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January 2021 #13258 Page #110
Signal-to-Noise Ratio in Our Lives By Omer Abdullah
T
he signal-to-noise ratio measures the level of a desired signal to the level of background noise. It’s commonly used in science and engineering applications but, of course, it has as much application in our professional and personal worlds, metaphorically speaking anyway. When someone close to us emotionally recounts a personal situation and demands that we get involved and do something about it – and we do. Or when an irate colleague tells us we need to do this, that, or the other, else the world is going to go to hell in a handbasket. And so we do. In either case, are we reacting to the signal or the noise? Making that distinction is the key to us staying focused on the “right” things – the stuff that really makes or breaks us, the stuff that moves us forward. The problem is, though, that so much of our lives gets caught up in reacting to the noise rather than the signal itself. We become focused on the language being used. We’re thrown by the tone. Or we’re taken aback by the volume. All of these can tend to obfuscate the actual content of the discussion. They lead to us making emotional decisions, which are almost always the wrong ones.
Photo by Alexandre Debiève on Unsplash
Signal-to-noise plays out in more than just relationships, though. It impacts whether we move forward with our mission or not. We get caught up in email and spend all day responding to what’s incoming, rather than sitting back and thinking about how we get there. We focus on our To-Do lists and not on the priority items
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