As I write this little blog, I am currently metabolising a coffee from an hour ago. At the exact same time I am losing hair and skin elasticity while gaining age and weight.
That’s about the full extent of my ability to multitask; if I were now to attempt an additional task (say, booking plane tickets or checking my emails or holding up my end of a conversation) my attention would be split into two lots of 50%; I’d be doing two things, badly.
When tasks multiply, attention divides.
And that equation can only ever get worse; imagine the horror of 100 important jobs all given just 1% of the care and attention they deserve.
Even if I use every brain-boosting exercise and app in the book there’s no getting around it; I only have 100% to give… and that’s on a good day. If I’m hungry or tired or stressed (or in any one of a dozen unhelpful States of Mind) I might struggle to perform above 30%.
Even then, I might be genuinely productive for no more than about 40 minutes before I hit a mental block or lose focus; luckily, there’s always other work waiting to be done, as a change of task usually resets my attention clock for another 40 minutes or so.
Experience has taught me that switching tasks like this makes the best use of my limited capacity so by the end of the day I’ve done half a dozen things as well as I possibly can.
I call it Monotasking and (unlike multitasking) it actually works.
Ok, that’s enough of that… if you’ll excuse me, it’s time to do something else.
Dave Isles
hmmmm.. Jason.. I wonder if this needs gender review?.. i have never been able to think and chew gum at the same time, but my better half is incapable of doing one thing at a time.. multiple, often complex tasks.. drives me crazy! She claims it is a genetic ‘mother’ thing… i’m sticking with your mono tasking, but wonder if the females out there agree! ?
Jason
Hey David, I’m SO glad you raised the gender question; I have many women friends who insist I’m wrong about this I was actually expecting more comments. The belief that women have some special capacity to successfully multitask is deeply ingrained in our society…the science however, says something very different. Women are more likely to attempt multiple tasks while men are more likely not to try… combine these two mindsets and you have a gender dynamic that gives men an excuse not to contribute and leaves women doing way more than their fair share. No-one can multitask without compromising their work and prolonging the myth that women somehow can (and should feel proud of this superpower) only contributes to the gender inequity we’re supposed to be correcting. I’d love to know what your exactly equal half thinks of this… thanks again Dave!
dave isles
the exactly equal, and often better half chooses not to comment directly, Jason, but she is on board with the ‘way more than their fair share’ notion.
We agree though, that motherhood drives a behaviour pattern that seems to enable successful multitasking, and in some (?many) that remains a life-long skill. For me? trying to do my fair share while chewing gum!
the science and the psychology of this one is very interesting.
cheers, Dave I