The digital economy is changing the way we work. People are working remotely, freelancing, and starting their own businesses.
The internet has given us more opportunities to work from home and make our own hours. But it also means that there’s no one around to hold us accountable for our work.
So what is accountability?
Accountability refers to the “acceptance of responsibility for one’s own action/s”. To put it simply, keeping yourself on the right track to achieve your goals is difficult, in order to keep on that track, you need to keep yourself in check or…. accountable.
The reason it is more difficult to keep in check in a digital world is exactly that, digital
Find ways to stay accountable in a digital economy so we can be successful in this new environment. Quick hint… look into gamification. I’ve said it a million times and I’ll say it a million more. I tried timeblocking, super complicated to do lists, everything. Trust me, gamification works. That’ll keep you on task and by result…
Accountable.
So, in order to start with accountability, start tracking your pickups through Screentime on your phone. Try and keep the amount of times you pick up your phone lower and lower every day by 5 pickups to start. Then once you’ve got your amount of pickups down to a limit your happy with, start focusing on lowering your screen time to under 2 hours of phone use a day.
It’s doable.
Start with that, then start looking for more ways to limit your distractions. Because it’s one thing to install all these blockers on your computer to block apps like Instagram and YouTube, it’s another thing to have the willpower to not find a workaround. Train your brain to only use social media apps for work. For example, a scrolling spree on Linkedin feels a lot different to me than a scrolling spree on Instagram. When I’m on Instagram, even though I use it for work and promotion, I still end up feeling in my mind that its acceptable to scroll around for a bit as the app is an entertainment first app. However, when I am screolling on Linkedin, I almost naturally feel like I want to stop (even when the content is super engaging) because it’s concrete in my mind as a business and networking app.
Do you get what I mean?
So train your brain to think about other social media apps in the same frame.
It’s difficult and there’s only so much advice I can give you over a newsletter, so just keep those key points in this article in your mind, and start thinking about ways to action them.
Good luck.
Now, get back to work.
— TB 