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Brought to you by Resource Alliance
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Laura Cecil
Resource Advantage,
Inc.
Ms. Cecil
is an experienced project manager, facilitator and
consultant. Her experience crosses a wide
array of disciplines including Human Resources,
Marketing, Technology, Operations, and Strategy. She
specializes in helping organizations establish and
maintain effective Program Office groups.
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ABOUT US |
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Resource Alliance
is a cooperative venture between three companies -
Resource Advantage, Inc., Diakon Consulting, Inc.,
and Chaosity LLC - who have joined
forces to provide specialized collaborative
consulting, training and facilitation
services.
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"To do two things at once
is to do neither." Publilius Syrus
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Multitasking
is a pervasive trend in the business community as well
as our personal lives today. We talk on cell
phones while driving, we respond to emails while on
conference calls, and we read the latest headlines on
our Blackberries while riding the elevator.
While many people
juggle multiple tasks concurrently in hopes of achieving
greater personal output in less time, studies have shown
that is not necessarily the case. As a
facilitator, it is important to understand the downside
of multitasking as well as how to manage it in a work
session.
Research
conducted at the Federal Aviation Administration and the
University of Michigan found
that doing two or more things at once can actually decrease efficiency
and take
extra time due to switching from one task to
another. They identified two stages in multitasking: goal shifting and rule
activation.
With goal shifting, you must first decide to
do something else now instead of the task currently
underway.
Then, you must activate the rules associated with
the new task as you shift your focus. These steps resulted in a
20-30% loss in the total time it took for subjects to
complete two separate problems, when they switched back
and forth mentally between the tasks. Ultimately, t
his study found that the cost of
multitasking (switching back
and forth between tasks) increases with the
complexity of tasks (Journal
of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and
Performance, August 2001).
This problem
is what Drs.
Larry Rosen and Michelle Weil, co-authors of
TechnoStress: Coping With Technology @Work
@Home @Play call "Multitasking Madness." Their research on
more than 25,000 people worldwide demonstrates that,
over time, multitasking has more even more detrimental
effects such as:
- Difficulty
concentrating for extended periods as thoughts of your
next “to do” comes to mind while engaged in another
activity.
- Memory
lapses as you start working on one thing and then
realize you don’t remember what you wanted to do or
say.
- Inability
to rest or relax as too many thoughts are buzzing in
your head.
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Increased
anxiety, a sense of feeling overwhelmed by various
demands, physical-mental burnout and depression.
Interestingly,
the word “multitask” was originally coined in the
technical arena to describe, ”concurrent performance of
several jobs by a computer,” [Webster]. However, our fast-paced
society has adopted this term and applied it to
ourselves.
And increasingly, the stigma of “not paying
attention” during a meeting can be excused by a simple
response of, “I was multi-tasking. Can you repeat
the question?” When this
happens, multitasking not only hinders the performance
of individuals, but that of the group.
In
facilitated work sessions, participants who are
interrupted by phone calls, emails, or other common
multitasking culprits slow the entire group down. The offending
individuals must go through both goal shifting and rule
activation before refocusing on the topic being
discussed.
And, if it is a
complex topic, we know the time shift takes longer, forcing the
group to wait while key contributors to reengage. Meanwhile, other
participants may decide to mentally check out and focus
on other issues thus compounding the problem.
As a
facilitator, there several steps you can take to
minimize the impact of multitasking.
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Start with
the Ground Rules. Clearly state
that cell phones, pagers, etc. should only be used at
breaks and laptops should only be used for note-taking
or referencing documents related to the session.
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Monitor
the groups’ level of engagement. If people seem
distracted, take a short break to allow participants
to return calls and emails so they may return and
focus on the discussion in the room.
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Perform a “round-robin” to ensure that
all participants are engaged and in support of
decisions as they are made. When key
decisions are made, go through the participant list
one-by-one and request that the participant state
their concurrence with the decision, or provide any
feedback that might alter the decision.
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Consider
holding group work sessions offsite to minimize
distractions from the office.
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Take into
account other activities and events when setting the
dates for a work session. If a sales
team has quotas to meet by the end of the month and
your meeting is scheduled for the 29th,
then expect multitasking behaviors.
Multitasking
is a reality in our world today. When we are familiar
with tasks, we can more easily shift from one to the
next and back again. However, these task shifts happen
at a time cost.
To maximize your personal efficiency, as well as
a facilitated group’s productivity, it is important to
manage multitasking behaviors.
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