There Is No Such Thing as Multitasking

There was a lot of commotion in the business world over ‘multitasking’.  Multitasking is a computer term that was stolen by business consultants.  Of course, you know the definition of a business consultant?  This is a person that either cannot or will not produce any useful work.  They make their living by cobbling together random concepts and selling them to managers as the ‘better mousetrap’.

The original definition of ‘multitasking’ was the ability to do more than one task or job at the same time.  If you have a computer with a single core processor, guess what?  It does NOT do multitasking.  That single core will stop, store the status of the current task, then begin the next task.  At some point, it will store the status of that task and move back to the first.  Since there is only a single core, only one thing can be worked on at a time.  THIS IS HOW THE HUMAN BRAIN WORKS.

The human brain can only do one conscious task at a time.  What business calls ‘multitasking’ is jerking your chain around from task to task like a kid with ADHD.  There have been many studies of multitasking and the universal conclusion is that multitasking kills productivity.

Check out this article which quotes some studies:

http://psychology.about.com/od/cognitivepsychology/a/costs-of-multitasking.htm

The easiest example of how people cannot really multitask is this:  Take one pen in each hand and try to write two different articles on two different subjects at the same time.  Don’t worry, nobody can do that.  As far as I’m concerned, listening to music and typing a memo is not multitasking.  All the music is doing is filling the dead time between thoughts.

Now that we know that multitasking does not work (remember all those videos of people texting in their cars and getting into accidents?), what are the ramifications for business?

Multitasking gives the multitasker the illusion of productivity.  While studies show that productivity is lost, the multitasker believes that they are accomplishing more.  This is because the brain is constantly occupied.  Never mind that the multitasker is training his mind to NOT concentrate on a task, but make it jump around like a caffeinated squirrel.

The cartoon strip ‘Over the Hedge’ (and the movie) features an out-of-control squirrel named Hammy.  Hammy darts around crazily, has a short attention span and is generally not the one you’d want to rely on.  However, this is what multitasking entails.  This is how multitasking will train you to act.

For management, multitasking is another win/win.  Your manager can load you down with projects, jerk you randomly from one project to another, complain about your slow progress in the ones you aren’t working on, and, finally, shift his work to you.  Oh, and of course, at your yearly review, your bosses can complain about your lack of ability to get the job done.

When a manager begins to ‘talk’ to you about multitasking, you can be assured that he is really confessing on how bad he is at prioritizing your work.  The next step is where prioritizing work will be pushed down to your level.  Don’t be deceived here.  This is another scheme like ‘empowerment’ which is just another way of shifting responsibility and work load to the next lower level.

When a computer multitasks, that is, a single core processor, every time a task is switched, the present state is saved.  Then the new task is loaded, or if it has been worked on already, reloaded.  The advantage is that the computer has infallible memory of where it was before.  Not so with human beings, when we jump between tasks, we not only have to find the paperwork and/or computer files, we have to remember what we were doing and what we were thinking at that time.  We may also have to ‘switch gears’ in moving from an analytical task to a creative one.  This takes time since we are not computers.  This leads to the conclusion that every time your manager jerks your chain to send you off in a different direction (or task), he is making sure that your efficiency declines.  If he does it fast enough, you may get nothing done!

Of course all this is too complicated for your typical manager to understand.  He’ll take the easy way out and require you to put in unpaid overtime.  Because, after all, you haven’t been able to get your work done!