The productivity revolution has gone through many phases.  But the basic theme throughout has been to figure out ways to get  more “stuff” done in the time we have allotted each day.

One of the natural by-products of this movement has been the rise of the term “multitasking”.  This term simply, and obviously, means doing many things at one time.

Many have over recent years prided themselves in their ability to mutitask, myself included.

Recently, my Black Belt Productivity and WLC partner, Michael Ramm introduced me to a book by Dave Crenshaw called “The Myth of Multitasking”.  In the book Crenshaw introduces a more accurate term for the phenomenon we call multitasking, it is “switchtasking”.

I read this book and said to myself, “self, you are guilty as charged.  My name is Jason Echols…and I…am a switchtasker.”

The truth is that we cannot devote undivided attention to more than one thing at a time.  Have you ever tried to read or study something while watching television?  I have.  If I am reading, I cannot focus on the telelvision.  If I hear something on the television that grabs my attention, I look up to focus on it…and I am no longer focused on my book.  As a result, I cannot retain the information from either media very well.

Crenshaw also demonstrates that doing two tasks in parallel causes us to actually take more time to complete those tasks…not a little more time…a lot more time.  Why?  Changing focus actually takes time.  Like manufacturers measure “switching cost” when changing over a machine or a vendor, there is a switching cost, in terms of time, when we are switchtasking.

So what now?

How do we break this habit of trying to split our attention between multiple tasks?  Crenshaw addresses this as well.

We must first remember that we can only give our best to something when we are completely present.  It might mean we need to block off time on our schedule to work on specific tasks.  Turn off email, BlackBerry, and IM.

Are we interrupted often by the same co-worker(s)?  Perhaps those people warrant a recurring meeting to address their recurring questions.  In those meetings, concentrate on being completely focused on that person and their needs.  This is very important to showing your team and your customers that they matter to you.

Set up “shop hours”, if possible. Let others know what hours it is acceptable to approach you or call you on the phone.  Post them outside your office or cubicle.  Put up an out of office message with the same information.

Use the time you save to be completely present with those who matter most…family, friends, significant others.

What does this mean to those of us who are trying to be productive?

• By switchtasking, we lose loads of time
• When we allow our focus to become divided, we cannot truly give anything our best effort
• Switchtasking can also take a toll on relationships (personal, co-workers, or even customers)
• Focus on one task or discussion at a time.  It makes us more efficient, and also allows us to be completely focused on that task or relationship

Isn’t that what we are looking for anyway?  It is all about being done with the things we have to do, so we can give all of our attention to the things we want to do.

How do you resist the urge to switchtask?

Or…are you a chronic switchtasker?

Let’s take the discussion to the forum.