Tim Ferris on Multitasking

(HT: Brian Barela)

March 22, 2010 | Filed Under Uncategorized | 7 Comments

Comments

7 Responses to “Tim Ferris on Multitasking”

Mike Anderson on March 22nd, 2010 9:05 am

Matt,

Since you oversee a quite large group of people, who do you deal with interruption?

Emails can wait, but people often need access—how do you balance both?
Scott S. on March 22nd, 2010 10:16 am

I think he overstates his case when suggesting you only check your email once (or was it twice/day?), and that he only checks his work email weekly. That’s a formula for getting fired, especially if you have a job that is customer focused. I can hear it now, “I’m sorry Mr. Customer, I only check my email once a day.” Or, what if you are an account executive: speed is frequently the key to getting the order.
Angus on March 22nd, 2010 8:33 pm

I read this often and agree it is overstated – at least in some professions. I’d love to have a job I could check my email once or twice a day! The reality is I work in network support, and we support a lot of clients, being alerted to emergencies and customer needs by email which we have to monitor consistently through the day…how to professions like that fit with this advice given out so frequently (I’d honestly love to hear your thoughts…I enjoy this blog a great deal…modeled my home home office by Ikea after reading your series and it’s working out great)
Matt on March 22nd, 2010 8:42 pm

Yes, if _your job itself_ consists in answering email, then certainly you couldn’t go down to checking email just once or twice a day.

I think that Ferris’ advice is mostly geared towards jobs that require significant work outside of the realms of email. For example, the authors of Rework, who started 37 Signals, talk a lot about the importance of having time to work uninterrupted. They are coming from an environment of software and coding. If someone who is doing coding acts like someone who is in network support for most of the day, you have a mis-match. Likewise, if someone in network support tried to give 60% of their time to blocks fully divorced from email, you would also have a mis-match.

I think the problem comes when people who really don’t have jobs that require very quick email turn around act like they do, and end up giving almost no time to sustained thought and initiatives that require significant concentration.
Mike Anderson on March 23rd, 2010 10:49 am

You’ve got to read his book for this to make sense.

He would tell you that you should quit your job if it requires such constant attention to communication, and you should create a system that allows you to work from the Bahamas.

The group of people that I think could really benefit from his ideas are foreign-missionaries. They could likely self-fund if they can pull it off.
Matt on March 25th, 2010 11:07 am

Mike: Great point there. In regard to the question in your first comment:

I don’t have this mastered. For the last chunk of time I’ve been in the middle of a large project that has complicated everything, because there’s this large project to do along with everyone else. This has meant being less available than I would ordinarily like. But there are a few things I do.

First, weekly 1:1s. This allows important but non-urgent items to be grouped and dealt with all together, and cuts down on the need for dealing with as many things throughout the week.

Second, what I primarily try and do is get individual, focused work done early in the morning so that for the afternoon I’m available more spontaneously. But this is where the large project has created the most interference.

Third, I designate all Tuesday for meetings when I am in town. Recurring meetings in the morning and meetings from people outside the organization who want to talk in the afternoon. In between I’m available spontaneously. Designating Tuesday in this way allows me to block my time better.

Fourth, I work from home all day on Thursdays. This is another good forum for getting a bunch of focused work done. Usually on Thursdays I don’t check email either.

Fifth, when there are important things to discuss with folks at DG that come up on the fly, I tend to give as much time as needed to the discussion. I actually enjoy that and I think it’s important not to be hurried. It’s also why I have to be careful to protect my time for focused work, though. I need to be making the progress I need on that front so that I can be unhurried in dealing with people, without that resulting in work overflowing to take over my home life.
Mike Anderson on March 25th, 2010 11:59 am

Matt, you should make the last comment a blog post.

It’s good.