More often than not, I have colleagues who get sidetracked with hobbies, or personal problems and they cannot focus on the work.  Immediately, this shows up in decrease of performance levels.  The good ones get sidetracked temporarily, and is able to refocus.   Some others don’t recover well, and ultimately falls over.

How important is focus in getting peak or even decent performance?

I would say a lot.  The other day, I almost figured in a vehicle accident.  I was still inside our home subdivision which is almost deserted most of the time. I was going at 5 miles per hour turning a corner, and momentarily distracted while fiddling with my cell phone, I almost hit a car.

I thought.  If I focus on driving, I could go 70 miles per hour and still be safe.  But getting distracted even at 5 miles per hour seemed to be a recipe for disaster.

I think with all the good people out there competing for their own space, we are not good enough to accomplish worhtwhile things unless we give it our all, or our 100% focus.

I remember a quote from the movie, Citizen Kane which goes like, ” If all you want to be is to be rich, that is easy.”  And I guess people who are willing to put all their focus on just one objective ( and make the necessary sacrifices) normally would succeed. 

Of course, the reason we are having so much difficult in coping or even hitting our objectives is that we have so many of them — maintaining your health, maintaining life + work balance, family time, not getting too stressed, investing in our marriage,  looking good and maintaining a lifestyle at par with the Joneses, indulging in hobbies and interests etc.

And in the space of it all, we lose focus, and score marginal in all our objectives. 

At the end, it depends on what you really want, and how much focus you can bear on it.

Related Posts:

-Too much Focus on the Topline, not the Bottomline
-MultiTasking for Productivity
- Going for What’s Important
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Focusing on Exceptions
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Focus is the Key
- Focus on Core Competence