You multitask all the time, right? Drive and talk on the phone. Talk with someone and answer your email. Participate on a conference call and catch up on email. So how can it be a myth?

Our brains automate everything possible, absorbing and integrating our daily experiences. What is new today, like learning to play a scale on the piano, becomes automated as we practice until, before we know it, we are playing the Moonlight Sonata.

Over 90% of what we say and do every day is automatic. The part of our brain that allows us to pay attention and act with intention is quite small. We actually only focus intentionally on one thing at a time. We do not and CAN not pay attention to two or more things without a decrement in performance of at least one of them.

Let’s say you are on a conference call and checking your email. You are actually only doing one of these at any given moment. This is why, even though you think you are successfully doing both, you find yourself not being able to answer a question on the conference call, or you keep rereading the same email. What is actually happening is that you are quickly switching back and forth between the two. Listen to the conference call, read the email, back and forth. If you practice this a lot, you can get pretty good at it – meaning, you won’t embarrass yourself too often by claiming to be paying attention to something that you are not.

Trouble for Us and Our Work

Here’s the catch: our brains are processing, which takes energy., The effort it takes to multitask is wasting our energy capacity. As we think about an issue, we bring it into focus and begin the process of thinking. It takes time before other associations are made in the brain. They topple like dominoes until the conceptual network fills out. Only at this point, are we able to work on the problem with our full capacity. When we stop focusing on this issue, the connections fade. If we want to go back to the issue, the conceptual network is not sitting there, waiting for us to reconnect to it. Our brain will recreate it. When we focus on one issue, then switch to another, and then return to the first, we expend serious energy, because we only get one focal framework at a time.

So what, you ask? Here are some implications of embracing multitasking behaviors:

• We do not bring our best thinking to the table, so innovation takes a big hit. Sound solutions to serious problems take a big hit. Looking smart takes a hit!
• We are exhausting energy that can be used for better results. Staying focused can result in actually getting something done in a sustainable way!
• We are building habits that make it harder to change. We are literally training our brain to do this “multi-tasking” in spite of getting worse results.
• We are reducing the likelihood of doing our best thinking when we really need it.

Breaking the Multitasking Habit

Here are some suggestions for taking better advantage of your incredible brain power:

• Practice good work habits. Clear your space of distractions. Turn off your phone, email ding, or other sounds that will draw you away from your intended work. You might want to check out the Pomodoro Technique (www.pomodorotechnique.com) for good suggestions for improving your intentional space.
• Form a new story. Accept that multitasking does not work the way you wish and that you limit your abilities with that story. Your new story can be a recognition that you have limited focal resources and you do not want to waste them.
• Diminish the multitasking myth in your work place. Organizations that value multitasking are reinforcing frantic and ineffective habits that reduce overall thinking capacity.