Don’t brown out to mediocrity

The subject of multi-tasking has been showing up in pop-psychology circuits for a decade now. The dialog is perpetuated by a growing arsenal of gadgetry and software that make our lives better through increased efficiency. But is efficiency being misconstrued? Efficiency is a process, not a result. And it appears that efficiency is experiencing a mid-life crisis, having a sultry closet affair with multi-tasking and breeding a love child called mediocrity.

I’ve spent…wasted…a lot of time downloading and testing list making, task prioritizing apps and coordinating personal calendars with work calendars across servers, syncing it and pushing it back to devices, etc. Fun for a geek, but I’ve been loading up lists while not checking anything off. Alas, the real problem is not being addressed. The lure of expansion, the romanticization of the renaissance man, has taken it’s toll. There should not be an app to perpetuate or skill deemed appropriate or used as an excuse for trying to do too many things at once.

I teach the art of hierarchy in design. Visual competition, functional competition, leads to poor use, misunderstandings, muddied communication, and missed opportunities, be it in interactive design or product design. A clarity of purpose is achieved not by making everything an equal priority, but by naming a single priority and letting the rest be subordinate, non-intrusive, and non-interruptive…until their times come.

Multi-tasking is the sanctioning of interruptions. Beyond the world of pop-psychology, there are well researched and conclusive studies on brown-outs in the brain as a result of task overload. Smaller bundles of energy are assigned to disparate acts negating the possibility of truly inspired and creative thinking for any one.

I’m not saying there isn’t a fine line that can be often crossed when negotiating tasks and priorities. And often, diversions serve as moments of rest and refocus. It’s probably unrealistic for me to expect that the one-thing-at-a-time notion can be an absolute truth in the modern world. But then why not?

Through almost two decades as a professional, I’ve never met or hired an individual that could do many things better than one person could do one thing best. I get resumes and hear the know-it-all braggarts boasting of whiz-bang juggling skills. But when it comes down to it, instead of “I have an ability to multi-task and juggle many projects at once,”  I would rather mentor a talent such as “I have an ability to focus and see things through to completion.” Don’t’ be afraid to reject the modern paradigm of multi-tasking. True efficiency is rewarded with quality. Focus and follow through. Slow down enough to be obsessively inspired and creative, and kick mediocrity out of your closet.

Posted: February 9th, 2010 | Author: Frankendesign | No Comments »