Here's How Entrepreneurs Can Multitask it Right! But when you are trying to do everything, there's also a possibility that you will also face setbacks.
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When you are building a business from scratch, you are involved everything. As an entrepreneur, you end up doing the smallest of tasks and also solving the biggest of problems. So for the founder, multitasking is an inherent capability.
But when you are trying to do everything, there's also a possibility that you will also face setbacks. Be it lack of time or the inability to finish each task with undivided focus, entrepreneurs end up facing more problems if they can't multitask it right.
Entrepreneur India spoke to entrepreneurs as they shared their tips for multitasking.
The Tricks to Multitasking
There are various things an entrepreneur can do to ensure they are multitasking perfectly. Ravish Yadav, Marketing Manager, Riversong Technologies believes that being an entrepreneur/professional can be a real juggling act. "For me, I run out steam in the afternoons, so I make sure that I'm maximizing my mornings. I get more work done 7-11a.m. if I minimize distractions. If not, I'm playing catchup all day," he said.
Juggling multiple tasks at the same time, entrepreneurs have to be careful that they find the right balance. Multi-tasking is a double-edged sword, as for entrepreneurs there is no way one can do away without multi-tasking, believes Rahul Agarwal, Director Wealth Discovery, EZ Wealth and added that however, multi-tasking at times leads to severe distraction and at the end of the day nothing gets done.
Set Priorities
One of the important things to keep in mind while multi-tasking is to create a task list and that too in the right order. Agarwal said that it's important to set priorities. "Although, I am usually engaged in multiple things at the same time but I do not lose sight on priorities, each task on my list has a set priority and at the end of the day all high priority work gets done and all low priority work gets shifted to the next available schedule," he said.
Bharti Taneja, Founder & Director, Alps Beauty Group too agrees. She said that multitasking is futile if you are not able to tick off things from your to-do list at the end of the day. "Multitasking is all about saving time or making the most out of it (time), so you must prioritise," she said. Taneja also added that this is my mantra you have to be mentally alert in order to multitask.
String Tasks Together
When you are creating that task list, another trick is to set similar tasks and finish them together. On a personal note, Agarwal said that during the course of the day, he usually works on several tasks some of them are related to each other for e.g. tasks related to back-office are also common with the account opening tasks. "In doing that, I tend to minimize switching costs between tasks as it is well established that it is easier for the brain to adjust and perform closely related tasks more efficiently," he said.
What You Should Avoid
While multitasking there are also things you should avoid so that you don't end up ruining things. When multitasking, you need to know when to do it and when not to, believes Yadav. "The ideal situation is to be able to multitask when multitasking is appropriate, and focus when focusing is important," he said.
He also added that you don't have to do everything at once. "Most of us try to do too many big things at the same time, and thus spread ourselves too thin. It's not uncommon for most of us to overestimate our abilities, so you have to set a hard limit for yourself to keep things in check," he said.
When you are doing several things together, it's not impossible that you also end up getting distracted. The perfect solution? Switch off that phone. Agarwal said, "I try to avoid all other distractions because multitasking in itself is a distraction of sorts. My phone is usually in silent mode, and notifications of popular messaging apps are off, I usually check my emails and messages once in an hour and usually do not get distracted every time my phone buzzes."
However, even when the going gets tough it's important to keep calm. Agarwal puts out a word of caution: Stress and multitasking do not go well together. "As entrepreneurs, we cannot avoid stress, however, there are ways to mitigate or reduce the intensity of stress to some extent. A proper diet, timely breaks, a good night sleep and a strict regimen of exercise are few things that help me go through my daily routine of work which involves a lot of multi-tasking smoothly," he said.
