Career Tools: Manage Time, Maximize Results

As executive assistant to Kyle Cavanaugh, Duke’s vice president of administration, Pat Marson knows every day will require her to think on her feet. 

“I reprioritize about 25 times a day,” Marson said. “What’s most critical for Kyle may change throughout the day, so I’m shuffling things all day long.”

To keep track of meetings, emails and phone calls, she has a system of printing documents, flagging electronic files and constantly jotting down notes on a legal pad at her desk. It can create a flurry of multitasking, but Marson has learned to organize those tasks together, helping her to juggle and remain focused.

In research published earlier this year, Jordan Etkin, an assistant professor at Duke’s Fuqua School of Business, shared findings that show how multitasking may influence how successful and happy individuals feel in their work.

“When you switch tasks, there’s a cost in terms of our cognitive resources,” Etkin said. “We can’t just go from Project A to Project B because it takes time and energy to transition between those tasks.”

The net result? The potential for increased stress due to less productivity.

“The more startup costs you incur in short amounts of time, the less productive you feel,” Etkin said.

To combat the feeling, the trick to successful multitasking lies in finding different but similar work, like Marson. Instead of jumping from responding to emails to attending meetings and writing a report, Etkin recommends working to block similar tasks together, such as email and phone calls for 60 to 90 minutes at a time before moving on to something new. That way, cognitive efforts don’t have to reset and start fresh.

Etkin also noted a greater feeling of success can come from viewing a series of similar tasks as pieces of a larger puzzle. So instead of viewing all the things necessary to get ready for work in the morning as different, from showering to walking a dog or preparing lunch for the day, lump them together mentally as one collective group of “getting ready tasks.”

In addition to multitasking, Etkin’s research has also focused on the perception of time and how two easy actions can help lower stress and help refocus on competing goals. Her separate study offered findings that can translate to faculty and staff looking for tips on how to better control daily anxieties when pressed for time:

• Get excited – Etkin’s research showed conflict-induced anxiety can be reframed through excitement. In her study, when participants felt anxious, they exclaimed, “I feel excited” over and over, combatting negative feelings associated with stress. “If we target those negative emotions, we can disrupt the cycle,” Etkin said. 

• Breathing – It may sound simple, but taking 11-count breaths – in for six, out for five – can lower stress and restore a sense of time and helping to slow down a moment. Etkin suggested cycling through the process five times for best results.

“Our personal goals may often compete for our time, money or energy and that can create conflict between them,” Etkin said. “Focusing on our perception of time is a tactic to again feel like we have more time.”