Friday, October 26, 2007

Multitasking does NOT make you more productive

I know this is quite trivial, but it's been on my mind lately as I know too many people who do it. How many times have you heard someone say, "I can't study/work without the tv/radio on" ?

Now, forgive me for being blunt, but this is the biggest load of bs that way too many people convince themselves of. When you were younger and played on a sports team, what would your coach have said if you pulled out some headphones (if you dared)? She'd yell at you and tell you to focus on the game. Well, why do some people decide that it will help them with their studies? You are not concentrating 100% at the task on hand if you are doing something else. It's like the printer/fax/copier combo: yeah, it can do all three functions with one machine, but it doesn't do ANY of them particularly well. Why on earth are you going to waste your time trying to multitask when you could really focus and finish your work/studying much more quickly and thoroughly? Now, if background noise is what you want, go looking for someplace with white noise that you will actually ignore.

You know, it's the same thing with the people who go to the gym and barely break a sweat. Newsflash: be more productive with your time and you won't have to spend so much of it doing one task. Yeah, reading while on the elliptical seems like a good idea, but if you can manage to do both you aren't pushing yourself very hard exercising. You're only cheating yourself...

Phew, I feel so much better now that I got that off my chest. To all my readers to whom it applies, no offense guys, but seriously, common! Next to tackle: sleep deprivation, but this time my own ...

2 comments:

Prince Hamilton said...

People have feasted on idealism that reality has eluded them. The ideal is that one could be more efficient in multitasking but the reality is that it is less productive. When truth becomes more absurd than fiction then a clean conscience becomes a scarce and seared commodity. So does it surprise you why our kids are behaving funny in school nowadays?
Did you go to Costa Rica? I went to Mexico last summer and it was wonderful that dream going there.
Anyway I just wanted to show my support for your perspective on the multitasking debate.

dpm said...

Good topic! My commentary =)