Busy students and young professionals have to wear a bunch of hats: student, PRSSA member, student-run firm associate, intern, part-time employee, sorority or fraternity leader, son or daughter, friend and the list goes on.
Multi-tasking is hard. It’s easy to get spread too thin and not do a great job on any one thing. You’ll find lots of tips on productivity all over the Internets. Some of my favorite sites are Zen Habits, Dumb Little Man, 43 Folders and Freelance Switch.
I’ve pulled some of my favorite tips from these sites (and my own experience as a master multi-tasker) to share with you.
To start, generally multi-tasking is bad. It takes precious time to shift from task to task (I’ve heard it takes 20 minutes to refocus after an interruption). Minimizing interruptions and creating time and space for each task separately – to the best of your ability – is important.
And remember, it takes longer than you think it will to do anything.
- Recognize each of the roles that you must play and define each. For example, think about the environment that you’re in when doing your “job” as a student. This isn’t just class time, of course, but study time, team time, etc. What do you need to do to be successful in each role? How much time does each take per week?
- Schedule time for each task/role/job. If you don’t have a schedule and stick to it, the squeakiest wheel will get the grease. That is to say you’ll pay attention and respond to the task that is right in front of you or the teammate who is demanding a response immediately and not necessarily the most important or highest priority task.
- Establish clear goals and objectives for what you want to accomplish in each role and work toward those goals with tasks that you can break down into parts every week.
- Make sure you have the necessary tools to do the job (or have access to the tools). There are a gazillion Web 2.0 tools that can help with task lists and organization, time management and collaboration. But necessary tools might also mean a clean workspace or a quiet corner of the library.
- Focus. Prioritize. Prioritize. Stop Procrastinating.
If you’ve slain the multi-tasking beast and have some tips to share, please! Leave them in the comments.
