Can Slacking and Procrastinating Actually Make Us MORE Productive?

by staff blogger Jacquie Van Wagner

When Mike Wolpert first went to a Stress Seminar it was because his wife made him do it. This is often the case.  In one of the workshops, Mike was exposed to an Inner Game of Stress tool known as S.T.O.P. — which he immediately declared to be procrastination. The tool encourages us to step back, think, and organize before we proceed and, yes, the acronym is intentional.

This culture that expects us "to be better than every body at everything" frowns upon our unplugging, even on our own time. At home we check our email, and god forbid we should be separated from our blackberries! It's killing us, literally. But — here's a thought — it's as bad for our productivity as it is for our health. Even the bright minds at CareerBuilder.com are saying so, and recently CNN and HuffPo linked to this article by Anthony Balderrama which discusses advice like our very own S.T.O.P. tool in terms of  'cost benefit analysis.' Take a look–your email will still be there when you get back to it.

6 tips for lazy workers to get ahead

BTW–Mike Wolpert gave the S.T.O.P. tool a test drive–and he became one of its biggest fans. Check out our video page and he'll tell you about it.