Multi-Tasking
This is something that should be
handled very carefully. In
fact it is in all senses a balancing
act. It will work very well for domestic
things, but in your professional life,
if you are not careful while
balancing, you could end up flat on your
nose.
Let’s take an example. At home I want to
iron my clothes
and it takes a couple of minutes for my
electric iron to heat up. At
the same time I want to make myself a
cup of coffee so while the
iron is heating up, I might as well
start a pot of coffee. I need to make some toast for my
breakfast and after
popping two slices of bread into the
toaster; I can go back to the
ironing.
After ironing one shirt perhaps, I can
go back to the kitchen and have
cup of coffee and some toast..
At the end of five minutes, I have
my coffee, two slices of
toast and a freshly ironed shirt.
I would
suggest that if you feel that
you can do more than one thing at a
time, go ahead but limit the
number to two at work and three at most
in the home or else you might end up
messing a whole lot of
things.
Let’s us now check out a couple of
things which can be
done simultaneously at the office.
In
today’s hectic world, where is
so much fret and fury, most of us hardly
get any exercise. Since we are so
pressured for time, the
question of taking time off to
get some exercise seems completely out
of question.
I think it would be a good idea to try
and get some exercise
while you are in the office itself. When
you are making a couple of
telephone calls, it would be a
good idea to get up and walk
if it is a cordless phone or cell phone. If you have to sit down,
stretch out your feet and try
to wiggle your toes. This exercise has
been proved to be a great
stress reliever.
Try and get
one of those hands free
sets which you can attach to your body
so that your hands are free
while you are talking. This gives you a
chance to do something
useful with your hands instead of just
supporting the phone.
The important
thing to consider in multi-tasking is that if
you choose to do two
things at the same time make sure that
one of those things is not
very important and does not require much
attention.
It is not a good idea to try to
answer your email while talking on the
phone. Both require your thoughts and
one will suffer. You can, however file
papers or dust your shelves while on the
phone with no problems. Trying to focus your
undivided
attention on two important things at the
same time, is really asking
for too much.
It is all a matter of
common sense when it
comes to choosing which two things that
you can do together at the
same time. It certainly will be
ridiculous for you to choose to clip
you nails while you are attending a
board meeting. And it would be
in bad taste to use a tooth pick while
dictating a letter. But you can carry your lap
top while you are traveling
and work on it during a flight or train
journey.
Try to get into the habit of
doing the same two things at the same
time. This way when you start one job,
the other will be automatic.
============
Learn the importance of planning |
