Whenever I start at any new job position, I have a bit of a panic in the first week: "how the heck am I supposed to be doing all this stuff that they want me to do?!" Life seems overwhelming, and, the truth of the matter, as the job goes along, that feeling doesn't go away--it just changes. So what's the key to multitasking?
The Harvard Business Review says today that the goal should be doing one thing at a time:
Tell the truth: Do you answer email during conference calls (and
sometimes even during calls with one other person)? Do you bring your
laptop to meetings and then pretend you're taking notes while you surf
the net? Do you eat lunch at your desk? Do you make calls while you're
driving, and even send the occasional text, even though you know you
shouldn't?
I nodded my head at all of these, and that can't be a good sign. It got so bad the other day that while on a conference call, I went to send an e-mail and while thinking about the next e-mail I was about to send, I sent the first e-mail to the second e-mail's recipient. Outlook's "recall mail" feature isn't going to make up for that mistake.
But I liked the author's solution: "
The best way for an organization to fuel higher productivity and more
innovative thinking is to strongly encourage finite periods of absorbed
focus, as well as shorter periods of real renewal." And here's how he suggests managers promote doing that:
