The Secret To Effective Multitasking
Moms who own their own businesses are constantly shifting gears to make time to do the things that matter most. So how do we moms get more done in the same 24 hours that everyone else has? What’s the secret to effective multi-tasking?
Don’t Do It.
[Tweet “The secret to #multitasking is not doing it. #timemanagement”]
How To Get Everything Done
Much ado has been given to the term multitasking yet recently many of us have read that multitasking is probably the most inefficient way to spend your time.
Why?
Any time you do more than one thing at a time, you delay the completion of both tasks. First, stopping a task on which you are already working interrupts your flow. Studies have shown that stopping tasks to pick up a new one actually delays completion of both tasks by nearly 70%. It is much like Isaac Newton’s Law of Mom-Inertia – A mompreneur on task tends to remain on task, until interrupted… (or something like that.)
When you interrupt yourself when you are already working on a task, not only do you not complete it – your energy shifts and completely falls away – to focus on the interruption. Before you begin again, you need to rethink what you were doing to get back into the level of concentration you were at when working. Not only does this process take time, it’s much harder to start than it is to continue moving on toward completing what is already at hand.
Consider this blog post. I know that very shortly, my boys will be returning from school. I am concentrating and working diligently to complete this blog post before they come home. Sure, there are several other things I could be working on. But I know that as soon as they come in I will be interrupted and need to focus on the after school routines that help our family work. If I interrupt myself and stop working on this blog post before it’s complete, the time it will take for me to do it later is extended by having to reboot my computer, open my blog, read what I’ve already written and then figure out what’s missing before I’ll be finished.
The key to getting it all done is to push to complete one task at a time
[Tweet “The key to getting it all done is to push to complete one task at a time”]
Your key to productivity as a mom entrepreneur is to minimize your interruptions so you can focus on ONE thing and ONE thing only, until completion.
Your Sanity Assignment
If you’re in the habit of multi-tasking throughout your day, I challenge you to go for the day focused on only one thing at once–and observe how much more productive you actually are, and, how much more you get done. Try it and see how much more you check off your list today.
Hey – Guess who just walked in? 🙂
Please comment!
We love learning from you and so do our readers… How do you avoid multi-tasking? Please share your thoughts, tips and any special techniques below in the comments section.
