Multi-tasking Overwhelm in the Virtual Meeting World

One of the smallest but most significant challenges I am seeing with my clients on a daily basis as we navigate this new world, is the incessant multi-tasking of the virtual world.

Through every meeting, every 1:1, every training session, every focused piece of work, professionals are constantly being disrupted.

• For some, it is the need to “prove I’m actually working” even though I’m at home,
• Or the need to ensure my team feels like I’m constantly supporting them,
• For others, it is the need to ‘not miss anything’, because everything is business critical right now.

I feel like the progress we had made in helping people to recognise that multi-tasking does not serve our performance or our well-being, is being rapidly eroded in the current context.

I get that it’s hard. I know there’s some technical fiddliness that is necessary to switch off notifications. I understand that the expectations and the risks are high.

And, if we keep being ‘on’ to everything all the time, our performance will drop, our well-being will plummet, and we won’t be able to serve any of these needs in the way we want to.

But how to fix it Amy?!

For starters…

1. Take back control from your device. Spend 10 minutes to figure out how to control all the notifications that distract you and choose how you want to be notified. It’s your choice to make, you do not have to live with the default “what about me, what about me” notification settings!
2. Then, intentionally choose what to focus on next. Bring all your attention to that, then move to the next thing. Pick the period/s during the day when you will attend to everything that’s popping up – just don’t make it all the time!
3. Finally – give yourself a few minutes between meetings, so you can pause, and choose to focus on the one you are in.
   If you don’t need to be fully present there, why are you plugging in?!

Let’s not create work environments where we are all partially present when we are in meetings together.

It’s important to respect each other’s time enough to clarify what we’re trying to achieve and choose who needs to actively contribute to the conversation. So each of us gives our attention in this moment to that which actually needs us.

A pipe dream of mine? Maybe.