OPTIMIZING TIME: The Myth of Multitasking (Part 2/4)

How many tabs do you have open right now?

If it’s more than two or three, you’re negatively impacting your productivity.

The brain isn’t built for multitasking, and we’ve known this for a long time.

In the 1990s, doctors Robert Rogers and Stephen Monsell ran a study that found when people switch between tasks, they suffer lost time and decreased focus.

It takes time to reset your brain in-between tasks. We also suffer from decreased focus during the first part of our new task, as thoughts from our previous task are leftover.

So if multitasking is so bad, then why does everyone do it?

Because it feels so good.

Seriously! It’s very mentally stimulating.

When you have a dozen tabs open, and you’re responding to messages on Slack, and you’re searching for inspiration on Instagram, and you’re writing a brief for a colleague, your brain is working a mile a minute.

It feels like you’re in the cockpit of a spaceship, shooting down bogeys one after the other.

There’s just one big problem: you’re not accomplishing anything important.

What’s the solution here? The Big 3

Are you an overachiever?

Continue to next part: Optimizing Time (Part 3)

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4