Your Guide to the Flowtime Technique and How It Helps Employee Performance

Everyone loves hitting 'the zone'. That wonderful feeling of powering through a task with total focus and motivation. When you're in the zone, you feel on top of your game and can be incredibly productive within a short time.

Every manager would love their team members to always be in the zone. This would be great for everything from productivity to satisfaction and job fulfillment. But everyone works differently, so it's impossible to manufacture that perfect state of 'flow' simultaneously for every single employee.

Or is it?

In an era where the quest for peak productivity often leads to burnout, the flowtime technique emerges as a beacon of balance. It's not just a time management method; it's a paradigm shift. 

Learn: 

• the ins and outs of the flowtime technique;
• how it helps employee performance;
• how to implement it in your organization. 

🧠 What is the flowtime technique?

The flowtime technique is a productivity and time management method designed to maximize focus and efficiency while minimizing burnout and fatigue. It's a variation of the Pomodoro Technique but with a more flexible approach. 

It aims to give people a way to work that keeps the brain fresh and productivity high all day through achieving a 'flow state' and staying in that flow state for as long as possible.

A 'flow state' (aka the zone) is a state of mind where productivity flows' easily. When you are in a flow state, you will be energized, focused, motivated, and fully immersed in your work. It's an enjoyable state, and it's fantastic for getting work done quickly and well.

Over time, the flowtime technique helps people understand their optimal work/break cycles, form habits that help them get into the zone, stay there for longer, and understand their most common distraction triggers.

In a nutshell, the flowtime technique is about working smarter, not harder. It aligns with the natural ebb and flow of human concentration and energy levels, leading to more sustainable productivity and happier employees. 

📜 Core principles of the flowtime technique

Here are the core principles of the flowtime technique:

Achieving peak focus and absorption in the work environment

The flowtime technique is all about hitting the zone fast and staying there for as long as possible. It works like this:

1. The worker writes down what they want to achieve within a Flowtime session.
2. The overall task can be broken down into sub-tasks/goals if helpful.
3. The worker writes down the time they began working on the task.
4. The worker continues to work until they get distracted or need a break.
5. The worker writes down the time they came out of 'The Zone,' what distracted them, and why they needed a break.

People can work and rest for as long as they need to, without having to clock watch. At the same time, the technique gives insight over time into what commonly distracts individuals and the optimal timings for their productivity/break cycles. This is a great way to develop high-performance behaviors over time.

Structuring tasks and goals to match individual skill levels

The flowtime technique encourages managers to be specific when assigning tasks. It also helps people to structure tasks in the ways that are most helpful for them. This means that it's a lot easier to structure tasks and goals to match individual skills and skill levels.

Similarly, over time, the flowtime technique reveals valuable insights about the working methods, schedules, and techniques that work best for each employee. These insights can be used to match the right people with the right task every time.

Integrating tasks for continuous workflow and minimal interruptions

Because it's designed to keep people in a highly motivated flow state, the flowtime technique is at its best when tasks are grouped for coherent flow. Tasks that go together and don't interrupt the flow are great for the flowtime technique.

For example, choosing a color scheme and designing a logo are complementary tasks that integrate well in a flowtime session. Both have a lot of overlap, and the same kind of thought processes are required for both. Someone with these two tasks could accomplish both without getting jolted out of The Zone.

On the other hand, choosing a color scheme and setting up a data spreadsheet is much less complimentary. It would take a shift in mindset to switch from one task to the other, which could result in a loss of flow. 

Assigning tasks to enhance individual fulfillment and satisfaction

We've discussed assigning tasks based on individual skill sets and combining complementary tasks. The third part of this vital flowtime trilogy is ensuring that assigned tasks are as enjoyable as possible for the assigned worker.

One of the reasons that a state of flow is so productive is that it's enjoyable. Becoming completely and productively absorbed in something you don't enjoy is hard.

So, one of the core principles of the flowtime technique is formulating tasks to be more satisfying and fulfilling for workers and assigning tasks to the people who will enjoy them the most.

Acknowledging and allowing flexibility amid changing circumstances

The flowtime technique is an advance on the famous Pomodoro technique, which aims to maximize productivity by keeping the brain fresh. The Pomodoro technique sets out work hours §in blocks of 25 minutes. 

The idea is that the brain starts to lag, and productivity decreases after 25 minutes. But by working for 25 minutes and then taking a five-minute break to refresh your mental state, you can achieve more in a day than if you were working continÎuously with a sluggish, unrefreshed brain. 

The problem with the Pomodoro technique is that sometimes people would get into a deep flow state during their 25-minute working intervals and then have to snap out of the flow for their five-minute break. While it's definitely important to give your brain a good rest when it needs it, it's also tough to get back into the flow once you're out of it.

Is flowtime better than Pomodoro? It depends significantly on what you're trying to achieve and your own working style. However, the flowtime technique does have the benefit of no rigid timescales for work periods and rest periods. 

This acknowledges the differences in people's workstyles, leaves leeway for changing circumstances, and generally gives much more flexibility than Pomodoro.

Valuing teamwork through collaboration and communication

The flowtime technique is task-based, which means that a degree of collaboration, communication, and teamwork is needed for all the separate tasks to come together into a coherent whole.

Flowtime sessions encourage teams to understand the unique skills, preferences, and working styles of all team members and to work together to utilize those things in the best, most collaborative way possible.

Creating a feedback loop for ongoing improvement and adjustment

At its most successful, the flowtime technique works overtime to create good habits. A big part of the technique is noting down distractions, start times, stop times, and so on.

This gives ongoing employee feedback that helps workers better understand their working styles, techniques, and distractions. Over time, they can adjust accordingly to achieve flow states faster and stay in the zone longer.

Similarly, with the right data-gathering and analysis technology, managers and HR can use insights from flowtime sessions to better understand the needs and working styles of the workforce. 

🏆 Best practices for implementing the flowtime technique

So, how can the flowtime technique be implemented successfully?

Integrate principles into the onboarding process

The flowtime technique works on building a greater understanding of how you work best and building better habits over time. So, it's a good idea to start getting Flowtime insights and building good Flowtime habits as quickly as possible from your onboarding processes. 

For example, you could build Flowtime training into your onboarding.

The best employee onboarding software will help you to seamlessly integrate Flowtime principles into onboarding wherever needed. With the right tech, you can get new employees off to a flying start with Flowtime. So, consider the tech you're using when building Flowtime into your HR processes.

Ensure active leadership support and alignment

Flowtime will work best when leadership is fully on board with it. It's hard for workers to undertake successful Flowtime sessions when their assigned tasks and workday structure don't align with flowtime technique principles.

So, ensure all managers and leaders understand the flowtime technique and align their leadership methods with Flowtime principles.

Conduct employee workshops for proper implementation

The flowtime technique is pretty simple, but it's still important that employees understand how it works and how to use it.

So, train your people in the flowtime technique and how it works. Workshops or AI training programs can be a great way to achieve this.

Adopt matching tools and technologies in HR operations

The flowtime technique can bring a lot of HR benefits to your business. For example, it can give fantastic insights into how your employees work at their best, what they find most distracting, the number (and length) of breaks they need, and more. 

With the right tools and technologies, your HR department can gather Flowtime data, store it, analyze it, and draw insights that will help optimize employee working conditions, raise productivity, and boost your business.

There's lots of good HR software online that you can use to integrate Flowtime into your HR systems and workflows. Many of them will also help you monitor employee performance and create feedback surveys so you can track and analyze how Flowtime has impacted your employees. Search around to find something that works for your business.

Review and adapt policies to support flexibility and adaptability

Flexibility and adaptability are vital to successfully implementing the flowtime technique into your working methods.

As such, reviewing and adapting your policies to support flexibility and adaptability in working is essential.

You can do this through a number of ways, such as launching employee surveys, holding feedback sessions and using reporting HR software. Combined, this will give you the information you need to analyze your policies and inform future improvements.

For example, you may need to change policies to allow employees to take breaks of any duration (within reason) whenever necessary. Or you may need to adjust your strategies to accommodate task splitting and greater collaboration.

➡️ Use the flowtime technique to boost both employee performance and satisfaction

So, what are the benefits of flowtime technique? Let's recap:

• Helps employees to form productive habits.
• Allows employees to understand their optimal working styles.
• Highlights common distractions so they can be avoided in the future.
• Gives more flexibility than the Pomodoro Technique.
• Shows employees how to achieve a flow state and stay in a flow state for longer.
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• Boosts employee satisfaction.

All in all, if you want happier, more productive employees, it's definitely worth considering the flowtime technique.

Zavvy helps you create structured and engaging training courses to help your people master this technique. Plus, if you need to review and improve employee performance, we have you covered, too.