The dangers of multi tasking to project teams has never been more so. Now we have additional online services and mobile devices to deal with. What I wrote about back in January 2007 about Multi-tasking, Covey, and TOC is even more applicable now. Your project schedule should drive priorities, not a false sense of urgency in adhoc daily tasks.
Multitasking Kills by Daquella manera via Flickr
Raven blogged about this and embedded a video, the same one I’m embedding below. (If you don’t know about Raven’s Brain, you NEED to check it out. It’s kind of noodley and gooey, but well worth it!)
As project managers, I feel it’s our duty to protect our staff from bad multi tasking.
Don’t expect your project team to be waiting for your email or IM and respond immediately. They have work to do. Encourage them and everyone else to only check email a few times a day, on a scheduled basis. Send them instructions to turn off the “auto-notification” sound/box whenever they receive a new email. For goodness sake, let them focus on their work! This goes for remote staff too!
Don’t wander around and interrupt people. I work with people who have no regard for this whatsoever. They’ll assume they can interrupt a discussion or pull someone off a focused task. It’s arrogant, annoying and a time waste because people have to switch gears. If you need to talk with someone, ask their permission before launching into a conversation. If I walk over and someone is in a discussion, I keep walking unless what I have is truly urgent and important. If they are engrossed in a project task, I’ll say something like “Hey John, could you stop by when you get to a good stopping point? No rush.” if I need to speak with them. This way they only have a minor interruption and can get re-focused rather quickly.
Lead focused and short project meetings. If everyone is not fully engaged in the meeting, then you are losing most of the value for them being there. Keep the pace fast and focused, and make sure only the right people are invited. If someone is distracting themselves, help them get engaged in the meeting by asking them direct questions about the topic at hand. Even better, as a part of your project meeting ground rules, outlaw all communication methods (IM, email, Twitter, texting, etc.) besides being engaged in the meeting.
Check out the video below, it’s funny because it’s mostly true!
Josh Nankivel, PMP
is the founder of pmStudent.com, a site dedicated to helping new and aspiring project managers succeed. He is a project manager for the ground system of the Landsat Data Continuity Mission, a joint project between the USGS and NASA. Josh’s academic background includes a BS in Project Management and he is PMP certified.
I liked the post – lots of common sense. Good to hear these thoughts from a younger PM, because when we “older folks”, come out with these comments, we are often told “it’s because you are old and don’t understand the new technology.
It is also good to observe this from a people skills perspective, because for many people if you are texting and speaking to me, either I am not important or what you are telling me is not important. This is probably a generational” perspective, but as a PM you have to be aware of different perspectives and manage them accordingly
Regards
Jim
In principle, I’m very much against multitasking and agree with most statements above.
Having said all that, when a team is responsible for new prod dev as well as existing prod support there is a real and definite need for a prod mgr, developer, or a project team member to be able to identify stopping points in their intra-day activities or development/work efforts. Moreover, I would suggest that a great developer will create stopping points in his/her own work in anticipation of disruptions/distractions
Ultimately, I think it comes down to balancing abilities vs. needs and as leaders/managers; we must guide our teams to find the right sort of balance that will enable optimal performance.
Best,
@rseres
Jim and Robert, thank you for the comments.
Jim, you are right on, this is all about people skills and productivity. The younger generation may tend to get more wrapped up in the technologies available today, but the way most of that technology is used is just a distraction from real work and the people who get the real work done: your project teams.
Robert, great point. I think you are talking more about task switching, and I think I’d make this distinction