Adverse Effects of Multitasking and Merge Bias on Projects
The myth of multitasking
Multitasking is the ability to handle the demands of multiple tasks simultaneously.
It is an unavoidable part of our business and personal lives—we work on different projects, operate many devices, and constantly switch our focus from one topic to another.
Multitasking may come naturally even while doing a single job and distract from searching for missing information.
Nowadays, there is a myth, especially in the business world, that human multitasking increases productivity and effectiveness. We will research the pros and cons of multitasking and its adjacent matter—a merge bias.
Multitasking leads to reduced productivity.
When someone pretends to multitask, they successively switch the execution of two or more operations. In fact, it has been scientifically proven that only 2.5% of people called "supertaskers" can make effective multitasking.
According to the American Psychology Association (APA), alternating between tasks may reduce productivity by up to 40%. The more complex the task is, the more significant the impact on productivity.
The explanation is simple - our attention has limited capacity. Switching attention may only lead to one task prospering at a cost. This comes at the expense of:
- reduced productivity;
- errors after an interruption of a task;
- increased stress;
- fatigue and even brain damage.
Therefore, the opposite of multitasking is specialization, where workers concentrate on a specific task and develop their particular skills and productivity.
Specialization also has a flip side - a monotonous, fragmented job leads to workers' demotivation.
Little's Law proves that multitasking leads to lower productivity
There's a fundamental theorem called Little's Law, which provides the following calculation:
Throughput = Work in Progress / Cycle Time.
This is super-intuitive and somewhat simplified, as the underlying condition is the system's steady state.
Yet, it is inevitable that multitasking increases the Cycle Time value; therefore, it decreases the Throughput.
Uncommon benefits of multitasking
While multitasking deteriorates productivity, it also provides a suite of benefits, some of which are not that obvious:
- the communication cost increases when workers with specialized information join together in a team;
- multitasking also means multiskilling, which positively affects the process innovation capability of a worker;
- one of the core job characteristics is "task variety," which improves the worker's satisfaction and retention;
- multitasking provides the staff flexibility;
- Multiskilled workers are better protected from layoffs due to labor-saving technological changes or high market volatility, implying rapid product changes.
The new face of multitasking - multiple team membership
Multitasking is not about an individual doing (or instead pretending to do) many jobs at once. We're increasingly involved in different project teams, working groups, task forces, etc. This tendency is called multiple team membership.
Firms increasingly adopt this approach to leverage resources and facilitate knowledge transfer, effectively managing essential commodities such as attention and information.
One can differentiate the multiple team membership by the number of variety of teams.
The first indicator is obvious; the second one becomes increasingly familiar to us from personal experience - we attend Finance, Technology, Governance, HR, and many other task forces with different and sometimes conflicting agendas.
The general observation is that the number of teams affects workers' productivity, while variety stimulates learning. Of course, that happens to a reasonable level, after which there are no additional benefits of productivity or learning but degradation.
The dimensions of productivity
When we mentioned the degradation of productivity resulting from multitasking, we simplified it a bit. In fact, productivity is a complex and multidimensional phenomenon, and experts distinguish at least two critical dimensions—turnaround and utilization.
Turnaround is the time from the receipt of a task to its accomplishment.
Utilization captures the extent to which resources are used instead of sitting idle, i.e., "billable hours."
Naturally, a worker may demonstrate a significant turnaround while not effectively utilized. Therefore, the earlier discussed multiple team membership should be looked at by optimizing turnaround and resource utilization.
The definition of merge bias.
In complex cross-functional projects, the notion of multitasking goes hand in hand with the merge bias.
Merge bias means that two or more parallel tasks must be completed to pass to the project's next stage. Therefore, a delay in any of these tasks delays the completion of an entire stage.
As the number of predecessors for a task increases, the likelihood of it starting on time
diminishes. Project plans with many activity linkages are more likely to achieve completion dates.
In the procurement context, if end-user experts evaluate RFP bids as a mandatory sequential step of the competitive process, the procurement cycle time must account for the cumulative delay caused by that.
The same applies to external experts on the project's critical path in the generic context of project management.
As we discussed earlier, merge bias will affect a project's turnaround. Still, the following study will show that the core of the problem lies in productivity utilization.
The effect of multitasking
Obviously, both the vendor and project manager's abnormal workload (20 tasks) creates the most significant delay.
The devastating effect of merge bias on cycle time
The number of experts contributing to the evaluation has a lesser impact on the project lead time, even in extreme cases. For example, one expert in the bid evaluation generated 135 hours of delay, while 10 - only 198 hours. However, this scenario assumed the 100% dedication of experts to the task.
The expert's task duration significantly impacted the project lead time. For example, the 8-hour evaluation period compared to 1 hour increased the delay threefold.
The most significant observation relates to the scenario of experts' variable commitment.
The change of commitment from 5% to 1% increased the project cycle time nearly 4 times, from (294 to 1132 hours,) while the transition from 10% to 5% only added 50%.
Is multitasking a skill?
Cognitive studies suggested that the common perception of decreased productivity due to multitasking is somewhat limited.
In cases where individuals are highly skilled at both tasks, the decrease in productivity in dual-tasking is negligible. Therefore, multitasking itself is not a skill.
Scientists observed that the decrease in dual-task performance is attributed to the following three factors:
- peripheral interference due to standard sensory or motor processes of the two tasks;
- lack of practice in combining the tasks;
- instructions that discourage simultaneous processing.
Therefore, individuals should be able to perform simultaneous cognitive operations without interference if the following three conditions are met:
- Motor or sensory overlap is eliminated.
- The individual is given sufficient practice at performing the tasks simultaneously.
- Instructions allocate equal priority to each task.
The earlier explained effect of merge bias may be related to point 3 above. Partial commitment leads to sufficient degradation of productivity. However, equal prioritization could limit the negative impact.
Merge bias can derail projects; multitasking is less of a concern
The conclusion from the above is pretty intuitive and straightforward, yet it points out a specific area of attention.
Multitasking is a hot topic in today's business environment. There are thousands of explanations for why multitasking is harmful and many more reasons why it's not.
However, the true center of attention should be the merge bias.
One of your project's most critical control points is the level of commitment of end-user experts, who contribute to your project while multitasking.
It is a problematic area of control, as it falls out of the direct responsibility of a project or procurement manager in charge. Nevertheless, the expert project manager should control all involved resources to ensure adequate turnaround.
Once again, this conversation points our attention to the importance of stakeholder management. Otherwise, 1%-committed experts would unconsciously derail any project unless adequately managed.
P.S. A view on competitive bidding as the barrier to project lead time reduction.
All graphs above were taken from this research, where section 6.1.3, pages 241-243, contains the following statements:
"Another significant opportunity (to reduce lead time) lies in streamlining the current procurement
practice and exploring alternatives to competitive bidding. Competitive bidding is not an efficient way to procure customized products.
Competitive bidding did not
provide incentives for long-range process development. It aims to cut costs and
not necessary to increase value."
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