The real location where we all need to be is connecting at local events. Let’s get to it:

Hey! Andres here,

Welcome to the networking desk! Every week, as you know I put together the best local events I find and share it with you guys.

ALSO, let me share your stories :) it can be anything, networking tips, business wins, I will share them here and link you so you can connect with this community.

🌟 Don’t forget to share your networking wins (or business wins and tips) to be featured next time!

Here’s what we got this week:

• Lean forward moment

• Local Events list

Alright, let’s do this.

“Lean forward moment” of the week - 🗺️The Location Effect

Honestly this week I did not feel as productive… not even creative for that matter.

I thought and thought about a topic for this week, and nothing.

Until I switched places, I went to work at this quiet room on my apartment’s lobby.

So guess what I am diving into today? LOL yep. Location and productivity.

I wonder why ideas flow better when we are in different environments. I did quite a bit of digging and here’s what I found:

I actually found quite a bit, but let me give you the quick tl;dr if you don’t want to nerd out with me (which it’s totally ok):

• Feels fresh for our brain → gives a small dopamine boost.

• Fewer familiar distractions (no laundry, TV, or anything else staring at you).

• The place becomes a “cue” for the task (Starbucks = writing, office = meetings).

• Travel creates a start/stop ritual. You sit, do the thing, then leave.

• roughly 70 dB of “loudness” helps the brain with staying focused.

• “social facilitation” having Which leads me to people around helps to do repetitive tasks

Alright now let’s get deep into the questions I wanted to answer:

1. How long until a place “gets old”?

So… for this one there is basically not set time.

The thing is that a new place gives you novelty that fades fast.

When reading, it mentioned that the way our brains are wired is to want more novelty, think in evolution humans travelled long distances even when they were good in some areas, always searching to new things.

Places only get old when we abuse them and stop relating the task that we went there to do initially for just thinking that the place was the reason why we completed our goals.

1. are there tricks that I can use to avoid this productivity decrease?

Actually yes, there is quite a bit of few threads that you can use to make a place not feel repetitive, like switching locations and relating each to an activity, taking breaks in between to mark a new start of a task…

Also, the same way that we go to a place, and we relate the place to the activity we need to make our workstation be related to the activity that we're trying to achieve think for example lights position smell any cues that we create around our environment can mean something for our brain to get into the mode of completing a task, which leads me to…

1. Are there changes to our offices we could make to make them feel distinct enough to not have to switch places all the time?

This one I found very interesting. It kind of works like how I have my home set to do different things at different times, let me explain. At 11pm my AC switches to be colder, as I want it to be cold for when I go to sleep, I often find myself looking for a blanket when I hear the click of the AC switching, haha I conditioned myself.

My notes on each thing that can be done:

• For idea generation and writing, a moderate hum, about 70 dB, improves creative performance compared with very quiet rooms. Think coffee shop level noise.

• For heads-down focus, reduce intelligible speech. Better absorption and level-adaptive sound masking improve perceived concentration and reduce distraction in open offices.

• Blue-enriched white light during the day improves subjective alertness and some performance measures in office settings. Smart bulbs make this easy to toggle.

• Distinct ambient smells can serve as context cues and aid later recall when reinstated. Novel or clearly different scents work best. Example, rosemary for “focus,” citrus for “admin.”

Activity-based workplaces support different tasks in different micro-settings. Reviews find benefits when quiet, privacy, and choice are present, and drawbacks when they are not. In a single office, you can mimic this with movable cues.

1. Does have a person (even if on a call) working with you make you more productive or less?

This explains why I like to do many tasks alone, as they are mostly new, and non-repetitive…

This can also lead to loneliness but with a well-balanced routine this can be overcome, I use Wednesdays for example to do all day interactions so meetings, and take hours during the day to do samey work, alongside my VA on a call, we can talk while doing minor, more repeatable tasks.

Closing Thoughts.

Because we attach goals to being at a location, this makes café, libraries etc., feel more productive.

We get tired of them when we try to go there every day and expect the same initial result.

The reason why it doesn't work is that we attached a goal to the location, and we made it which increased our dopamine and felt good, but it can’t be achieved if we are trying to do more than we can in a day.

We can schedule main tasks per day and attached them to a location. Like I will get this video script done at Starbucks then come back home. And we can do different objectives with different locations each week.

I think my best recommendation is to create a daily goal of what makes a day successful 1–3 tasks then associate them to a location or spot in your office, then just go there and get it done, this was very interesting to research and I would love to hear your thoughts!

💻 Shameless plug

Hey! In case you didn’t know, I make websites and help non-profits to stay top of mind to create more revenue.

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🗓️ Now, the events…

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Thank you for reading! Quick thing before I go:

1. If you are new or would like to read older posts, check out this page. There is a backlog of previous weeks of “The Networking Desk”

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See you next week.

- Andres Inciarte