It’s a truism that you need to be aware of what’s going on in your field, and the world in general, in order to find opportunity. However, too much focus on news is counter-productive. According to a study by researchers at UC Irvine, people who watched television coverage of traumatic events suffered more PTSD than people who actually experienced the events. So how do you find productive news sources that will improve your work, rather than downgrade your health?
Choose Your Format
Choose a format for your productive news sources that will help you to consume them, without being distracted by them. Ideally, this will be a curated source, rather than open sifting through all the available news and commentary. Instead of reading a newspaper, read a weekly summary of the biggest news items. The blog post, Eliminate Reading Overwhelm, gives sources of news summaries. Instead of watching whichever YouTube video strikes your fancy, subscribe to a channel that gives you curated videos. Rather than watching television news, watch commentaries that will provide context for the news.
Consume the News on Your Schedule
One of the easiest things to do for improving productivity is task blocking. Set aside a period of time during which you will consume your news. Give this your focus during that time, so that you are specifically searching for news that will improve your situation. How can you turn what you learn into an opportunity? Is it something for which you need to build a contingency plan? Smaller blocks of time, such as 5-minute or 15-minute intervals, can be sandwiched in between larger tasks. That gives you a cognitive break, without the potential for distraction. If your preferred format is audio, you can download all of your podcasts into a feed collection service, then select podcasts of the appropriate length.
If you do find something you’re interested in following up on, add it to your feed rather than investigating it now. Pocket lets you save websites. There are many tools for saving videos, or marking them for later viewing. Schedule a block of time every week to look over what you’ve saved and either consume it or get rid of it.
Ask Others What Their Productive News Sources Are
Your friends and colleagues have their own favorite sources of news. When someone seems to know something others don’t, or seems faster to identify an opportunity, ask them how they learned of it. Most people are pleased to be recognized for their superior judgment. They will be happy to tell you about their productive news sources.
