Letting your mind wander — if focused on the right things — can be a good use of your business day. Getty Images

The mind is prone to wander. Commonly known as daydreaming – the state of mental disconnection from the task at hand – it can take up as much as half of the typical workday.

Some research suggests this may be a good thing. Wandering minds help us adapt to problems, the reasoning goes, because by briefly changing our focus, we can solve problems more creatively.

That's not to say daydreaming is always benign. We prefer that the E.R. surgeon focus on the operation. The boxer is best off concentrating on slipping a punch. In general, when it comes to one-time tasks, daydreaming is suboptimal.

Rice Business professor Erik Dane has tried to bridge these two different views of mind wandering at work. In a recent paper, Dane suggests that while daydreaming can undermine productivity, it is also a critical problem-solving tool.

In an extensive literature review, Dane explored a series of questions about how mind wandering works. Based on current research, he concluded that a wandering mind can be positive if where it wanders is work related. Such a wandering mind helps employees conceive of possibilities not previously considered.

There's a vast difference between daydreaming and plain distraction, Dane notes. Turning your attention from composing a strategy memo to answering an annoying text from the cable company is not mind- wandering – it's digression (or multitasking). And when you look up from cooking dinner to see your neighbor hacking down your bamboo, that's not mind wandering – it's annoyance.

Mind wandering implies instead that your thoughts have drifted from the present altogether. From a neuroscience perspective, it is a journey into the brain's "default network" – a mode of functioning that occurs when the mind is not consumed with demands in one's surroundings. When you're driving home and forget to stop at the grocery store because you're envisioning your imminent vacation to Barcelona, that's mind wandering.

According to Dane, mind wandering can be good for businesses – if it revolves around work issues. Wandering on your downtime may steal a few moments from your personal life, but it's a powerful way to take advantage of relaxation to solve professional problems.

There are other ways mind wandering can be positive. Think for a moment about James Thurber's classic character Walter Mitty, whose mind is constantly taking flights of fancy. He's not as hapless as he might seem. Outside the work context, Dane writes, mind wandering allows us to conceive of possibilities, scenarios and images disconnected from time and, in some cases, basic feasibility. But it's the quintessential first step of innovation.

Another type of mind wandering involves movement through time. Past, present and future mingle. As a manager mulls strategies for handling a problem employee, her thoughts may slide to a time when she too was considered a problem at work. The memories, context and details swirling through her mind may redirect her toward a less-obvious solution to the conundrum.

But mind wandering is not all positive. It can easily devolve into thoughts and feelings that inhibit performance. The stress from negative daydreams may even discourage a worker from focusing on a task – or doing it at all.

To facilitate job performance, Dane writes, it's important to keep in mind your work goals. It's also essential to stay positive – even as you let your thoughts drift. In other words, focus on goals, their associated tasks and sub-goals, and steer clear of distracting worries, which can keep you from finding solutions.

The more you succumb to anxiety, Dane warns, the more the associated cognitive effects will undermine your performance. It's a skill, in other words: relax enough to be creative, yet keep the negative thoughts in check. Like getting comfortable with new software or maximizing production on an assembly line, productive mind wandering is learnable, Dane promises. And unlike a computer or a car factory, the tools within our brains only grow more productive with use.

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This article originally appeared on Rice Business Wisdom.

Erik Dane is an associate professor of management at the Jones Graduate School of Business at Rice University.

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Mark Cuban calls AI ‘the greater democratizer’ for young entrepreneurs

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Texas billionaire Mark Cuban—whose investment portfolio includes Houston-based Holliball, a startup that makes and sells large inflatable holiday ornaments—believes AI is leveling the playing field for budding low-income entrepreneurs.

At the recent Clover x Shark Tank Summit in Las Vegas, the Shark Tank alum called AI “the greater democratizer.”

Cuban told Axios that free and low-cost AI tools enable disadvantaged teenagers to compete with seasoned professionals.

“Right now, if you’re a 14- to 18-year-old and you’re in not-so-good circumstances, you have access to the best professors and the best consultants,” Cuban said. “It allows people who otherwise would not have access to any resources to have access to the best resources in real time. You can compete with anybody.”

While Cuban believes AI is “the great democratizer” for low-income young people, low-income workers still face hurdles in navigating the AI landscape, according to Public Works Partners, an urban planning and consulting firm. The firm says access to AI among low-income workers may be limited due to cost, insufficient digital literacy and infrastructure gaps.

“Without adequate resources and training, these workers may struggle to adapt to AI-driven workplaces or access the educational opportunities necessary to acquire new skills,” Public Works Partners said.

Texas 2036, a public policy organization focused on the state’s future, reported in January AI jobs in Texas are projected to grow 27 percent over the next decade. The number 2036 refers to the year when Texas will celebrate its bicentennial.

As for the current state of AI, Cuban said he doesn’t think the economy is witnessing an AI bubble comparable to the dot-com bubble, which lasted from 1998 to 2000.

“The difference is, the improvement in technology basically slowed to a trickle,” Cuban said of the dot-com era. “We’re nowhere near the improvement in technology slowing to a trickle in AI.”

CPRIT hires MD Anderson official as chief cancer prevention officer

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The Austin-based Cancer Prevention and Research Institute of Texas, which provides funding for cancer research across the state, has hired Ruth Rechis as its chief prevention officer. She comes to CPRIT from Houston’s University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, where she led the Cancer Prevention and Control Platform.

Before joining MD Anderson, Rechis was a member of the executive leadership team at the Livestrong Foundation, an Austin-based nonprofit that supports people affected by cancer.

“Ruth has widespread connections throughout the cancer prevention community, both in Texas and across the nation,” CPRIT CEO Kristen Doyle said in a news release. “She is a long-term passionate supporter of CPRIT, and she is very familiar with our process, programs, and commitment to transparency. Ruth is a terrific addition to the team here at CPRIT.”

Rechis said that by collaborating with researchers, policymakers, public health leaders and community partners, CPRIT “can continue to drive forward proven prevention strategies that improve health outcomes, lower long-term costs, and create healthier futures for all.”

At MD Anderson, Rechis and her team worked with more than 100 organizations in Texas to bolster cancer prevention initiatives at clinics and community-based organizations.

Rechis is a longtime survivor of Hodgkin lymphoma, a type of cancer that affects the lymph nodes, which are part of a person’s immune system.