Work Interrupted


Work Interrupted: A Conversation with Social and Organizational Scientists on
Work Interruptions and How to Get Work Done in this New World of Work


Click here to access the video to the virtual panel!

In partnership with the Vistex Institute for Executive Learning and Research, Lehigh University College of Business, we host a virtual conversation about “Work Interrupted” with four amazing scholars: Marlys Christianson, Erik Dane, Sophie Leroy, and Shimul Melwani.

Session organizers and moderators: Brianna Caza, and Naomi Rothman


Academic Articles

Barton MA, Christianson M, Myers CG, et al Resilience in action: leading for resilience in response to COVID-19 BMJ Leader. https://bmjleader.bmj.com/content/early/2020/05/27/leader-2020-000260

  • Resilience in the face of crisis, which talks about creating good interruptions. 

Baer, M., Dane, E., & Madrid, H. P. (In press). Zoning out or breaking through? Linking daydreaming to creativity in the workplace. Forthcoming in Academy of Management Journal.

Dane, E. (In press). Attention, please: How the attention-related stories we tell our students in class can influence their performance at work. Forthcoming in Academy of Management Learning & Education.

Dane, E. (2018). Where is my mind? Theorizing mind wandering and its performance-related consequences in organizations. Academy of Management Review, 43, 179-197.

Leroy, S., Schmidt, A.M., and Madjar, N. (2020). Interruptions and task transitions: Understanding their characteristics, processes, and consequences. Academy of Management Annals, 14, 2, 661–694. https://doi.org/10.5465/annals.2017.0146

Leroy, S. and Glomb, T. (2018). Tasks interrupted: How anticipating time pressure upon return to an interrupted task leads to attention residue and low performance on interrupting tasks and how a "ready-to-resume" plan mitigates those effects. Organization Science, 29, 3 357-546.  https://doi.org/10.1287/orsc.2017.1184

Leroy, S. and Schmidt, A.M. (2016). The effect of regulatory focus on attention residue and performance during interruptions. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Process, 137, 218–235. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.obhdp.2016.07.006

Leroy, S. (2009). Why is it so hard to do my work? The challenge of attention residue when switching between work tasks. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 109, 168-181. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.obhdp.2009.04.002

Sutcliffe, K. M., Vogus, T. J., & Dane, E. (2016). Mindfulness in organizations: A cross-level review. Annual Review of Organizational Psychology and Organizational Behavior, 3, 55-81.


TED Talks

Adam Alter: “Why Our Screens Make Us Less Happy”: https://www.ted.com/talks/adam_alter_why_our_screens_make_us_less_happy 

Cal Newport: “Why You Should Quit Social Media”: https://www.ted.com/talks/cal_newport_why_you_should_quit_social_media?language=en


Practitioner oriented Articles

Barton and Sutcliffe’s MIT Sloan Review article: https://sloanreview.mit.edu/article/learning-when-to-stop-momentum/

Leroy, S. and Glomb, T. “A Plan for Managing (Constant) Interruptions at work” https://hbr.org/2020/06/a-plan-for-managing-constant-interruptions-at-work

NBC News, February 21, 2018. A better way to deal with those constant interruptions

Cal Newport article on remote work: https://www.newyorker.com/culture/annals-of-inquiry/can-remote-work-be-fixed


Interviews/Podcasts

The David Pakman Show, June 2019: There's No Such Thing as Multitasking

Podcast/audio interview: Quartz, Fall 2018: The productivity paradox

TV interview: King 5, Seattle, February 12, 2018: Stay on task with a plan for productivity