Legendary basketball coach John Wooden is quoted as having once said: “Never mistake activity for achievement.” And yet, within our companies, a kind of cult of hyperactivity often exists. It is considered good form to show that you are always busy, even overwhelmed. Is this not a sign of being indispensable, at the heart of critical projects? Of course, your effective workload has an incompressible impact on your schedule. But it is also common to measure a person’s level of commitment and contribution by how busy they appear to be.

This over-valuation of hyperactivity has high individual and collective costs. Professional burnout syndrome, bureaucratic overload, diminished creativity…: the consequences of this frenzy are numerous. So, what if you rehabilitated the value of downtime or less directly productive moments? Here are some actions you can initiate to get the ball rolling:

– Create slots of time within the team’s agenda during which meetings are forbidden.

– As a manager, dare to take breaks conspicuously.

– Encourage your team members to do the same and to take advantage of breaks to truly disconnect—for instance by stepping outside for some fresh air.

Source: Beware a Culture of Busyness, Adam Waytz, Harvard Business Review, March-April 2023.