Multitasking Infection, PMCamp Berlin 2014

MULTITASKING
Don’t infect your Team

MULTITASKING Christoph Moser
(chris@vividbreeze.com)
I DEVELOPED THE GAME MULTITASKING INFECTION TO SHOW MANAGERS THAT
MULTITASKING CAN HAVE SEVERE EFFECTS NOT ONLY TO THEMSELVES BUT
ESPECIALLY TO THEIR TEAMS. IN ADDITION THIS GAME AIMS TO MAKE ANYONE AWARE
OF THE NEGATIVE EFFECTS AND HOW TO DEAL WITH THEM SUCCESSFULLY.
ADDITIONAL MATERIAL (TASK SHEETS ETC.) WILL BE MADE AVAILABLE VERY SOON.
THE GAME IS AVAILABLE UNDER CREATIVE COMMONS LICENSE
SUMMARY

YOUR WORKPLACE
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xO_oEGHWSMU

MANY OF US
(LOVE TO)
MULTITASK

More than half of the 1.100 participants stated they respond to e-mail immediately or
as soon as possible.
21% respond to incoming e-mails within a meeting
“Infomania” Study for Hewlett-Packard (Wilson G, 2005)
PEOPLE LOVE TO MULTITASK

POSSIBLE REASONS?
LACK OF SELF-DISCIPLINE
SOME LIKE TO BE DISRUPTED
CURRENT TASK IS BORING OR DIFFICULT
LOVE A WELCOME DISTRACTION
OTHERS EXPECT THAT I’M REACTING ASAP
…

THE PROJECT MANAGER
Five Salty Balls by Gabriel Rojas Hruska , https://www.flickr.com/photos/bluefade/4229364807/
WE USUALLY MULTITASK

GREAT (PROJECT)
MANAGERS DELEGATE
TASKS
http://www.recruiter.com/i/10-things-that-make-a-good-project-manager-great/

QS
UX
DEV
Manager
MULTITASKING IS INFECTIOUS
PM

HOW DO I RECOGNISE?
NOT YET
ANOTHER
NON-SENSE
MEETING!
ARRGG – I
WANT TO STAY
FOCUSSED FOR
30 MINS….
UX
DEV

MULTITASKING
=
TASK SWITCHING

10-point fall in IQ by people getting distracted by phone calls or incoming
emails.
“Infomania” Study for Hewlett-Packard (Wilson G, 2005)
Chronic Multitaskers perfomend extremely bad at all tasks given compared to
non-multitaskers. Multitaskers use their brains less effectively.
Cognitive control in media multitaskers (Nass, C et al., 2009)
Participants who had to perform three tasks simultaneously regulary forgot
one of the tasks and made three times as many mistakes compared to working
on two tasks at the same time.
Divided Representation of Concurrent Goals in the Human Frontal Lobes (Charron
S, Koechlin E, 2010)
CONSEQUENCES

LOSS OF BRAIN POWER

CONSEQUENCES
Participants lost a significant amount of time when they
switched between tasks. The more complex the task, the
more time they lost.
Executive Control of Cognitive Processes in Task Switching (Rubinstein et al., 2001)

SWITCHING TIME
t
Task
Interruption
Task + Interruptions
Switching Time
Total

THE PLAYERS

THE DEVELOPMENT TEAM
Designs the product in a way
customers love.
QS
UX
Finds pragmatic solutions
for complicated problems.
An expert in finding bugs
and errors.
DEV

THE PROJECT MANAGER
PM

THE TASKS
Contribute Slides to a Presentation
Research Tasks
Help with Technical Problems
Administrative Tasks

THE SIGNIFICANT OTHERS
Need Help
Managers
Other PMs
Colleagues
Members of
other Teams

THE WHOLE PICTURE
UX
QS
DEV
Others
Others
PM

THE RULES
Project Managers receive 1 point per
correctly completed task on time1 PT
1 PT
-1 PT
If a task is not completed correctly (of not
on time) the Project Managers receive minus
1 point
Team Member receive 1 point for each entity
(block)

ROUND 1
8 Minutes (equivalent to 8h workday)
Project Manager approached tasks on
TODO-List sequentially (one after the
other)
Others
Others ask project managers or other
team members occasionally for help.
Team-Members do their job

MIKE SAYS
” The usual example is that the ScrumMaster must
protect the team from an overly aggressive product
owner.”
Mike Cohen, 2011

HOW CAN WE DECREASE
MULTITASKING ?

ROUND 2
2 Minutes Preparation Time.
8 Minutes (equivalent to 8h workday)
Project Manager approached tasks on
TODO-List in any order she or he
likes.
Others
Others ask project managers or other
team members occasionally for help.
Team-Members do their job

HOW CAN WE DECREASE MULTITASKING?
!   Say “no” or “come back later, please”
!   Check your emails only once an hour
!   Disable your messenger
!   Plan Meetings carefully
!   Prioritise and batch tasks for others
!   Occasionally work somewhere else
!   Establish “Office Hours”
!   Only delegate tasks if you really cannot
solve them on your own

PMCAMP BERLIN 2014

!   Create no-disturbing slots
!   Scrum Master is SPoC for the team
!   Agree on other busy signals (Status in Messengers,
Traffic Light, etc.)
!   Don’t pick up the phone when you are busy (if the
problem is urgent the person will visit you)
!   Plan Meetings around common arrival times or breaks
!   Plan Meetings efficiently, split meetings with different
participants (e.g. technical and managerial part)
!   Mutual education of members about when to
interrupt and when not to disturb
PMCAMP BERLIN 2014

LEARNINGS
The Game needs about 15 Minutes of preparation of the environment.
The one team per table setting was quite good.
If you have only 40 minutes, use only one round without measuring
team performance. If you plan to run the whole game with two
rounds, it will take about two hours.
Let the discussion about improvements run freely for about 15
minutes without pushing the team to the improvements you have
already thought about before.
The QS Task (comparing two rows) was too easy – it will be altered
soon.
Although project managers are kind of aware about the negative
effects of Multitasking, the game helps to put a focus on it.

WHO WAS THIS GUY?
Christoph Moser
Dipl-Ing. tech. Informatik, MBA

Agile Coach, Agile Project Manager

Strong Background as Java Developer
and Information Architect

Certified Scrum Master
Certified Scrum Product Owner

Keen runner, photographer and cook

chris@vividbreeze.com
0049 173 36 18 15 8
www.vividbreeze.com

Multitasking Infection, PMCamp Berlin 2014

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