Teach students that multitasking is evil

Photo by?Matt Bero?on?Unsplash

We overestimate our ability to multitask at our peril.

You can walk and talk with a friend. You might knit and watch TV. Both knitting and walking are autonomous in that you don’t need to think about them too much while doing them. This leaves you able to focus on the talk with your friend, and what is happening on TV.

You can’t watch TV and read, code, or do other focused work at the same time. I find for example, that I can’t listen to a podcast while trying to do other work. My brain keeps switching from one: doing the work, and the other: listening to the podcast, so I end up doing both slowly. I find that annoying.

Like the person in the photo their attention is focused on the ball at the top of the arc. They rely upon knowing where the other balls will be so that they can be caught correctly. The key is also tossing them in a known manner. That is why they can listen to something and juggle at the same time.

Multitasking is task switching and slows you down

This is the thing: our brains are like a computer. Computers provide the illusion of multitasking: multiple things happening in different windows. This is an illusion. Deep down inside on the CPU it’s just switching from one task to another very, very quickly.

While the computer can switch tasks easily as it moves from one context to another, people don’t for most things. This is why multitasking for autonomous tasks like knitting, and walking work. We don’t have to direct the work being done. For deeper work, however, we lose concentration when we switch context. The switch costs us time.

Think of the time you lose when you’re working on something and you’re interrupted by someone. There you were, deep in thought and writing, or coding, and you’re interrupted. You are pulled out of your thoughts, just as you had an idea half-down… How long does it take to get back to where you were? Five, ten minutes or longer?

Maybe you’re lucky and no one interrupts you. Then I’d ask how long does it take to get back to where you were after you come back to the work after lunch, or the next day? This is not quite the same, but does show that we need to load information into our heads to do the work we do.

We cannot jump back and forth from one deep task to another. Our brains are not a CPU. Our brains are more like the lazy loading you see in web pages that load information a bit at a time. Eventually it is all there, but you need to be patient.

Multitasking in teams has more impact

In a team the multitasking happens differently. It also affects the whole team, not just one person. First, the simple version.

A person, or pair complete their task, and move onto the next one. A bit later, an error is discovered and the task needs to be fixed. There is now the tension between the current and previous task. Both are important, and need doing. Should the work on the current one stop immediately, or can it wait until the current task is done?

There is no obvious answer. A mitigation is possible if the team shorten feedback loops, so that errors/issues are noticed sooner. The sooner they are caught the more likely the context around the work is still fresh and available to the people doing the work. This is also while mobbing on work wins. Everyone is available to help, and issues will be noticed sooner as the whole team swarms on a task. The knowledge is also stored in everyone’s head too. When the team needs to reload the context the members can help each other, which means it goes faster.

Second, there is the complex version all students face. How do they juggle their workload between courses? They can’t effectively listen to an audio book, or video for one course, while completing a programming task for their team. They need to decide how to move from one context to another, and complete their work.

I know, this isn’t quite the same thing. I’m suggesting it is related due to the context switching between subjects and the work. Given university structure of course delivery, it is also outside student control.

What we can do is offer processes to help students manage their workload. Schedule their work across the day to suit the different tasks, and start work sooner rather than later. The goal is to avoid the working all night and day to complete something as this is likely to be lower quality work.

Multitasking follows your students after they graduate

After students graduate, they encounter the business version of this challenge in similar forms. First, the employer might be on multiple projects and have to balance their work between the different projects. Now, they are working on one project task, when work is suddenly needed on another project they contribute to too.

Second, the company might have multiple projects/products being developed. Say there are four. Should the company do them ABCD, ABCD.. until completion? Or, should they be AAAA, then BBB…until completion?

While this is similar to the student juggling coursework, there is more flexibility for the company. This opens up more options.

The answer comes back to throughput mentioned in previous posts on the Theory of Constraints. The answer is AAA, BBB…

By doing ABCD, ABCD work moves forward on all products, but delays the completion of any one of them. Delay means slower validation in the market, and slower feedback too. Most importantly, it delays income.

No product can generate revenue until it is out the door. When A completes, income can arrive. This can help pay for the work of B. When B completes, then the revenue of A and B can pay for C.

Yes, A might have issues and need more work, but it will be bringing in some revenue.

Cover this with your students in multiple ways.

You can discuss the ABCD vs AAAA ordering in a lecture and let students debate the options and reasons behind their choices.

After you do this you can also use Henrik Kniberg’s Multitasking Name Game too. This game takes a bit of organising, and you need some index cards, but is well worth the time to run in class. I’ve use it repeatedly. The game illustrates the pain of multitasking. Students see how much faster work completes without when multitasking. Read the facilitation guide, and try it out.

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