A lot of women especially mothers pride ourselves in the ability to multitask as it gives us a sense of getting more done in less time.

However several studies have found that multitasking can actually result in us wasting around 20 – 40 per cent of our time, depending on what we are trying to accomplish.

Sure, there are times when you can multitask such as doing the ironing and listening to an inspirational podcast or music or cooking two different meals at the same time.

However when it comes to your life and business, it is a myth that multitasking makes you more productive and faster.

Multitasking is known as the act of conducting two (or more) unrelated activities at the same time. In reality, multitasking slows you down and leads to low performance and potentially costly errors.

You are better off keeping your focus on one task at a time. In fact, that is how your brain was designed- to process one activity at a time.  Your brain is not a glorified computer, even a computer has a limit to how much multi processing it can do.

One thing your brain is extremely good at is rapidly switching from one task to another.

MIT neuroscientist Earl Miller (Think You’re Multitasking? Think Again: John Hamilton, NPR October 2008) says, “Switching from task to task, you think that you’re actually paying attention to everything around you at the same time. But, you’re actually not.”

What you are doing is moving from one task to the other at amazing fast speeds. So in actual sense, we never multitasking.

Imagine trying to talk to someone on the phone and balancing your accounts at the same time. One of those tasks or even both will suffer.

Multitasking can lower the quality of your work. It could also make you feel overwhelmed and stressed as you have all these things you are juggling in your mind at the same time.

[Tweet “Multitasking can lower the quality of your work”]

When you try to multitask think of how you feel at the end. Probably tired, frustrated and overwhelmed. Your brain feels overloaded.

Think of how satisfied you feel when you devote your full attention to just one task at a time. You are able to focus, and you’ll probably finish it feeling as if you’ve not only completed something, but also done your best.

To help you stay focused and get your work done, set a timer for 10, 20, 30, 60 minutes (estimate how long it would take you to complete the task) and focus SOLELY on that task, blazing your way through it. When the timer goes off, give yourself permission to move on to the next task.

Get rid of all distractions. Put your phone on silent. Remove all visual and audible alerts for when emails come in, or for social media.

If you find your mind wandering when you should be focusing on your work, you need to guide your thoughts back to what you are doing by putting yourself in the moment. Stay disciplined.

I know as a mum you feel like there is so much to do given the different roles you perform, but if you want to feel less stressed and overwhelmed try handling one task at a time, or at least unrelated tasks which you can do together.  At first this will be hard as you are used to multitasking,  but practice makes perfect.

If you want to move your career or business and even your life to the next level it is imperative that you ditch the act of multitasking and stay focused on the tasks that will help your business grow.

If you want to know more about maximising your time and taking back control of your time join the Super Working Mum Academy