One of the particular challenges I have observed, as I work from home all the time these days, is that it provides opportunities for, and accentuates the challenges, of trying to do several things at the same time. For example, reading emails, answering urgent IM’s and also trying to make a cup of tea - whilst at the same time participating in a conference call or online training session. Unless you are particularly and unusually gifted this tends to result in some or even most of these parallel activities being done poorly.
It also seems inevitable that the very moment you stop paying full attention to the conference call because your mobile just rang, someone decides to describe a complex business scenario – and then ask you a critical question. You can either then (a) bluff and make up an answer (dangerous) (b) lie and say your internet went down just at that very moment and ask them to say it all again (devious) or (c) be truthful and just say you weren’t listening so please repeat (embarrassing).
Wikipedia sagely observes: Human multitasking is an apparent human ability to perform more than one task, or activity, at the same time. An example of multitasking is taking a phone call while driving a car. Multitasking can result in time wasted due to human context switching and apparently causing more errors due to insufficient attention.
This blog suggests that As multiple studies have confirmed, true multitasking—doing more than one task at the same time—is a myth and that amongst other things it impacts your short-term memory, leads to increased anxiety, and causes more mistakes and less productivity.
A Harvard Business Review article You Can’t Multitask, So Stop Trying reinforces this view Based on over a half-century of cognitive science and more recent studies on multitasking, we know that multitaskers do less and miss information commenting We have a brain with billions of neurons and many trillion of connections, but we seem incapable of doing multiple things at the same time.
And it is apparently true that men are worse at this – see a medical article Why men might find multitasking more challenging which suggests that from a psychological point of view, “task-switching” may be a more accurate term. Findings in neuroscience and psychology suggest that during what is commonly referred to as “multitasking,” the brain actually performs a task, stops, and switches to the next one, all in a very short span of time. It then cites research which suggests that women are better at task-switching than men.
See also this Forbes article Multitasking Damages Your Brain And Career, New Studies Suggest which comments Research conducted at Stanford University found that multitasking is less productive than doing a single thing at a time. The researchers also found that people who are regularly bombarded with several streams of electronic information cannot pay attention, recall information, or switch from one job to another as well as those who complete one task at a time.
However, assuming we are always going to be forced to multitask to some extent, here is some good advice around on how best to achieve this. See, for example, this blog aimed at entrepreneurs How to Train Your Brain to Multitask Effectively which comments that 'Effective multitasking' is sort of an oxymoron. "The human brain doesn't really multitask," says Art Markman, cognitive psychologist and author of Smart Thinking (Perigee, 2012). "What the human brain does is what I call time-sharing." It then suggests ways of managing this such as working on related tasks together.
See also this article 12 Tips to boost your multitasking skills or this Wikihow article (with pictures!) which quite sensibly suggests Work on one thing at a time, but alternate. Jugglers may have many objects in the air, but they usually manipulate only one at a time.
My practical advice, going back to the conference call scenario, is to be very aware when you are on camera (Zoom starts with video enabled) and mute your speaker phone or headset whilst you try to answer a call on your mobile – or shout at the dog!
As American entrepreneur and best-selling author Gary W Keller says Multi-tasking is merely the opportunity to screw up more than one thing at a time.
It also seems inevitable that the very moment you stop paying full attention to the conference call because your mobile just rang, someone decides to describe a complex business scenario – and then ask you a critical question. You can either then (a) bluff and make up an answer (dangerous) (b) lie and say your internet went down just at that very moment and ask them to say it all again (devious) or (c) be truthful and just say you weren’t listening so please repeat (embarrassing).
Wikipedia sagely observes: Human multitasking is an apparent human ability to perform more than one task, or activity, at the same time. An example of multitasking is taking a phone call while driving a car. Multitasking can result in time wasted due to human context switching and apparently causing more errors due to insufficient attention.
This blog suggests that As multiple studies have confirmed, true multitasking—doing more than one task at the same time—is a myth and that amongst other things it impacts your short-term memory, leads to increased anxiety, and causes more mistakes and less productivity.
A Harvard Business Review article You Can’t Multitask, So Stop Trying reinforces this view Based on over a half-century of cognitive science and more recent studies on multitasking, we know that multitaskers do less and miss information commenting We have a brain with billions of neurons and many trillion of connections, but we seem incapable of doing multiple things at the same time.
And it is apparently true that men are worse at this – see a medical article Why men might find multitasking more challenging which suggests that from a psychological point of view, “task-switching” may be a more accurate term. Findings in neuroscience and psychology suggest that during what is commonly referred to as “multitasking,” the brain actually performs a task, stops, and switches to the next one, all in a very short span of time. It then cites research which suggests that women are better at task-switching than men.
See also this Forbes article Multitasking Damages Your Brain And Career, New Studies Suggest which comments Research conducted at Stanford University found that multitasking is less productive than doing a single thing at a time. The researchers also found that people who are regularly bombarded with several streams of electronic information cannot pay attention, recall information, or switch from one job to another as well as those who complete one task at a time.
However, assuming we are always going to be forced to multitask to some extent, here is some good advice around on how best to achieve this. See, for example, this blog aimed at entrepreneurs How to Train Your Brain to Multitask Effectively which comments that 'Effective multitasking' is sort of an oxymoron. "The human brain doesn't really multitask," says Art Markman, cognitive psychologist and author of Smart Thinking (Perigee, 2012). "What the human brain does is what I call time-sharing." It then suggests ways of managing this such as working on related tasks together.
See also this article 12 Tips to boost your multitasking skills or this Wikihow article (with pictures!) which quite sensibly suggests Work on one thing at a time, but alternate. Jugglers may have many objects in the air, but they usually manipulate only one at a time.
My practical advice, going back to the conference call scenario, is to be very aware when you are on camera (Zoom starts with video enabled) and mute your speaker phone or headset whilst you try to answer a call on your mobile – or shout at the dog!
As American entrepreneur and best-selling author Gary W Keller says Multi-tasking is merely the opportunity to screw up more than one thing at a time.
RSS Feed
