Stanford University researchers have found that compulsive mulit-taskers are harming their ability to focus on the task at hand. They were tested to see if they could ignore irrelevant information when given a task and apparently they couldn't.
I know I have good multi tasking days when I get so much done and bad days when I just get distracted, flitting from one thing to another. The bad days are usually a symptom of a lack of pre planning or focus for the day. It's not that I have lost focus by multi-tasking, it was never there in the first place!
Experience has taught me that I work best when I'm on the edge - preparing for things 'just in time' - but this only works if I get the basics right. I use our CRM system to hold as much info as possible about what I am doing. For example, if I arrange a meeting for a future date I need to clearly record what it's about and what my goals are, because I know that I will grab the info just before I set off to the meeting. This may sound like I am not preparing but actually I prepare long in advance. If I have all the facts in one place then I can use travel time really well - I get so much done on trains.
A top tip to reduce distractions - stop Outlook telling you that a new email has arrived. Check your mail every hour instead. A study by Microsoft found that it takes 25 minutes to return to the original task after an interruption by email. Another survey claims only 8 minutes but that's still a huge amount of time.
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