got um brick walls and wooden floors and everything right quite New Age I'd say I I feel quite old when I'm in there let's be honest um but it took and it it's kind of a um a funky bar and it took from the moment I said can I have four pints please to them actually being delivered bear in mind I'd been served was an hour one hour one hour to which we get the beer and I said Is it supposed to have you ever tried a Belgian sour beer where it's sour yeah yeah right and I was like is it supposed to be a sour beer no and you know what made me feel really weird right because I I tried this beer and everyone else on the table was probably around the same age as me right we're all quite old um and we all agree this is either off or it's a sour beer right yeah yeah there's a lot of these craft bit of things and I took the pipe to benefit to work so I took the point to the barman the bar manager and I said is this supposed to be sad I said try that now what normally happens in a pub is the barman takes a sip and goes no yeah that's off no no this guy went actually went like this oh no I can't do that he he then he then took a straw and I thought oh he's going to sip it put the straw in the point and that's it yeah dipped it and nicked the end of the straw now I thought I find that the fan is quite amusing um and I discussed with my work colleagues who also found it quite amusing but I was like is that what kind of covid has turned us into where people are oh I can't possibly touch that come on man I know a few people like that who would be the same or you know they would they'd wear gloves bringing in the shopping where the Tesco delivers your home stuff they're like right gloves on let's leave them a few days to uh yeah yeah I'm really like suffer from the anxiety I think of potentially catching covered yeah yeah and there wasn't one and and there was one other Tale on the train on the way home but I don't know whether I can say in this podcast so I'll talk to you about it Watershed Time Podcast but it was it was one of the funniest moments um not of my life because I lived a sad life if that was case but it was one of the funniest moments I've ever seen or heard um better than the neighbor falling over in the snow it was it was on a part of neighbor falling on the slope it was poo related um yeah right yeah I think our audience um anyway moving swiftly on um work related I've been doing more designer based stuff today data yeah table schemas for data data stream I've been getting involved in data stream actions in flow designs playing with those expect a YouTube video out soon people yeah your eyes out and the other thing I've been doing how many minutes have I had mate what enjoys your update no they don't and the other thing I've had is I've had quite a few people um on LinkedIn message me direct around let's talk about next gen and how we bridge that gap between okay and the next gen person and I've been trained and how do I get the experience to get a job so I've been having quite a few um conversations with different people I spoke to someone in Florida uh last week because it's something um they're doing and keen on I've got another couple of calls I've got one tomorrow one next week just trying to find out a bit more about what's going on um in that space and how I can help out as much as I can so that's been quite useful it's busy busy isn't it yeah so this went you've obviously opened up on your own service nerd website the ability for people to kind of book in these kind of chats I have I I've got some calendar Lily app on my website which to be fair it's a WordPress plugin took two minutes and it allows people we said it last time didn't we um it allows people to book like 30 minutes with me over my lunch hour so we can just chat and I will say if anyone's um listening and fancy the chat go for it but right bear in mind you are using my lunch time I've come from a very structured format no no no no no come on yeah let's have an informal chat but you've got to have this in the agenda no yeah it's got to be about me yeah it's all about me no the point I was going to make is is I've been doing Google Hangouts and stuff but I might expand that to other platforms because I have to walk my dog at lunchtime and I have to have lunch so I'm quite happy to walk and talk you know the main sometimes people don't mind yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah I don't think that's okay informal chat really yeah busy busy we should have some sound effects so yeah well we'll do somewhere yeah no one's interested in you let's get to the topic yep okay so today come on come on tell us how many meetings have you been in yeah let me ask you a question right yeah meetings were you in last Thursday you're gonna go for sixth all right I'm gonna go straight to my calendar and I'm gonna tell you last Thursday have you got access to my calendar one two three four five five that was close okay yeah so that was a bit of fun so yeah anyway I mean that was that was majority of the day as well these aren't like 15 minutes 30 minutes minions either so you know by the time you have all the meetings we've got about an hour left to do stuff yeah what I've been up to um so last uh last week um I was invited to do a tech talk um which was quite interesting so it was internal to pound in the jar dxc um so it was to The Wider DXE practice um to talk about servicenow so obviously dxc do a lot more than just servicenow service now is just one part of their Enterprise apps offerings and um we were there to just demonstrate um the power of service now and I had a nice little section around low code and AI um which is definitely the area which I'm trying to kind of pigeonhole myself into a little bit more um to you know demonstrating the the abilities and capabilities of that hang on I have two comments to make let's go pigeonhole yeah okay um but in terms of Tech talk and uh well basically one of those did you push the podcast you had a captive audience there did you do it I did have a captive audience I mean there was I think there was over 600 there watching who's that I didn't I know we could have got all them followers on LinkedIn we're above 300 now um yeah no I didn't I didn't but I do push it quite regularly internally they probably hadn't heard enough of it by now but um yeah gotta get your foot and wrap it down the throat yes exactly you're not following are you yeah no it was it's good to be involved in them sort of things because there's a lot more than just servicenow out there it's about understanding how like we can work together creating more of an Enterprise offering and you know um just showing what we do it's good to because a lot of us are part of Partners who are you know quite big and you know a lot of times you can just be siled and just your service now thing but what's wrong was there much interaction or was it just you talking because there's nothing worse well it was a webinar so a lot of interactions were through just questions on the chat and things like that um there was a lot of like you know oh that was really interesting to hear and learn about what you do but because I want there wasn't specifically servicenow people you know at the beginning we did like a poll of right who's actually heard of servicenow and you know who's actually had experience with it and majority of them was like yeah I've heard of it but I'm not an expert in it but it is it is a challenge I think we should set ourselves before the end of the year is each of us have to do one of these podcasts on our own to see how difficult it is can you imagine that people actually do that didn't they they do the podcast and they just talk yeah yeah that'd be weird um anyway that was fun that was one thing and I guess the second thing that was that happened last week was sports day um I think that's a global thing isn't it generally you get Sports dating kids schools sports tend to be Global yeah I'd say yeah sports day specifically and I think one thing which we all get excited for and something that we do maybe in the UK only I don't know but there's a dad's race there's a dad's race there's a month race and you're guaranteed that there's at least one person that's going to fall over there was it you please tell me it was you it was not me it was not me although it was quite interesting is that halfway down the little strip and it was about 100 meters Dash I think it was it wasn't like a 20 meter thing yeah there was a like little dip in the middle there was a few people that came for all of that but um did people fall over did they actually fall over yeah yeah yeah full-on face plant yes oh um uh no I did really badly um as we know we do running but I'd consider myself more of a long distance Runner didn't you do really badly but it's okay because everyone's a winner or did you do it every really badly and you'd have lost well I didn't get a sticker who was last the person that fell over on their face [Laughter] all right um it's not till July and I never I never get to make it um and I don't think the last two times they've had a um a dance right to be fair they're not no I don't think so I've never heard it yeah I mean come on look at me I'm like some Usain Bolt kind of 40 year old bloke my excuse is that the school's quite near a lot of like you know army bases and RAF bases which are you know excuses coming in excuses uh no business so we've established that you ran a race which is good yeah are they badly yeah I participated um yeah come on let's get let's go back on topic how long have we spent now talking rubbish we're spending 17 minutes Wow Come on we've got 20 minutes yeah we've I can't even edit this out it's live right I know I know right let me start the topic then so this is one that obviously um we take turns a lot of time to choose a topic and we're on the same theme as you know homeworking and you know mental health and all this sort of thing and productivity is what we're talking about so it's about the being able to master the art of remote working but um looking into those strategies and techniques are used to stay in productive from home but I guess this is my first kind of leading question into this is that do you feel that you are actually more productive working from home compared to when you were in the office yes yes let's move on [Laughter] let's just delve into why yeah no no podcast [Laughter] [Music] yeah no um so yeah so essentially the the fact to actually back that up so I'll be doing a little bit of delving into facts no this is what's happened you've done some research and you've asked you've you've orchestrated the topic of the podcast to be around your researchers you can go you can go according to recent research I mean yeah I know your game for the LinkedIn no come on I mean it backs up what you've been saying to be honest because it is apparently 13 more productive compared to being in the office I think in the office there's always the I've already talked about it like the informal chats you know there's always people that's going to come up and having more informal chat at work because they're suddenly not sitting in your office with you at home so they'd just annoy you um but there are distractions from home as well um and basically I've been asking a few different people what they've been doing to try and you know maximize their day um you know whether there's distractions it could be your mobile phone could be you know your other half or your children that keeps coming in or your dog that you have to let in every few minutes yeah um yeah it's just to kind of discuss that and see what see what you do and see what I do and see what everyone else does just to kind of maximize the you know productivity so for me this topic is really quite simple um am I more productive at home than if I was in an office maybe it's not simple right am I I personally am I getting more work done at home than I'm in the office absolutely 100 hands down always have done because I can zone out I can stick my music on I can just crack on right yeah and am I more productive for everyone else I don't know maybe not right because those again that 20 minute conversation that I had with someone in the office yeah they were probably more productive because it allowed them to answer a question that otherwise it might have lasted a couple of weeks because in that kind of sense maybe for other people at the level that we're at I mean you're a you're an architect people come to you I'm a bit of a mentor I guess an elite Dev if we're all in one room in the office it may be more productive as a team but as a personal individual I'm far more productive um yeah well excuse me sorry that's direct coach I've been on the diet coke moment other drinks are available yeah at home it's quite easy for me the only thing that distracts me is I mean the dog's quite old now so she keeps going in and out the door yeah but other than that I don't get and and you know what oh my God the amount of delivery drivers oh constantly ringing the doorbell that's an annoyance but in terms of do I get distracted and go oh I'm gonna go to the park or a fancy going down the shops or I'm gonna go make tea for everyone for three hours yeah it doesn't happen just doesn't never happen never I'm quite disciplined so yeah my question back then because I get for some people this might be a this might be a topic that some people either don't want to discuss or be honest about right in terms of oh yeah I do nip off and go and get my hair cut for three hours but is it is it like the demographic of people right is it because you've got different uh what they call like you've got um gen Z gen X's yeah Boomers and everything is it different did I mean do you do anything in different demographics or different types we'll have different answers maybe yeah maybe yeah I think it probably depends based on your own um circumstances as well for example um I'm Reliant to do the school run so a lot of the time you know there'll be a period of time in the day hang on hang on hang on there's a joke there with the school run after just coming second to last in the schoolroom the school walk the school yeah School amble yeah yeah so yeah there'll be there'll be times where it's you know I need to be able to do that whereas if it was me back at the office then potentially that's you know it's more of a taboo thing it's like whoa why are you leaving the office you know to go and do the school run it's a lot more time well these days yeah yeah whereas um yeah it's a different yeah it's a different time where you know it's a lot more flexible for you to do that but I think generally you probably end up working a lot more time in the day as compared to when you you were at the office I think because at the office you'd maybe turn up at nine or something you go home at five or whatever the situation is at home I think majority of time for me anyway I end up working through a lot of my lunch times like lunch breaks um there'll be the odd call in the evening where you know I feel that it's okay for me to do yeah yeah you know I'm used to working from home working through lunch for me is just a no-go you need that time I think if I'm being honest before covid I always used to work through lunch always and and I was working from home then right after covid um it's more of a uh I separate out that hour that I can have to myself right I I don't yeah I don't tend to work through lunch anymore at all um yeah yeah so that's that's me yeah no that's definitely something that I would I need to improve on and something that I'd hold my hand up and say I don't do that enough um it it makes me then kind of like you know take smaller breaks during the day and just fine food at that point when I'm hungry which may not be the best thing for like my own lifestyle and diet you know just kind of pick go down to the fridge grab a chocolate bar or whatever yeah that's the bad thing is it nibbling nibbling or whatever yeah so you said you'd asked a bunch of people is like in terms of what they said and I I saw your LinkedIn Post in terms of productivity and and uh what I guess what concerns people have in terms of um working from what's the answer you got about it and do you think LinkedIn not too long ago so there's only so so many responses but it seems to be when I asked this internally as well same the same things were coming up and it was number one was time management in terms of um being able to block out time to achieving your kind of goals for the day um I think they find that a lot of the time um they're after you know join ad hoc meetings or you know their ping during the day and these things happen we've you know we've gone through this before but um yeah that and both uh this phone so I've been having a distraction of your phone and um I don't personally go through it I kind of ignore my phone unless someone calls me or whatever um what tends to work for them is to lock their phone away unless they need it to you know do some kind of multi-factor authentication um you know sign on for some kind of system um they will tend to lock the phone away to kind of create this kind of vision of just concentrating on their work um so I've got feedback from two particular people and they're happy for me to name them as well so bin and Ryan from DXE pounding the jar um so they go back to me they told me their techniques for managing their time basically and I thought I'd run this by you and see what you think um so Ben came back to me and said that what he does was he blocks his time almost regimently like even as granular as 15 minute blocks in his schedule um so he plans out his day all beforehand um and he understands that there is some you know unforeseen situations where he needs to jump on calls and things that happen but generally um it works for him to kind of time block things in his diary that sort of thing it's actually the mental effect of having to concentrate on that one task then you move to something else you move to another for him he removes uh distractions um such as having like a Chrome extension to block any of these kind of like procrastination websites and things like that keep your phone hidden and on silent um he goes for walls so he goes to original walks without headphones there is a Japanese theory for productivity right it says that you should concentrate and work hard for 25 minutes on a particular task you just take a drink you just do that instead [Laughter] yeah that's the um the Pomo Focus stuff is what you're um talking about what promo Focus so what that is Pomodoro Technique right okay which is the 25 minutes exactly as you mentioned the 25 minutes thing of being able to focus on certain tasks in your list for 25 minutes and then you take a five minute break and then you kind of increase that kind of iteration of doing 25 minutes yeah um so Ryan that's one of his techniques he uses um to concentrate on tasks he says he doesn't actually make to-do lists too much anymore but due to that technique to get things done so that was really really interesting he also his phone lives in a draw um yeah I don't think there was too much Chelsea mentioned the blocks time out yeah I think is that generational thing with the phone because my [ __ ] government using my mind's on my desk right I'm just I've shown you a picture it doesn't distract me to the point where it stops me doing work um yeah yeah I I I don't see there's not anything on my phone that I wouldn't have on the web on the web on the desktop do you know what I mean it's like I don't yeah I don't for me maybe it's a social thing like you know social media and like I don't know that might be the thing then isn't it I mean people just kind of refreshed Twitter all the time and you know you know I think for me the one thing I do is um in the morning so I start about quarter past half past eight and that window between then and nine o'clock is about me making to-do lists for what I'm going to do that day yeah but also I'm a freelancer right so I don't start until nine o'clock not necessarily every day there's other times I might start but I I time box it and say nine o'clocks when I start so everything before nine is about me right so it's either what I've got to achieve that day and I do um I update uh my socials so I'll put out posts out there I'll think about topics that we're going to discuss I'll update the website you know what I mean it's like today I was looking at Google analytics for our website and stuff like that so I'll do that before nine o'clock um I posted a short as well this morning all before nine and then after that I'm I'm good to go but I don't yeah it's weird I don't maybe it helps having this this environment right so this is my office this is my invite I'm gonna put the fan on one second this is this is my office and it's my place right so I don't tend no one really bugs me yeah no one no one knows if that door's shut I'm working leave me alone so it's I don't know I don't what about you did you get people bugging do you get people come in the office is that a secret you know what I mean yeah I'd say in terms of my like biggest distractions for me is um I guess I kind of need to sound proof this room so I have a one-year-old um and a seven-year-old so the seven-year-old's obviously at school but the one-year-old you hear all the time you know just screaming and you know she doesn't wander in but I'm sure in the next year she probably would start to just wander in the office and say hi Daddy yeah I'm hungry or something but um yeah but other half's obviously we'll we'll take care of that most of the time but it's just noise for me I prefer in a you know quiet um atmosphere I don't play music like when I work or anything like that or put other phones on or anything like that I prefer just you know silent and head down and just kidding no see I I have I have music on it just there's nothing better it's like today I looked at my diary and thought I've got like half a day with no meetings I can just put my music on and I can just crack on with stuff yeah yeah and I think for me for me managing my time what I tend to do is I'm very very big on lists um yes I do everything by list so in the morning it's been similar to you I mean I'd write down everything that I plan to achieve for that day anything that's kind of burning or you know things I had to do immediately and the other like stretch goals I guess for the day yeah and then I'll just cross them off as I get through them sort of thing exactly what I do I use this app called notion which is great for making like tassis and I just literally ticked stuff off it's got an AI capability now actually um but yes absolutely um what I do yeah I wouldn't mind like trying to use some other techniques like going out for a walk and that sort of thing I've not tried it um I I've always kind of found myself and maybe this is the taboo thing that I've always think I'm too busy I'm too busy to go up and you know go out for a walk yeah but um no man see yeah I was in the same boat pre-covered it was always a lunch I was always too busy and I don't know whether it was after covid or the or when I started becoming a freelancer when I made that mental switch yeah um because they were both at the same time really I started Contracting and um they the great you know what I mean the great unleashing of people from Kobe had happened at the same time so I don't know which one it was but at that time I said well I'm blocking out so literally in my calendar you cannot walk between 12 and 1. yeah um and that's my time to walk the dog to have a Wonder uh when it's nice I lie out on the sofa outside [Laughter] um and I think that helps yeah and I think yeah another thing if you do if you're so set to like lists and things like that I think one argument against doing that is if you don't get through everything on your list then you kind of get that downbeat feelings oh you know I've not been able to get through all these things or you end up working later just so that you do get through all them things um which is probably not not great so maybe but it helps because if you're working with a project manager engagement manager that kind of understands the importance of um I guess one in one out right so if you've got a bunch of stuff to do and you've only got certain amount of capacity to do it if you've got more stuff coming in and nothing going out you're never gonna win right you're never gonna keep up so it's a case of prioritizing and I'm covering my face there it's about prioritizing but but that's part of the PM and Em's job for us to help that prioritization you you kind of say well this is what you've asked me to do you tell me which one do I want to do not exactly exactly yeah yeah it says no no you you've got done what you can during the day prioritization is probably the The Way Forward here is a question to you then so so we've established that you fall over when you're running so you're quite old like me right [Laughter] it wasn't me we're both old uh yes I guess the point is we've both been around in the industry a bit uh I'm not necessarily just servicenow industry but yeah working industry of how to deliver projects delivery um experience yeah so for new new people people just coming into the industry or people just starting work or whatever do you see any trends that that distract them from work and if you do what would you say to them to help them so you're a mentor right someone said oh James I just I'm trying to do work but I keep getting distracted by Tick Tock all the time what kind of stuff are you saying how are you how are you weeding that out you know what I mean are people being honest with you or how does it work um honestly um so from those those that I Mentor so some of them are junior or you know grad sort of level as well um I don't I don't hear too much of that in terms of you know this is what's being um like distracting me sort of thing um I'll tell you what it is mostly it's balanced with um knowing what is important I guess on the day so it could well be that you know they're on a project which is full time and there's no time to do things like you know learning or training or fitting in um you know what's coming up in the next release and they'll end up just going through project time and not concentrating on other things that are just as important so it's a lot about just managing time yeah is the probably the biggest challenge and knowing what to do with it you know if you're you know completely booked out to a customer and you feel that you have to do just that for all the time um you know maybe there are people but are people likely to be honest with you though right because time management has always been and it always will be the biggest factor in people not achieving what they're setting attitude right it's one of those things that go oh how come you didn't do that well I just need some management time better or other stuff came in so and the answer from a manager will be why you need better time management go yeah well I didn't get it achieved because I sat on Tick Tock for three hours and then I decided to go and get my haircut for two they'll never yeah and I don't think that would be the case either because a lot of the people I've been speaking to are just they're incredibly eager for their work and to learn and to you know pick up bits and pieces but um I think it's more about just understanding how to manage their day more efficiently yeah um and what I do here is a lot of people will use their evenings and weekends to you know cramming and things like that and just yeah you know while you're young maybe that's fine and you're happy to do that and you know to progress your career and things like that which is great for eagerness and you know shows that you've got willingness to do so here's another question right because I like this on a topic right it's not necessarily technical it's it's subjective yeah and if so if you relate this back to a topic I've been really interested in recently which is about the next gen people coming out um you've been through the course right the service now I'm going to train you up course and send you out into the ether yeah you've been through that you've learned about the itsm world the technical world that this is a flow this is a business rule which you're not supposed to use anymore but we all do um you know this is an incident this has changed you've learned about that and you kind of get thrown out and say well now go and find a job so it's it's kind of you've got those servicenow skills but is I don't want to say time management but is working more productively at home another skill that one you should look for when employing someone and two how do you train that because other than other than saying no you're not being as productive as you can do you need to manage your time better how do you train it like servicenow you'd sit on you'd be a mentor and say this is an if statement this is a I think that's really hard isn't it because I don't think that even fits in with those kind of like core soft skills either um or the kind of you know generic company training that they get you to do for health and safety or it's it's kind of like one of those subjects this has not talked about um about how to how to work from home yeah you know it's almost just expected that you should just know or maybe just kind of Garner opinions from your colleagues so what what do you do or you know asking that question is it okay if I go for a haircut at lunch time it's getting like that though isn't it because I've worked from home for many many years and and it's probably something I take for granted that I've just learned to do and it's just normal to me yeah but you think about these graduates coming through brand new probably never worked in an office before hmm and if they happen it's always been virtual so it's kind of like it's not normal for them it's not natural um so maybe there is some kind of specific training that that needs to happen because you you touched on it earlier about a lot of things these things are kind of personal circumstance and things that maybe people don't want to discuss and that could be also the reason for for not too many responses on the LinkedIn other than me just being rubbish at social media but you know it's a personal thing it might show badly on you if you're opening up to these distractions and people feel that if they you know say that they have to do the school run uh that might be marked against them uh in any way shape or form or you know yeah yeah I think it's an interesting one I'm just I'm just diving into LinkedIn now just have a check because I repost it as well and then I'm consciously we're 45 40 41 minutes in yeah we spent 20 minutes just waffling um we better wrap this up at some point but let me just check and see if if is LinkedIn gonna load what we're referring to is James and I kind of um primed people with the topic we were discussing today we're trying to figure out what distractions people have at home um and when the excuse me whether they be honest about it and my theory is I don't think people would be I'm not saying people will deceive but come on would you outwardly say yeah I get distracted all the time yeah or lack motivation to work from home I don't think people would it's more of a um I just I just think that's that's what people do and they do we just need to I don't know from a from a recruitment uh an employer point of view you need to learn how to spot it and help people to get past it and from an individual point of view you also need to learn how to spot it and it's okay to say I'm getting distracted I need some help to to manage it because the whole thing in the world is you're not delivering projects if you're not delivering your workload because you're getting constantly distracted or um you're not getting it done on time because at the end of the day we're there to do a job right yeah exactly yeah yeah there's got to be that kind of happy medium where you do work with your employer to understanding what is acceptable for your employer as well as you know what you need to do from home as well because they should also understand that if you are working from home there are some things that you can't avoid exactly it might be baked into your contract that you are a homework let's be fair right it goes both ways working from home is a benefit to the employee because they don't have to pay rent rates but it's also been worse right it can't be both ways it can't be or the employer gets it we'd have to pay any rent but we expect you to work nine to five and be there all the time no it doesn't work like that you're allowed to be distracted but at least acknowledge what they are um yeah yeah anyway that's that's for me so should we wrap this up then yes I think we should I think um so we come into this obviously talking about this whole subject of productivity and we've understood that yeah absolutely we're more productive working from home on the most part um there are going to be distractions and there are going to be things outside of your control with distractions and we believe that you know employers are aware of this I think they're becoming more flexible in terms of what you can and can't do from home um there's lots of techniques out there um like the Pomodoro Technique we've discussed around the 25 minutes rule being able to create lists being able to um you know block book your time and your Diaries I think the important kind of message is these sort of things you'll have to find out for yourself what works in terms of your productivity it can be very specific to your own individual circumstances whether you have family whether you have pets coming in and out all the time um yeah I guess that's my kind of summary of this is really you've got to try these different techniques and different things to try and work in your your life work sort of balance um yeah and you've missed that we've also learned that you're quite old and if you put you in front of 100 meter dash you're gonna fall over yeah and now if you do want a free scooter uh Ruskin if it's addressing the link yeah there's someone out there you may not be tracking you it's gone it's got a black market ring on scooter mongering anyway so I guess that um that's uh thanks for wrapping us up there James um I think that just reminds us to say you can go first yep I've been James I've been Russ and this has been the service Ducks that's all for today's podcast thank you for listening and if you want to get your question answered by the service Ducks get in touch through talk to the doc at service hyphandux.com or just use one of the links below [Music] [Applause] [Music]