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Do You Make These Mental Basketball Shooting Mistakes?

ก.ย. 6

Posted by admin in Shooting | No Comments

You can have the most superior physical attributes in the world, but without the proper mental attitude, it’s all for nothing!

By developing an effective basketball shooting mentality, you can expect to boost your shooting percentage by 20% or more!!

HOWEVER, very few players and coaches look into the mental aspect of shooting because the subject seems so mysterious…

Fortunately, it’s really not that difficult…  But it IS critically important — important enough that we’ve written many articles about the mental aspects of basketball shooting!

Just as there are mechanical fundamentals that you can check on in order to develop a more effective shot motion, there are mental fundamentals that you can check on in order to develop focus and confidence.

Understanding negative impacts…

Before going into the details of how to develop an effective mental approach, let’s take a look at what often happens if you have NOT devoted enough (if any) attention to the mental aspects of shooting.  If you think about your shooting slumps in the past, this will probably sound very familiar to you.

Here’s how it unfolds and how your mind can really become almost like an enemy:

Say you have one of those days where you miss a couple of shots. Suddenly, you start thinking, “Geez, maybe I’m OFF today!” 

You tighten up and miss another shot.  Then you start getting worried because you don’t want to lose the game for your team, or you don’t want your teammates to get mad at you for missing so many shots. 

With each missed shot, your anxiety increases, your muscles tighten up more, and you get farther and farther out of “the zone”.

You become more and more frustrated and wonder why your shots aren’t falling.

Your mind is focused on whether or not you’ll make the next shot.  Or perhaps you’re thinking about your mechanics while you shoot…

Either way, you’re thinking WAY too much and in counter-productive ways!  By this time, everything has snowballed and you’re in a HORRIBLE shooting slump!!!

Does this story sound familiar?

That’s how your mind can work AGAINST you!!  Sometimes a slump is really short – maybe only for one quarter of a game. Other times, it can last an ENTIRE season!

It’s important for you to understand what physically happens when you get in those “shooting slumps”.

You may not even notice it, but your body and muscles become physically tight when you start to worry about missing your shots.

Anxiety hinders your performance at a physical level. That’s why…

 Thinking is your enemy!

 The fear of failure is your enemy!

 Mind clutter is your enemy!

Now that you understand some of the negative effects that your mind can have on your shot, you have the opportunity to eliminate those “negative thoughts”.

To learn more about improving your basketball shooting percentage and the mental aspects of shooting, check out these free articles and tips: http://www.breakthroughbasketball.com/pr/btshooting.html

Jeff Haefner is the owner of www.breakthroughbasketball.com. He?s been playing for over 20 years and coaching for 10 years.

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History of Clay Pigeon Shooting

ก.ย. 4

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Clay shooting is the art of aiming at special flying targets. This sports activity has a long history as it was commenced way back in 1880. At that time, pheasant and grouse shooting were mainly popular in the UK.

During the period from 1883-1887, significant changes in shooting were witnessed when the first clay target was introduced in the game.

 

This form of clay shooting was well included in the Victorian and Edwardian hunting parties, where numerous birds were used as targets. People used to do regular practice of their shooing skills. In fact, institutions such as the Shooting Schools in London catered the desires and installed traps and towers that would facilitate flight of game birds. Later, many others targets were introduced as a discipline in shooting. Also, during this era only, it was given the name of sporting and tournaments were held in London to promote this sporting activity.

 

Before initiation of clay shooting, the game of glass ball was quite popular in England that took place in several parts of the United States. Historically, the first tournament of glass ball was held in 1867 in Boston. But, due to some reasons, it didn’t get its desired place.

 

In France clay shooting went under a real revolution when the first hand throwing device, the “Hand Trap” was used in shooting in the year 1927. That inventor of the throwing device was known as, Emile Laporte. In this shooting sport, targets are thrown from a machine known as a trap. The trap is made up of a spring which was loaded with throwing metal arm. The machine can throw the targets up to the distances covering the range the area of 135metres. In 1980’s, automatic traps were developed, giving a boost to the clay shooting sport and encouraging people to take up the challenge.

I webmaster of http://www.southernpursuits.co.uk/ dealing in all types of outdoor activities such as Clay Shooting, off road karting, quad biking, Clay shooting, 4×4 driving, archery, team building, corporate events all over the UK. Choose from our program for the ultimate adventure day and experience something new with your friends and colleagues.

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Types of Clay Pigeon Shooting

ก.ย. 3

Posted by admin in Shooting | No Comments

 

Clay shooting is one of the most popular activities for all activity days out. It is a perfect adventure days out activity for people who like the thrill of firing a weapon at a target, but are quite passionate about animal’s safety and security; clay pigeon shooting is tailored for meeting everyone’s interest.

 

Basically, there are many types of clay pigeon shooting the shooter to take part in and enjoy. Here, we’ll talk about the main disciplines of the clay shooting.

 

World Sporting

In this gaming activity, mainly three to four traps per stand is used. Here, shooting sequences from the traps is available in a similar way to compak sporting. On a 100 target shoot between 10 and 13 stands will be used. This type of shooting activity provides a shooter a quite realistic approach of chasing their targets in comparatively low costs.

 

In this shooting activity, a shooter gets to shoot reversed sequence report pairs. In addition to it, he can choose the best simultaneous pairs on a three trap layout to get the most fulfilling entertainment.

 

English Sporting

English Sporting is one of the most popular forms of clay pigeon shooting. Here, a shooter can shoot two different targets at the same time. In this sporting event, targets chosen are normally quartering targets, crossers, driven, overhead, rabbits, and others to create the most competent and compatible environment for every shooter. In today’s English Sporting game, different layouts are provided to inculcate constant challenging flavor in shooting.

In this gaming , the targets can be launched as singles or pairs. The pair would consist either of one target, then the second being launched the instant a shot is fired or both targets fired at the same time.

If you haven’t tasted the pleasure of clay shooting, it is the time you taste the pleasure of hitting the right target with your roaring gun.

I webmaster of http://www.southernpursuits.co.uk/ dealing in all types of outdoor activities such as Clay Shooting, off road karting, quad biking, Clay shooting, 4×4 driving, archery, team building, corporate events all over the UK. Choose from our program for the ultimate adventure day and experience something new with your friends and colleagues.

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Basketball Shooting Drills: Increasing Your Freethrow Accuracy

ก.ย. 1

Posted by admin in Shooting | No Comments

While not really an offensive basketball shooting move, free throws are very important as they still contribute points to the scoreboards. It has been proven many times over that free throws can be crucial in important games. Such fact warrants that every basketball player should be accurate from the foul line, or else end up like Shaquille O’Neal who, during his younger days in the NBA, was the target of consistent fouling to make him go to the freethrow line. His poor freethrow shooting made him a liability during tight ball games.

While it can be an easy shot for most players, especially those with a knack for midrange and 3-point shooting, a freethrow can also be the most difficult to make. Players who have low self-confidence or can be easily broken psychologically experience difficulties in making a freethrow, even if they are exceptionally good shooters during game time. Mental pressure does come into play during freethrows – crowds booing, other team players saying things for distraction, and even the gravity of situation can spell a lot on a person’s freethrow accuracy.

Apart from the usual, basic method of freethrow practice, there are several basketball shooting drills that are effective in increasing freethrow accuracy, though in general these drills and basketball shooting workouts are used to improve a player’s midrange shooting.

To The Foul Line

This drill is designed for novices who are starting to work with their freethrows. There are three different shooting spots in this drill, all places in front and straight from the basket. Position A is located just a foot in front of the basket. Position B is slightly farther away, just between Position A and the foul line. Position C is at the freethrow line.

For this particular drill, you will need two players and at least one basketball.

Instructions:

Player 1 will start from Position A and try to make as many shots as possible within 1 minute. Player 2 will grab the rebounds and pass them to Player 1. While shooting, coaches should emphasize the proper basketball shooting form when doing the drill. Since this is a freethrow exercise, coaches should also instill to the player that he should not jump and must remain planted on his feet.

If Player 1 is able to make 20 shots within 1 minute, he can now move on to the second spot and repeat the same procedure. If he makes another set of 20 shots within the same amount of time, he can then move to the freethrow line.

The goal of this drill is to teach basketball novices the basics of freethrow shooting and getting them accustomed to take shots without jumping. This drill also helps them to adjust their strength when shooting near or far from the basket. By gradually moving them away from the basket, they get more and more proficient with not just their freethrow shooting, but overall shooting skills in general.

But accuracy is only half of the equation as a player must also be tough mentally to block out any distractions. Teaching kids some useful tips like having a mantra or a habit to help them relax before taking a freethrow shot improves the players’ chance of making the shot.

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Duck Hunting Game – Shooting Down The Ugly Duckling

ส.ค. 31

Posted by admin in Shooting | No Comments

During the 1980′s, the 1st hunting video game which was made was a game called duck hunt for the video game console, Nintendo. It needed the use of one special laser gun which allowed us to shoot ducks or ducks. You would be accompanied by one hunting dog which laughs if you miss a duck and would clap when you shoot one. Its graphics were basic and its landscape was not very much exciting, but this game was the base for the technology to move forward to the place where we’re today – having various duck hunt games to select from for all the video game consoles as well as in the personal system.

There’re various duck hunting games available for our personal computer -either you utilise an IBM-based computer or a Macintosh one. The software which is available today will be very much advanced and would give many options while it comes to the duck hunt experience. Software games which you install in your computer would give you different locations where you may hunt along with options of weapons and also various duck’s sizes. A good duck hunt game which comes in the software form would give you one online demo in their web site such that you may try the game before you get it.

Just like other hunting games, one can also get a good duck hunt game on the web and often can play it freely. While not as developed and in-depth like software versions, they’re fun nevertheless and don’t cost anything for playing other than small amount of time for registering as one member of the particular site and the site’s community.

While you’re looking for any good duck hunt game, you should take into consideration which interests you very much. Do you want to shoot many ducks or are you very much interested in lying down waiting as ducks come into the picture from hiding and will try to avoid the bullets? Maybe you would want a mix of both in the duck hunt game with multi-players capability such that you may play against your friends.

Whatever you think you need in a duck hunt game, we’re sure you’ll be able to see it. Whether it’s in the local video game’s store or any online retailer, there are many to select from and they’re readily got. So go ahead, get a duck hunt game, press that trigger, and start shooting. Oh yeah, have fun!

Download Abhishek’s FREE 66 Pages Ebook, “How To Play And Enjoy Hunting Video Games” from his website http://www.Hunting-Guru.com/100/index.htm . Only limited Free Copies available.

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Seven Soccer Shooting Tips

ส.ค. 30

Posted by admin in Shooting | No Comments

Introduction

In this article I will provide you with valuable soccer shooting tips that will surely increase your overall soccer skills. You may reprint these tips and have them as a checklist while practicing on your shooting skills. Let’s start…

Bigger Leg Muscles – Building bigger leg muscles will make it easier to shoot harder. However, you will also get more resistant against serious muscle injuries. However, you are not after some bodybuilder leg muscles. It is therefore vital for you to combine your leg training with ball training. One way is to lift weights one day and practice on shooting next day. By practicing like this you will be able to increase your muscle mass while you will maintain your flexibility and adaptability on the soccer field.

Shooting with accuracy – Shooting doesn’t only mean kicking the ball with great force. What is more vital is to kick the ball with accuracy. If you can’t kick the ball with accuracy then how do you then expect to get it on the goal? Of course, you may have luck and get one of this great hard shoots but believe me; you will score many more goals by having a solid accuracy.

Different methods for shooting – You should not only focus on improving one type of shoot. While practicing on your shooting skills you should try to use your instep, outside, and inside of foot. You can’t just limit yourself to one shooting method as different situations require different types of shoot. For ex; it is better to shoot with the inside of your foot from 8-12 yards range. However, 20 + yards ranges are perfect for instep shoots.

Analyze your game – You should try to analyze your performance after every soccer game. You may for ex use a block and take notice on how many goals (if you scored any :-) you have scored, the amount of shoots that have hit the goal, how many times you have managed to dribble your defender and so on. By analyze your own performance you will be able to spot mistakes and correct them in the next game. However, you should try to not analyze your game after a defeat as you will be emotionally too involved.

Find a goalkeeper to practice with – It is great for your overall soccer skills to find a goalkeeper to practice with. You will also have much more fun comparing to practicing by yourself and an empty goal. A goalie will keep you more focused and you will also get a chance to practice on real game situations.

You may also set up a competition between you and the goalkeeper where the losers must buy a Coca Cola or Pizza. I can ensure you that you will do everything in you power to win that battle. I mean, is there any better than a cold Coca Cola and a juicy pizza? :-)

Watch LIVE or Professional Games on TV – This exercise doesn’t require any physical efforts. However, you should try to watch professional soccer matches as often you can. Bring a note block and write down from which positions the professional players are shooting, which part of foot they use, what they to after the shoot and so on.

Satisfied is a No, No – You should never feel satisfied with your shooting skills. Keep in mind that there are always things you can improve and you should always try to improve these no matter how good you are.

My English may not be the best in the world but I can ensure you that my soccer knowledge is pretty good.



http://www.soccer-training-guide.com

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Basketball Workouts: Free Throw Shooting

ส.ค. 30

Posted by admin in Shooting | No Comments

Free throw shooting is a very important part of playing winning basketball. If you disagree then look at all the close games that are lost and then look at the losing teams free throw percentage. If they could have have only made 2 or 3 more free throws then they could have won.

You hear the phrase “You have to learn how to win.” Well one part of learning how to win is making your free throws. So lets talk about basketball shooting drills to improve your free throw shooting.

To be an excellent free throw shooter I believe that you need to have a routine at the foul line. Find a routine that you are comfortable with and will relax you. Do this routine every time you are shooting a free throw.

The second thing to remember is having good fundamentals when shooting the free throw. Make sure you bend your knees and get your legs into the shot. The legs are very important, especially late in a game when you are tired.
Have your shooting hand behind the ball on the fingertips and use your off hand as a guide. As you begin to shoot you will drop your off hand from the ball and then extend your shooting arm to the sky. Your hand will naturally wave good bye to the ball. Make sure you have arc and backspin on the ball. That will give you the shooters roll.

When practicing your free throws you can do these two things.

1. Stand at the foul line and shoot hundreds of foul shots a day. This will improve your foul shooting because of the repetition and hard work you are putting in. Please understand that you must be practicing the correct fundamentals of shooting and always do your routine. If you practice the wrong fundamentals, then you will not improve. You are just practicing the wrong way to shoot.

2. Put yourself in game time situations
Never shoot more than 2 foul shots at time or 3 if you are fouled taking a three pointer. The point is to put yourself in game time situations. Shoot one and one, 2 foul shots and 3 foul shots. After shooting your foul shots, you can:

• Run suicides – this will increase your endurance and also make you tired so you can practice what it feels like to take foul shots late in the game when you are tired.

• Shot 10 shots on floor where you normally shoot in the game. After the 10 shots, go the line and put yourself in a game time situation. For example, 2 shots, down by 2 with 30 seconds to play.

• Do ball handling drills – do these drills for about 5 minutes then go the foul line and make up a game time situation.

Repeat the drills until you have made 100 free throws.

I personally like the second method of practicing free throws. This way you are practicing the same thing that you will doing in a game. There will be less pressure on you because you have practiced this many times in the gym to prepare for this moment.

To learn more basketball workouts to help improve your game visit this site: basketball workouts

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Basketball Shooting Tips: How to Develop the “Right” Mental Attitude and Improve Your Shooting

ส.ค. 29

Posted by admin in Shooting | No Comments

The mental aspects of shooting are critically important. A good mental attitude and confidence can literally increase your shooting percentage by 20%!

It’s all about getting yourself in the right state of mind…

To get yourself in the “mental zone”, you should master three key areas. Study and apply the following aspects and you’ll be on your way:

1) Don’t Think When Shooting the Basketball.

You’ll hear this from us many times because it’s important…

”Thinking about your shot is for practice, NOT for games!”

In fact, you should only think during certain parts of your practice. It’s ok to think during a form shooting session or when learning a new skill, but once you start developing rhythm and get further into practice, don’t think!

The absolute WORST THING you can do during a game is to start thinking about the mechanics of your shot. Train yourself to think about other things or nothing at all.

Thinking about your shot during a game does NO good! You’re going to miss a few. So what!

Don’t think, just shoot the damn ball!!!

If you adopt this mentality, your shooting percentage will go UP.
You might want to come up with your own method to stop thinking during games. Often times, simply being aware of the common problem can tremendously help players.

But if you want a technique to eliminate thinking, you can also try this little trick…

Before each game, practice, and shooting session, tell yourself that you don’t care if you make any baskets. Say it out loud or in your head several times.

THEN, when you go to shoot (right as you’re catching the ball), say something to yourself like, “Nice shot. I can do better.” In other words, try not to care if it goes in or not.

This simple little trick helps you to relax into the process and not think about the result. Using this technique will be enough to break you out of mini slumps and restore your confidence.

2) Eliminate the Fear of Failure.

Guess what?

The best NBA shooters miss more than half of the time!!

That’s right; they FAIL more than they SUCCEED.

Shooting is an activity of failure.

Guess what else?

Fear of failure can cause you to miss more shots than you can imagine. Think about this for a moment…

Even the smallest fear of missing causes anxiety. Anxiety causes tense muscles and a clouded mind. Tense muscles lead to missed shots.

You can’t worry about missing. It’s going to happen. Accept the fact that you’re going to miss shots in every game that you play. If you can accept this, you will become a better player.

Here are a few tactics and basketball shooting tips to help you eliminate the fear of missing. It’s not that hard to do once you understand these concepts:

- Remind yourself that the greatest shooters of all time have missed about HALF of the shots that they’ve taken.

- Develop an understanding of what a good shot is for your range, ability, and specific game situations. Take good shots only.

- Let the coach coach. It’s up to the coach to take you out of a game or to tell you to stop shooting. Meanwhile, keep taking those good shots.

- Before every game, tell yourself that you’re more than just a shooter. You can help your team by rebounding, playing defense, and passing the ball. So even if your shot doesn’t go in all the time, it’s OK. You can contribute in other ways. By keeping these realities in mind, you reduce the pressure on your shot.

- Don’t get upset and throw fits when you miss. Instead of muttering something negative after a miss, be calmly aware of exactly why the shot missed. If you’ve practiced enough and have solid fundamentals, you will subconsciously realize what you need to correct on your next shot.

- A more direct and active approach is to add a corrective phrase that reinforces the proper fundamental that was lacking in the missed shot. Do this at practice. In games, you want to be shooting without extra thinking or stress.

3) Clear your mind and get in the zone.

Have you ever been in the zone?

Do you remember what it was like?

We’ll bet you a hundred bucks that the last time you were in “the zone”, you were completely relaxed and you weren’t thinking. It probably happened by complete accident.

Well, getting in the zone doesn’t always have to be an accident. You can clear your mind to get there on a consistent basis.

Here’s how:

Make an effort to take care of issues away from basketball in order to clear your mind of unnecessary clutter.

If you agreed to clean the floor for your mother, clean the floor and get it over with. Take care of any prior commitments that you’ve made.

Cleaning up your life OFF the court will certainly help your mental attitude ON the court.

Another tip to clear the “mind clutter” that happens away from the court is to make lists. Keep an up-to-date list of all the things that you need to do. You might have a “home to-do list”, “basketball to-do list”, and “school/work to-do list”. The key is to get your list on paper or on the computer where you can easily reference it.

These to-do lists will ease your mind because you’ll subconsciously know that you have everything written down, so you won’t forget. This allows you to de-clutter your mind with all these things you are supposed to remember.

Get in the Alpha state.

Have you ever heard of the Alpha state and how much better the mind works in this relaxed condition? Your mind is actually much more powerful in a tranquil state. Just by teaching your mind to relax, you can dramatically improve your shooting percentage!!

When your mind is truly relaxed and in the Alpha state, you have an AMAZING clarity and focus. Your mind is unbelievably sharp and powerful.

That’s why the game seems to be in slow motion and you can shoot with amazing accuracy.

So how do you get in the Alpha state?

Stop thinking and worrying about whether or not you’ll miss your shot.

There are many other ways to get in a relaxed state, but find out what works best for YOU.

A few good ways to get in the relaxed, Alpha state include:

- Meditation. Yes, even Kobe Bryant meditates before games. Meditation is simply a process of relaxed breathing and clearing you mind. Start by sitting in a comfortable position, and then take a series of slow, deep breaths– in through your nose and out through your mouth. Nice and slow. Follow your breath. Focus your mind on the air going in and out of your body. Don’t think about anything else. Continue this relaxed breathing for 3-20 minutes. Often times, 5 or 10 minutes is plenty, but don’t limit yourself. Once you quiet your mind, you should be able to feel and hear your own heart beating. Once you do, you know that you are completely relaxed.

- Listening to the “right” kind of music. Even better, meditate and listen to music at the same time. Music has the ability to make people angry, happy, sad, and even relaxed by affecting an individual’s rhythmic energy. It may sound crazy, but it’s true. Perhaps you listen to rap or rock before games. That may be best for you, but try some classical music, or search the Internet for relaxing music. You’ll find all kinds of peaceful tunes to help you get to a very peaceful and focused state of mind.

- Yoga. Most of you will have trouble doing yoga before games, but this tactic is still worth mentioning. Consider practicing yoga a few times each week. It’s good for the mind and body as a whole and combining it with relaxing music can get you in “the zone”.

Like we mentioned before, you need to figure out which methods work for you. There’s no right or wrong way. The key is having the knowledge.

With just a little effort, it’s really not that difficult to dramatically improve your relaxation, focus and basketball shooting percentage at all!

Jeff Haefner is the owner of www.breakthroughbasketball.com For more basketball shooting tips, drills, and workouts, go to: www.breakthroughbasketball.com/pr/btshooting.html

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Shooting Games – Get Ready to Target

ส.ค. 26

Posted by admin in Adventure | No Comments

Imagine for a moment that is a rainy Saturday afternoon. Sure, you could see a little television – but after a while it gets boring. You choose to call some friends and see what they are doing. Try calling your best friend, but nobody answers. So you call someone else to be your friend, and he picks up the phone. After a brief conversation, the topic turns to what would be fun to do considering that it’s raining outside. The issue of online multiplayer games out shooting. Her friend loves them, and although they have heard of them, I never really bothered to check these cool shooting games.

There are different types of games for all ages and all tastes. In such situations, the most recommended are the shooters, because we completely forget about everything around us and concentrate fully on the game. Some of us even dreamed in his youth, or perhaps wanted to be policemen or soldiers perhaps. Now we can hear our children talk about their desires and what is going to be when they grow.

If you like to play shooting games, then you could play a lot of our site. There are many variations of this game, target games fair to those of limited accuracy in time. Shooting games are undoubtedly the simplest, most entertaining games for children. If girls love dress up games, kids definitely prefer the shooting games.

Are you someone who enjoys the games? If so, you might be interested in checking out some of the best shooters out there that are cool. You know, there is much controversy that sometimes swirls around the different types of games that occur every year. However, what many critics do not realize is the fact that the vast majority of people who play shooters are well-adjusted individuals who are just looking for fun.

You can play all types of online games shooting range, and then have to check out the following games, Wheel of Misfortune in 3-D exchange, Endless Zombie Rampage, 3 Black & Tan dry. Each of these games allows you to test and practice your shooting skills. You should take a look around and play some games and when you find that you like you can download free games for play later. Build your catalog of games, for free.

Shooting games are action games and are considered to relieve stress! There is nothing to confuse that what how can the gun work like anti-depressants? Many psychiatrists have concluded that people who play shooting games can let out their anger by gunning down the enemies and objects in action games. There may be a lot of variety in action games to choose from. Shooting games can also be included in the genre of adventure games, but have been labeled separate due to the popularity of games of ‘extreme.

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Sheep Shooting for Boredom – Bored Sick: How Workplace Boredom Affects You

ส.ค. 21

Posted by admin in Shooting | No Comments

Have you ever wondered where that email sheep-shooting game came from? It was probably created by someone who was bored at work. If you ended up playing the game, you might be one of them. Underwork, in the sense of having literally nothing to do while at work, is one of many causes of boredom and may be just as harmful to employee and employer as overwork.

What would happen if your working day only involved internet ‘research’, reading and sending emails, trawling through some self-guided learning, and stacking papers neatly for the umpteenth time? It might be fun at first, but eventually leads to boredom. While there are more factors that cause boredom at work – such as personal predisposition, environment, task and situation – the sheer lack of work is a major contributor. According to a survey by Sirota Consulting LLC in the USA, of more than 800,000 employees at 61 organizations worldwide, those with ‘too little work’ gave an overall job satisfaction rating of 49 out of 100, while those with ‘too much work’ had a rating of 57.

So what? Who are these dissatisfied people, those who spend their day sharpening their pencils rather than their wit? These are the ‘underworked’ or ‘underloaded’, and may be in your own office.

Underload can be qualitative, in which job demands are too simple to adequately use an employee’s skills, or quantitative, in which the employee doesn’t have enough work to fill the work day. Quantitative underload can happen for a period of minutes, hours, or a day, to longer periods of weeks or even months. Typical industries with occasional quantitative underload include service (retail, hospitality) and administration (reception, accounts), where demand fluctuates unpredictably. Think of a supermarket cashier who is waiting for a customer to arrive. In a project-based environment such as engineering and research, boredom through underload can be caused by poor planning/scheduling, too many employees, temporary downturn in demand, and over-qualification for positions.

These underloaded workers may not realise their peril: boredom is not healthy for mind or body. Studies at the University of Northumbria attribute the lack of stimulation at work as a cause for ‘underload syndrome’ aka ‘bored sick’, resulting in more sick days due to depression, fatigue and headaches. On a physiological level, when the body does not experience rushes of stress, there are no endorphins in the system to provide energy, which then drops the metabolic rate, leading to immunodeficiency.

As for boredom’s effect on the mind, the worker can feel worthless, bitter and dull and may also face resentment from overworked colleagues.

Jamie Travis, an occupational therapist with private practice, nth Degree, sees underload syndrome as a convenient label for a range of non-specific physical and psychological symptoms arising from work conditions Travis describes the psychological impact of boredom at work causing job dissatisfaction. ‘The worker may ask themselves “Why the hell do I exist here?”, when the job lacks clarity and purpose.’ The overall malaise from monotony thus increases the incidence of recurrent absenteeism and the development of musculoskeletal pain in the future.

These health effects of underload can affect any level of job, as described by Hugh*, an engineer with a doctorate in Telecommunications – physical layer technologies.Hired by an engineering firm to do testing, which was constantly delayed, the firm kept him busy with secretarial work – scanning, printing, binding and word processing, or as Hugh describes: ‘Basically all the work that no one else wanted to do and the company didn’t want to employ anyone to do it. It made me feel depressed and suicidal. Instead of solving project problems…I gossiped, whinged, and surfed the internet for a new job.’ Hugh has since escaped his underloaded environment and uses his brain to develop cutting edge technology at a university in Victoria.

Hugh’s ex-employer may have experienced the common consequences of boredom at work, such as absenteeism, worker dissatisfaction, accidents, reduced performance on vigilance tasks, horseplay, and sabotage, as identified by Professor Cynthia D Fisher, industrial psychologist and Head of the Department of Management at Bond University. Fisher and her colleagues studied enlisted men in the US Marine Corps. Outside of the programmed hours of Marine activity but largely confined to base, some soldiers did not report any boredom at all. Many, however, were bored and dealt with the experience of having ‘nothing to do’ in one of two ways. Some were destructively bored, drinking and brawling, while others were constructively bored, choosing to go to the gym, read, or enrol in a correspondence course.

Whether employees are marines or mail clerks, the employer must take action to prevent underload, and thus avoid the presence of underload syndrome, which may lead to absenteeism and workplace claims for psychological injury.

Ellen Jackson and Rachel Clements described in InPsych magazine that the average cost of a psychological injury claim is $27,798 per claim compared with $18,913 for a physical injury claim and the average time off work is 21 weeks compared with 8 weeks for a physical injury claim (WorkCover NSW Statistical Bulletin 2003/04).

If only to save money, what can the employer do about qualitative underload? Fisher recommends that they ensure that workers have background tasks to fulfil, such as improving processes, preparing for meetings or helping another employee. Travis recommends that the company should conduct a psychologically based risk assessment, which is mindful of the health and productivity hazard of underload. A staff survey should measure against key indicators of job satisfaction, such as role uncertainty, lack of workload control and lack of support in the workplace.

What can an employee do about quantitative underload? It depends on whether the underload is short term (hours or a few days) or longer (weeks to months). The following tips explain how to cope with underload, to avoid underload syndrome.

Short term underload

clean up your desk and your hard drive and sort your documents into folders

finish any outstanding correspondence

build up social capital with colleagues or clients

go the extra mile for a client or help a coworker who is overloaded

or you could always go to the “Bored at work website” http://www.boredatwork.com/

Long term underload:

use the time to do some learning:

see if your company has on online university and take a course

share your skills with others by coaching/mentoring a less experienced employee

help someone with their job and see if you like it, and take away some of their stress

tell your boss that you can offer the company more, and ask for additional responsibilities.

You may even need to change careers; if the work is enough to occupy most of the day, and yet you are still bored due to qualitative underload, then you may suit a job that is more congruent with your skills, or where the pace of organisational life is faster.

So if you find that you’re a sheep sharpshooter, you’re not alone. The key is to make the most of the downtime, or move on.

I am a freelance writer and editor from Australia specialising in article and review format. I generate story ideas, conduct research and interviews then complete the piece in line with house style and expected deadlines. The underlying philosophy to any writing I do is ?information through engagement?.

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