Why I kick people out of their office

(originally published on April 6, 2016)
I do. Seriously. At a recent team meeting, I told my team that they needed to get out of their office. Why, you might ask? Did they do something wrong? Were they sent home for inappropriate behavior? Did they miss a deadline?
No. Not quite. Not even close.
Our team delivers some good work. I mean some really good work. I am always telling people that we have a team that is going to shift things, create a new way of doing what we do.
But their offices? That is where the execution might happen, but the magic? That can only really come from separating ourselves, psychologically, but also physically.
Here’s the thing about most offices, and it doesn’t matter whether you have a cool and trendy open space, or a private and C-Suite-worthy corner office: the longer you stay in them, rooted to your chair and screen, the heavier they get.
Email notifications. Phone messages. Text messages. The drop-in “got two seconds?” that turns into 45 minutes. The stack of papers on the corner of the desk. The “To Do list” on the white board. Urgent requests. I could go on, but do I need to? Our minds create powerful associations, and the only way to avoid getting trapped by them is to break away from them.
Now, don’t get me wrong — I like my office. I arrive most mornings ready to go and do some good. I fire up the laptop and start preparing my day in my mind, taking notes on what I need to accomplish and what order to get them done in.
At least once in the morning and again in the afternoon, I take a pause, turn my back on the computer and kind of get lost in what is outside my window. I also have a standing work area, which I try to work from for at least 30 minutes twice a day. But I am still in my office. And the air is getting heavy. Ideas start to…stop. Solutions are evasive. Words cease to just flow. Creativity has been suffocated.
I need to get out.
At least twice a week, I make sure I have opportunities for what Brian Grazer calls “Curiosity Conversations”. I seek out opportunities for coffee or lunch with someone who is, on the surface, at least two degrees from the work that I do. Other times, I just make sure that I have an hour, some quiet, my notebook and pen, and have these conversations with myself, in a vibrant environment (there are tons in Montreal, literally tons!).
When I am with others, there is no agenda. Not really, anyway. We know what we both do, or are curious to find out. We ask questions, lots of questions, and let the conversations take their own path. Most often, the other person is not aware that this is my creativity reboot, but (I like to think), they get it, too. Almost always, we both come away with action items for our work, and new ways to collaborate and help each other. Maybe not today, but definitely sometime soon.
And the really fun part is, the momentum built from that conversation, or time reflecting and scribbling and writing, carries on. Sometimes for a day, sometimes two. And just when it feels like the weight of the office is getting to be too much to take, I do the only thing I can do: I kick myself out of my own office.
Go ahead, give yourself the (re)boot.
