Wow, was Charles Dickens ever ahead of his time when he made this declaration in the 1800’s!
The art of time management rightfully reinforced the importance of such traits as planning, proactivity, prioritizing and punctuality as essential in achieving your goals (see the blog on the 6 P’s for more).
In the late 1960’s, the computer industry introduced the concept of multitasking, the apparent improved performance by an individual via handling more than one task at the same time.
I recall an era when job seekers proudly touted multitasking as a skill on their resumes!
The reality is that multitasking results in wasted effort due to human context switching and apparently causing more errors due to insufficient attention.
A 2009 study by Hewlett-Packard revealed that multitaskers performed much worse at tasks involving cognitive processes and memory than did those who focused on single tasks.
As alluded to in The Electronic Leash blog, modern day technology has forced us to heed Dickens’ direction. Those who indeed can demonstrate the skill of concentrating on one task at a time will surely outperform the others who remain at the mercy of allowing distraction to occur.
Leadership Strikes 