{"id":1678,"date":"2009-03-24T06:31:24","date_gmt":"2009-03-24T06:31:24","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/beyondblue\/2009\/03\/russell-bishop-is-multitasking.html"},"modified":"2009-03-24T06:31:24","modified_gmt":"2009-03-24T06:31:24","slug":"russell-bishop-is-multitasking","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beyondblue\/2009\/03\/russell-bishop-is-multitasking.html","title":{"rendered":"Russell Bishop: Is Multitasking Good for You?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span class=\"mt-enclosure mt-enclosure-image\"><img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"r-MULTITASKING-large.jpg\" src=\"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/71\/import\/imgs\/r-MULTITASKING-large.jpg\" width=\"600\" height=\"400\" class=\"mt-image-center\" style=\"text-align: center;margin: 0 auto 20px\" \/><\/span><a href=\"http:\/\/www.huffingtonpost.com\/russell-bishop\/is-multitasking-good-for_b_177860.html\">Russell Bishop over at the Huffington Post has an interesting take on multitasking. <\/a>I like his distinction between <strong>multiple goals<\/strong> versus <strong>multitasking<\/strong>. He writes:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<blockquote><p>When you take on a goal, figure out what you have to deliver in order to succeed, and then determine the steps necessary, you must manage the process one step at a time. That doesn&#8217;t mean you can&#8217;t have multiple goals; however, it does mean that when you are working on one area, you better have your focus there if you want to do well.\u00a0\n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<blockquote>\n<p>Have you ever been on one of those &#8220;conference calls&#8221; with co-workers? You know the ones &#8211; people spread around the country or even the world &#8211; inevitably someone poses a question to someone else and the other person has no idea what the question is about? Been there? Maybe you were the one who didn&#8217;t know what was up?<\/p>\n<p>How come? Perhaps you decided the call wasn&#8217;t that important and so decided to catch up on your email instead. Been there? Even better, ever been on one call and used your cell phone to make a second call? (Mute buttons hide lots of sins).<\/p>\n<p>These days, you can even be in the same room and someone, perhaps most, will be &#8220;attending the meeting&#8221; while simultaneously answering messages on their Blackberries or leaving the room for a phone call.<\/p>\n<p>What&#8217;s up with this? Most people call it multitasking. I call it half-tasking. Half their attention is on one goal, and half their attention is on another.<\/p>\n<p>When someone is busy half-tasking, often both tasks wind up being underperformed. In fact, sometimes the most important reasons for being there get missed.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.huffingtonpost.com\/russell-bishop\/is-multitasking-good-for_b_177860.html\">You should click here and read his entire article though,<\/a> because it makes you think a little more creativity about this whole issue, that I simply just avoid. Precisely because I do have difficulty chewing gum and walking (or at least boiling water).<\/p>\n<p><em>To read more <a href=\"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/beyondblue\">Beyond Blue, go to http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/beyondblue<\/a>, and to get to <a href=\"http:\/\/community.beliefnet.com\/beyond_blue\">Group Beyond Blue, a support group at Beliefnet Community, click here.<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.feedburner.com\/fb\/a\/emailverifySubmit?feedId=611738&amp;loc=en_US\">To subscribe to &#8220;Beyond Blue&#8221; click here.<\/a><\/p>\n<p><span class=\"mt-enclosure mt-enclosure-image\"><img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"rss.gif\" src=\"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/71\/import\/imgs\/rss.gif\" width=\"45\" height=\"44\" class=\"mt-image-left\" style=\"float: left;margin: 0 20px 20px 0\" \/><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Russell Bishop over at the Huffington Post has an interesting take on multitasking. I like his distinction between multiple goals versus multitasking. He writes: When you take on a goal, figure out what you have to deliver in order to succeed, and then determine the steps necessary, you must manage the process one step at&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":17,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1678","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-mental-health"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Russell Bishop: Is Multitasking Good for You? - Beyond Blue<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beyondblue\/2009\/03\/russell-bishop-is-multitasking.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Russell Bishop: Is Multitasking Good for You? - Beyond Blue\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Russell Bishop over at the Huffington Post has an interesting take on multitasking. 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I like his distinction between multiple goals versus multitasking. He writes: When you take on a goal, figure out what you have to deliver in order to succeed, and then determine the steps necessary, you must manage the process one step at&hellip;","og_url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beyondblue\/2009\/03\/russell-bishop-is-multitasking.html","og_site_name":"Beyond Blue","article_published_time":"2009-03-24T06:31:24+00:00","og_image":[{"url":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/beyondblue\/files\/import\/imgs\/r-MULTITASKING-large.jpg"}],"author":"Beyond Blue","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beyondblue\/2009\/03\/russell-bishop-is-multitasking.html","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beyondblue\/2009\/03\/russell-bishop-is-multitasking.html","name":"Russell Bishop: Is Multitasking Good for You? - Beyond Blue","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beyondblue\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beyondblue\/2009\/03\/russell-bishop-is-multitasking.html#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beyondblue\/2009\/03\/russell-bishop-is-multitasking.html#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/beyondblue\/files\/import\/imgs\/r-MULTITASKING-large.jpg","datePublished":"2009-03-24T06:31:24+00:00","dateModified":"2009-03-24T06:31:24+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beyondblue\/#\/schema\/person\/47318cdf8063cc052eccff0c99db4e75"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beyondblue\/2009\/03\/russell-bishop-is-multitasking.html#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beyondblue\/2009\/03\/russell-bishop-is-multitasking.html"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beyondblue\/2009\/03\/russell-bishop-is-multitasking.html#primaryimage","url":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/beyondblue\/files\/import\/imgs\/r-MULTITASKING-large.jpg","contentUrl":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/beyondblue\/files\/import\/imgs\/r-MULTITASKING-large.jpg"},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beyondblue\/2009\/03\/russell-bishop-is-multitasking.html#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beyondblue"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Russell Bishop: Is Multitasking Good for You?"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beyondblue\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beyondblue\/","name":"Beyond Blue","description":"Beliefnet Voices - Therese J. 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