By Fred Ouma

DO you want to be seen as valuable at work by doing several things at once? If yes, you may not necessarily be gaining points. Instead, you could be hurting yourself. Experts say multi-tasking can lead to rude and unforgivable behaviour, and in some cases, less productivity.

Imagine a manager who took time off her busy schedule and organised a meeting to update everyone about the business. She felt the meeting was important and wanted to give staff her full attention and respond to questions.

Most of those in attendance were alert and polite. But too many people were distracted every few minutes with cell phones and left the room to receive the calls. A few stayed and held private conversations, while the meeting was continuing.

Two people fell asleep. The most unforgivable was the employee who asked a question, then answered a call on his mobile phone. While the manager was giving an eloquent response to his question, he stood at the back of the room talking on his phone, looking up at his boss every few seconds.

Some people would excuse this behaviour by saying he was merely multi-tasking and dealing with some important business. Instead, he did two things badly at the same time: attending an important meeting and not pay attention and holding a phone conversation that he was distracted from because he was trying to listen to his boss.

Research shows that the amount of activation in the brain is substantially reduced for a given task if the task is performed simultaneously with another one. You are not giving either tasks your all and you are not being productive.

Dr. Fred Kigozi, a consultant psychiatrist, warns that doing several things at once has health risks such as mental burnout, anxiety and depression.
“Focusing on the present can do a lot for you. It reduces stress and helps you enjoy life to the fullest. It can increase your effectiveness,” he says.

Even if you are striving for efficiency, your performance is not judged solely by the amount of stuff you get done, but how you do it. Whether you get a result is what is key.

Why does focus matter?
Consider a situation whereby your goal for this month is to clean a house. On the first day, you’re completely focused. You get boxes and trash bags and fill them with junk. On the second day, you are still focused, and you fill up more boxes.

This goes on for a few more days and suddenly, you decide to become a runner before finishing the house cleaning. You are now focussing on running and not only do you jog for a few days, you buy running clothes, shoes and read running magazines. Now you’ve lost your focus on cleaning the house and you are not doing much of it because your focus is on running.

Meanwhile, if you had maintained your focus on cleaning the entire month, you would have a neat house. Instead, multiple goals spread out your focus.

“Too many people are obsessed with the idea of getting things done. They think their stature rises by doing multiple tasks. It doesn’t. Not to mention that it can’t be done,” Silvia Nandera, a human resource and management consultant, says.

Multi-tasking is a habit you can break. She gives the following tips