Multitasking is a word that was at first linked with computers. People are of course capable of doing 2 things at the same time. It is perfectly possible. What is impossible, however, concentrating on more than one task at a time. This is because multitasking forces our brains to switch back and forth very quickly. By assign one – only one – priority to each work day you can complete more planned tasks. Prioritizing is absolutely necessary to accomplish this, advises the business2community.com website.
The human brain is simply not able to make a seamless transition from one task to another. Multitasking, therefore, forces us to pay a mental price which we call the switching cost.
Multitasking costs us 10 minutes per hour
We experience a disruption in our performance when we switch our attention from one task to another. There was a study published in 2003 by the International Journal of Information Management. It found that typically we check email every 5 minutes. It takes usually 64 seconds to return to the previous task. Because of email alone we, on average, waste 1 out of every 6 minutes.
Say no to being busy
Busyness and overwork are ubiquitous, however, much of this activity is not meaningful. The underlying thought is “If I’m doing all this work, I must be doing something really important.” If we believe being busy is what drives meaning in our lives, we are wrong.
Meaning is derived from contributing something of value. People who are very skilled at what they do possess a remarkable willingness to say no to all distractions. They prefer to focus on one important thing.
-jk-