Learning and creativity often take a hit under remote work conditions. What’s happening in your brain when this occurs and what can you do about it? When employees come together to brainstorm, they often enter a state of ‘burstiness’, where they are rapidly bouncing concepts around, building on each others’ ideas and getting closer to finding an innovative solution. But in remote work environments, the creative spark is often extinguished.

When you’re in the physical presence of another person, you feel their presence through body language, smell, and touch. Video calls cause cognitive dissonance, which causes people to have conflicting feelings, and makes it exhausting to be in the conversation. We spend more mental effort on a video call managing our own presence and checking how we’re coming across, which is draining our attention from the actual conversation that’s taking place.

When we’re together, we can learn from and build off each other’s ideas. When we’re in a creative zone, we can focus very deeply. In-person interactions allow complementary ideas to sit side by side, and allow for creative ideation. When you’re physically with another person, you give off 2000 chemo signals that help you process information and make creative ideas.

Creativity is as much a group activity as it is an individual exercise in contemplation. Employees need to swap between the group phase in a live situation and the individual phase to ensure effective creative processes. Though you might engage in eye contact over a screen, video calls are not as rich as in-person interactions.

There is a solution:

• Spend some time in a quiet space, internally focused.
• Don’t directly focus on the problem you are trying to solve
• Have less video meetings – save them for high-value conversations
• Have a break
• Focus on your to-do list to reset your brain

In meetings, extroverts thrive because they have a captive audience, a large group of people around them, and plenty of opportunities to talk. In contrast, endless meetings exhaust introverts who need a break to recharge their energy, or who may simply want to listen quietly. In spite of this, introverts’ inward-looking nature can prevent them from sharing their creative ideas with others.

Consider your creative moments and look for an environment that triggers them

Be aware of the pros and cons of your own personality.

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