Re: [MLUG - DISCUSSION] multitasking considered harmful

[Stephen Montgomery-Smith <EMAIL:PROTECTED>]

Mike Miller wrote:
> On Tue, 6 Nov 2007, Jim Locke wrote:
>
> > On Nov 6, 2007 1:08 PM, Mike Miller <EMAIL:PROTECTED> wrote:
> >
> > > http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/prem/200711/multitasking
> >
> > I saw this quite some time ago, and good to see again.
>
> It's in the November 2007 issue of The Atlantic Monthly, so it probably 
> wasn't a very long time ago that you saw it unless it was also published 
> somewhere else, or maybe you saw a similar article.
>
>
> > Very true, and it would be nice if today's professionals, marketing 
> > people, and management knew this and worked by it.
> >
> > We're in an age of "more more, faster faster" which often results in a 
> > shoddier job done.
>
> I think I've made the mistake of trying to do too much and I have spread 
> myself too thin.  It's a great feeling to see the big picture but it is 
> through specialization that you win all the respect and the money 
> (really by becoming absolutely the best at one small thing).  

It really depends on your life goals.  If you want to become rich and 
well respected, then by all means specialize.  But if you want to be a 
true scholar and academic, then you should follow your heart.  Some 
people are naturally more attuned to specialization, but others like 
you, me and Jon prefer more breadth.  I am sure that if I had 
specialized more, then I would definitely have more respect and perhaps 
more money.  But I just don't want to live that way.  If I follow that 
respect/money route, then I am not taking true and proper advantage of 
my tenure.  Then I may as well work for industry, and get way more money.


> Veterinarians who work with many diseases in many animal species are 
> paid less than Physicians who work on many diseases in only one animal 
> species and they in turn are paid less than specialist physicians who 
> work on one aspect of one disease in one species.  Being the go-to guy 
> in one narrow area is worth more to people than being "the guy who knows 
> everything about everything."
>
> Another big issue:  As you imply, we've been forcing more people to do 
> many different kinds of work.  For example, professors now do a lot more 
> of their own secretarial work than they used to.  They used to just 
> dictate things and have other people do all the typing work.  Now most 
> of them have to do their own word processing.  It is better that way, 
> maybe, but it means fewer jobs for secretaries and it also means that 
> brilliant people like Jon King have to dedicate a bunch of time to 
> installing, learning and running word processing software.  
> Perfectionists like me (and Jon, I'd guess) can easily get sidetracked 
> into spending too much time on that kind of stuff -- getting just the 
> right program to do our typesetting or whatever.  We also get more into 
> computers than we should.
>
> In my area I feel like I have to be really good in statistics, 
> computing, genetics, epidemiology and some aspects of medicine and 
> psychology, but it's really impossible to do it all (it's like that in 
> Jon's field too, but with more neuroscience thrown in there).  This 
> problem is really a big one and it isn't just that I'm not managing my 
> time well (and I am not managing my time well).  Many fields now require 
> major interdisciplinary projects and people are almost forced to learn a 
> lot in multiple fields in order to push research forward.  It's really 
> hard to do everything and the pay just isn't good enough to warrant all 
> the stress you get from trying to do it all.  There's also the problem 
> of trying to have a life outside of work, a family, etc.  So I think I'm 
> going to try to specialize a bit more than I have so far.
>
> I just subscribed to the Atlantic so that I can read the whole article.
>
> Mike
>
> _______________________________________________
> discussion mailing list
> EMAIL:PROTECTED
> http://mlug.missouri.edu/mailman/listinfo/discussion


_______________________________________________
discussion mailing list
EMAIL:PROTECTED
http://mlug.missouri.edu/mailman/listinfo/discussion