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Roula Khalaf, editor of FT, chooses her favorite story in this weekly newsletter.
The arrest claim fell into my inbox. A quarter of the British, says a new research, send e -hats from Loo, because they are so much pressed on time. “Relaxation is a thing of the past,” the public statement hesitate, which says that a third of the respondents continues to work on their phones in the evening – “as they watch their TV programs.” Ah.
With the “Polelm” feature of modern life, reports such as this imply that disturbed workers are forced into multiple tasks to be at the top of a balloon request. But when 13 percent of respondents admit that during a business meeting, the weekly website has wondered what happened with Saturdays – and their boss. Have we reached a superb delay, in which the meetings are now a performance supplement to real life – walking the dog and cleaning the house, which the respondents did in this study while on work calls?
Multitasking advocates like to remind us that Archimed had his moment of Eurek while in the tub. But he let the mind wandering as he soaked. He did not sit there with the camera off, trying not to spray, while others invented.
Recently I asked the painter for a quote for some decoration. We talked as he looked at various walls. From Pandemi, he told me, he was full of how often he arrived at the house to find adult men sitting on sofas, watching sports in the middle of the day as they blurredly knocking on their keyboard. This puts a new complexion on “Excessive work”.
These days, if you do only one thing at once, you are considered to be fooling. But 20 years of evidence tells us that switching tasks makes most people stupid. The 2006 University of Utah’s study found that the conversation with the phone while driving was as dangerous as drunk: slowing reactions. The same team recently reported that the “info -female” systems are even more dangerous than the phone in terms of distraction.
Our brains are primarily worse to do one thing at a time. Even walking and conversation begins to become cunning when we grow old. This does not mean that life must be a monotonous sequence. Many workers enjoy switching between tasks, according to the Center for Studying, at King’s College London, and that can be positive. Indeed, “interbating” – switching between topics, and then I come back later – everything is anger in schools as a proven technique for auditing exams.
But the growing level of anxiety means that it is important to turn the conversation to focus. The difficulty of concentration is very correlated with some of the anxiety disorders recognized by the American psychiatric association. And we tend to overestimate our abilities for more tasks. In fact, those who are the most controversial juggling should do so at least: because studies show that they are more impulsive and have less executive control.
I’m afraid I’m going into that last group, but I recently found two simple hacks. I tried to check the E -Kost only twice a day, but it doesn’t fit my personality or work life. Instead, I returned to the manuscript of the lists of obligations. The existence of the list releases my brain from anxiety – as long as the tasks are detailed enough. And it seems that the pen and paper imprints it deeper into my subconscious. This is supported by new studies that reveal that we do more complex brain connections when we write than when we knock. These relationships are key to the formation of memory – and it makes it necessary to maintain children with handwriting.
I also try what Cal Newport, in my book Slow productivitycalls the “withdrawal system”. Basically, you ruthlessly focus on your first three projects, and make a laugh as much as possible to communicate, meetings on meetings and messages about meetings related to later projects. Only when you finish one of your best three, do you draw next to that slot.
We will all have different versions of this system – and I suppose it could be called “focus”. But following my own version, it made me think about how often the distinction is lost between a job that actually creates income, triggers things forward and has meaning; and a job that is a process. By that I mean a meeting, a compliance module, a constant moody e-mail chain “Answer all” and so on. The first type of work is far satisfactory. Second may be the kind that office workers report that they work on a walking of dogs and toilet – and what my new decorator says he is glad he has less in his physical business.
Such procedures, I doubt, are more comfortable if they are working on the background of music, lyrics, moving or occasionally checking football results. The problem is that people who switch between multiple channels – researchers at Stanford called heavy media – show worse memory and lower executive control, even when they focus on one job.
It turns out that there are some “Supertaskers”, those who are able to withstand more tasks without losing efficiency. On brain scan, this group shows less brain activity, not more, when additional tasks are added. Unfortunately, only about 2 percent of us are in that category. So, it would be kinder to themselves and our employers, to admit that the ranges of attention are not infinite and treat them with care.
