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Regaining Deep Work After Moving to a Distributed Team

1 min read
career reflection productivity

The problem

Remote work eliminated commute time but replaced it with Slack threads that never end. My focus blocks shrank from 3 hours to 45 minutes.

What I tried

  1. Slack schedule: Notifications off until 11 AM. Morning is for writing code, not reacting.
  2. Focus status: A status emoji that means “will reply within 4 hours, not minutes.”
  3. Written updates: Instead of a standup meeting, a daily written summary in a shared doc.

What stuck

The biggest change was meeting audit. Every recurring meeting got a test: “Could this be a written update?” About 40% could.

What I learned

Deep work requires environmental design, not willpower. If Slack is open, you will check it. If your calendar has back-to-back meetings, you won’t write code. Design the environment first, then trust yourself to work.