Are you listening? Keeping the digital age in check

Without question, smartphones have it easy to be efficient professionals. Whether on the street, in the car or train, in meetings, during lunch or even on the toilette, we have been given incredible accessibility. Naturally, all that accessible goodness cannot be expected to go on without adverse effects. Too often we have stopped in mid-sentence because the person we are talking to keeps glancing at his phone or worse, is nodding (too) enthusiastically at our (sob) story while his fingers are frantically tapping away at the phone keys. We have all been victims and to tell the truth, many have been guilty as well. All that accessibility has divided attention between present lives and digital lives. Emails, texts, Facebook notifications... Social media networks can survive the hour that it takes to have lunch with a client, a friend, or a family member. Doing too many things at the same time will lead to confusion and ineffectiveness, contrary to the popular notion that multitasking is the way to go. Less productive
If you are doing the same brain process at the same time, it's not really multitasking. Multitasking is singing and dancing or driving while talking to your teen about the complexities of teenage love. A study conducted by the American Psychological Association revealed that doing multiple things at the same time will make you less productive. Shifting from one task to another actually wastes more time than if you do one task at a time. Goodbye quality
In juggling too many balls in the air you are bound to let a couple fall. Driving while replying to a client's email may not be the best decision is not only dangerous to your safety, it can be damaging to your brand. Typos, grammatical and formatting errors cannot be avoided when you compose correspondence on the road. Half the story
Listening with half an ear will only give you half the story. How can you absorb all details with your attention divided? Besides, people will know if they don't have your full attention. Part of being efficient is getting all the details and absorbing the unspoken nuances. The science of serial tasking
Psychology Today wrote in an article that what most workaholics are doing is not multitasking but serial tasking. It is doing tasks in rapid succession or vacillating from one task to another (sometimes one on top of another). Learning how to effectively serial-task is more useful and productive. The tasks of updating a guest list, writing several invitation emails and confirming attendance would go a lot faster if you do alike tasks in one go, moving in a logistical order. You can write all invites first, then call confirmations then update the guest list with the current status of guests. To truly maximize your time, you need to focus. Checking your followed Tweets or chatting with a friend while updating the guest list will set up back a few minutes every time while your brain adjusts from one function to another. Listening app
No matter how you look at it, not giving your full attention to someone who is talking to you directly will always be considered rude. The best listening app are your ears. Use them to strengthen personal and professional ties. As in all aspects in life, balance is key. Successfully managing your time using the advantages of being wired takes conscious effort. It is easy to get lost in the joys of the digital age but face to face contact still goes a long way in building relationships. The choice is simple: choose to focus on the person in front of you and not on the person who is reaching you from the other side of the Facebook mobile app.