CHENNAI: People are increasingly mastering the art of multitasking post the global economic recession when lesser people were assigned to do more jobs. Unfortunately, research has proven that this doesn’t work in the long run. While it can make you realise that you are capable of doing many things you thought impossible, many career consultants are of the opinion that multitasking makes you stretch and strain more. The question is, is it conducive for good quality work?
Most people are under the illusion that multitasking can help you save time, energy and money. One must take into account the fatigue factor associated with doing the same in the long run — quality and efficiency naturally become difficult to expect owing to boredom. Many people believe it’s admirable to juggle many tasks at once. But eventually, both the employer and employee will be victims of an unsatisfactory output. The ability to multitask may be considered while hiring, but you need to determine how much you can multitask and how much you can unitask.
In order to be effective with projects that require undivided attention, one should definitely stay away from distractions like telephone conversations. With multitasking, you can end up as the Jack of all trades, but master of none.
By encouraging employees to unitask, we are helping them develop their skills to become experts in their domain and add more value to their output. Have a sound to-do list to concentrate on the important tasks for the day. Whenever you need to read and make decisions based on reports, it is better to do it when you are relaxed and not in the middle of firefighting at work. As Don Herald remarked in the Forbes, “Work is the greatest thing in the world, so we should always save some of it for tomorrow.”
Kalpana R is the founder of The Academy for Communication and Learning
— kalpana@acl-india.in