Change your pattern, change your output

One of our faculty authors ran into the classic problem of getting sucked into department busywork/life if she tried to write in her office. From colleagues, to students sitting in the hall waiting for her even if it wasn't her office hour, to mail in the cubbyhole, the office was turning into the last place she could work productively. So she signed up for a carrel in the library, and she began going there when she arrived on campus instead of directly to the department. It's working. She gets a couple of hours of writing done before she ever sets foot in that beehive known as the typical academic department. Then no matter what happens the rest of the day, she has done her writing.