Talk about irony! The modern office space has become one of the worst places to be if you need to be productive. With ringing phones, chiming emails, interrupting coworkers, and meetings held to determine if you should hold meetings, it is hard to get any work done.

The solution? Most people revert to longer hours. That’s a big mistake.

Longer hours make you feel like you are working hard (hence being more productive), but the truth is you are not. You are simply availing yourself a few continuous hours where you won’t be distracted. If you stay at the office past 7pm, the phones won’t ring… much. The coworker distractions will be lessened, too. And if you can discipline yourself not to check your PDA, from 7pm to 10pm you will finally get your work done.

There is a better way that I discovered while at the library. I now use this technique in every business I own, and the result has been increased productivity and fewer work hours for everyone, every time.

You should apply this same approach at your office, and your productivity will climb too. Here is the method:

1. Every day, during the morning hours, designate two hours as “library hours”.
2. During this time (I recommend 9:30am to 11:30am) employees may not interrupt, ask for help or otherwise distract any other employee.
3. Additionally, during these two hours, employees are required to turn off email and PDAs.
4. Also during this time, the office must be quiet. There are no outbound calls made and inbound calls are sent to voice mail.
5. And of course, each employee must work on their most important project.

Are there a million and one excuses not to do this? Sure! I hear them all the time. “But I need to be on the phone.” “I need the help from Mike down the hallway, it will save me hours.” “How can I serve clients, when I can’t be on my email?”

The funny thing is those complaints fade away quickly. It really is a withdrawal from the past, always busy but nonproductive ways of the past. After a few weeks of the new rule’s enforcement, you will see a change. A big change.

You and your colleagues will get more done in less time, you won’t need to work the late hours. Oh yeah, and people (this includes you too) will be under a lot less stress.

All this, thanks to the library.