Multitasking is having more than one project on the go at a time and being able to work on them in rotation as incremental progress is made on one project - it is not responding to every interruption that the telephone, SMS and walk-in visitors cause.
Multitasking is a productivity "increaser" by:
- breaking up the boredom of doing one thing too long
- allowing other to "catch-up" - indeed even allowing the delegation of work to others - while not getting ahead of the useful results. (there is a tendency when one gets "in the zone" to "continue coding" even though other features or elements of the project are not far enough along to justify spending the time - and as a result prodcuing "code" that will have to be redone becuse of wrong assumptions - not bad code. **note: "code" is used generically - the problem occurs in all kinds of project work.)
- causing a "wrap-up" phase and reassessment of what work has been accomplished and if it has veered off course from the planned destination in the process of focusing on the near term result.(Sort of like the times when framing the wall gets so quick and easy that the windows get left out.)
The difference is that <more>
Multitasking is a productivity reducer by:
- interrupting the fleeting bit of unwritten "code" that is in short term memory but has not made it past the keyboard yet. (see **)
- causuing
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