BuiltEnvironment

Multi-tasking -- two things at once or just divided attention?

The May 2011 issue of Harvard Business Review includes an interview with David Allen and Tony Schwartz, entitled, "Being More Productive." Toward the end of the interview, Allen (author of "Getting Things Done") says with great confidence, "You can only do one thing at a time."

That made me think about the concept of multi-tasking, and how businesses and managers value the act and the people who say they can do it.

My thought process goes like this: Can you truly write with both hands at the same time, each hand writing something different? Can you actually read two books at the same time, each with only one eye, understanding and retaining both stories or messages? Or are you really just shifting back and forth between two tasks, making a little progress on one and then shifting to the other, making a little progress on the second and shifting back to the first?

To me, this seems both ineffective and inefficient. Let's say you have two tasks to accomplish, each of which should take one hour. If you are going back and forth between the two, then it will take you almost two hours to finish the first task, maybe more than two hours. Further, if you add the time it will take to get into the mindset of each task every time you switch back and forth, and the fact that you might have to reread or rethink part of what you've already accomplished to get back on track, it could take much more than two hours to complete the two one-hour tasks.

It is a good thing to be able to balance a multitude of priorities and directives from a number of managers, but the fact is that we do the highest priority task first. When we reach a point where we must wait for someone else to do something (review a draft, for example) or provide additional data, we can turn to another priority in the interim. All well and good. But working on two different things in one day is not the same as working on two different things at the same time.

For me, the belief that "multi-tasking" means doing two things at once, making them feel simultaneous by carving each into very small consecutive pieces, is simply a delusion that results in being both ineffective and inefficient. I think managers and clients should be less impressed with people who claim they can "multi-task" and more impressed with people who demonstrate that they can focus and produce.

Winning principles . . . losing principals

As a long-term A/E/C/environmental marketer, I have written many proposals. Some win, some don't. Even great proposals are not always selected. But how many of those "not selected" efforts were lost by the project principal?

A client invited me to a debriefing for a proposal and short-list presentation I had managed. We repeated only what was needed to answer the questions in the short-list notice. We spent our time addressing the client's needs (both published and not), the project's technical challenges (with pictures) and our potential solutions (with rough sketches).

The principal hadn't attended any rehearsals. He said, "I've done this so many times; I'm better when I 'wing it'. My time is better used elsewhere."

The intended project manager (PM) and I met with the client, and asked her to explain the major reason we were not selected. Her reply went like this:

You had the highest-scoring proposal of all three short-listed firms. This was your project to lose. Your presentation was on point, with great visuals to help us understand the project's challenges and possible solutions.

But your principal's behavior demonstrated that neither we nor our project was terribly important to him.

The intended PM and I were flabbergasted! She asked why the client thought this.

If we and our project had been important, the principal would have made time for the rehearsals, but it was obvious he didn't. He was being introduced to team members in the hallway. He hadn't met them before because he didn't attend rehearsals.

His introduction of the team member firms showed only cursory knowledge of what each firm did and how they would participate. That told us he wasn't very interested in the team.

We watched his face as team members spoke. He often looked surprised -- what he was hearing was totally new to him. That confirmed our suspicion that he had not been in the rehearsals.

It's basically an ego thing. Thinking there are better uses of his time than presenting to us means that he doesn't think we are an important client of your firm. So we selected a firm that values us more highly.

Bottom line? The next time you put an RFQ or RFP through your "Go/No Go" process, ask your principal if he will attend rehearsals. If not, maybe someone else can fill the principal role and demonstrate this client's importance to your firm's success, or maybe the solicitation should really be a "No Go."

A metric for "wasted money"

In the March 2011 issue of Harvard Business Review, I found a great quote attributed to John Wanamaker, the founder of a chain of department stores popular from the late 1800s to the late 1900s. Wanamaker said:

"Half the money I spend on advertising is wasted; the touble is, I don't know which half."

A/E/C and related firms spend a lot of money on advertising and promotion -- not only the actual cost of print and digital ad placement, but also the salaries of the graphics people who design their business card and display ads, and the marketing staff and other people who write and update their web site text, blogs, tweets, Facebook pages, etc.

But there don't seem to be any true, accurate metrics to measure the impact or benefit of these contacts or the spending they entail. For example, the number of people who follow your firm on Twitter does not equate directly to the number of existing or new clients; the number of people who click through from an online ad to your web site is an equally non-informative measure of how many viewers actually open projects with your firm.

Perhaps what we really need is a new kind of client survey -- one that you can implement shortly after a new client signs their first contract -- one where you ask questions to find out how the client heard about your firm in the first place, why they decided to contact you for information, and how they finally decided to select you to design and/or build their project.

When all is said and done, such a survey might be as instructive and valuable to you as the in-person surveys you do at project mid-point (and then again at project completion). These surveys might tell you a great deal more about the client's expectations than you currently understand. And knowing the client's expectations greatly improves your chances of adjusting those expectations to the realities of designing and constructing their project.