Multi-Tasking and the Motherhood Penalty

by Tracey Collins

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For decades women have learned to divide their focus between the twin demands of career and caretaker.  The National Center for Policy Analysis estimates that 70% of today’s home-based businesses are run by women and a recent US Economics and Statistics Administration (ESA) report put out the by US Department of Commerce attributes “work-life” balance as a key factor for why women are starting businesses twice as often as men.  That same ESA report noted that female businesses grow at a slower rate than male-run businesses.  Female owners tend to work fewer hours than male business owners.  They obtain less outside financing and may expect less business growth than men.  Maybe that is because one-third of all self-employed women have children under the age of 18.  We spend less time working at our businesses because we have less time to work.

If you are a woman running a business alongside other commitments – family or parental -- chances are you engage in a daily struggle for balance.  Some call this multi-tasking, and after years of struggling to balance the tensional pull between my growing family and growing business, I’ve come to loathe this term.


A study in 2002 by John Arden found that, “multitasking decreases your memory ability.” He also claims that for every new task that you take on “you dilute your investment in each task.”  Dr. David Meyer, a psychology professor at the University of Michigan, claims that multitasking can actually hinder a person’s ability to complete tasks at the optimum level because it adversely affects the brain’s short-term memory and concentration. One 2005 UK study actually found that when it comes to multi-tasking, males were superior in quiet conditions; females were superior during distracting conditions. However that same study also noted that male or female, our IQ drops 10 points when multi-tasking.


Here at the SmartGirls Way we have oft debated the upside and downside of multitasking.  When I am effectively multi-tasking I feel empowered, efficient and capable – delivering a feature article in advance of a deadline, plowing through the laundry and wrapping up a new coaching contract in time to steal some precious moments on the playground with my kids.  But on a bad day multi-tasking just seems to provide me multiple things to feel guilty about.   Even if I have had a good session with a client --it wouldn’t be a surprise to discover I’ve forgotten the parent-teacher conference and misplaced my cell phone in the refrigerator.   These are the days that I contemplate closing up shop because the fear of failure – as both a mother and a consultant – clouds my head with doubt and dread.

And I’m willing to bet I’m not alone.  A 2007 Global Entrepreneurship Monitor survey found that an increased fear of failure among women in particular is why fewer people are now considering setting up a business. Is the underlying problem really a fear of failure or an impossible standard of achievement by which I measure myself?  

Shelley J. Correll at the Clayman Institute at Stanford, calls this the Motherhood Penalty. When it comes to entrepreneurial ventures, men view lower levels of achievement as success, whereas women see it as confirmation that they were not up to the job. Is it the disadvantageous stereotyping of working women that is really the culprit here?   I know what I tell my own clients when they’re feeling overwhelmed and guilty.  

• First, identify the lesson in each situation. When I’ve consistently dropped the ball on my familial responsibilities I see it as a big sign from the universe that I need to step back and evaluate.  I love the definition of insanity:  doing something the same way every time and expecting a different outcome.  When I start to see a pattern, then I know I’ve got to make a change.  That doesn’t mean I need to stop running my business, but it may mean I need to stop working for a specific client or ask for some help from my husband to get me through a busy time.

• Second, focus on your strengths.  I am a big fan of life coach Markus Buckingham’s 80/20 rule.  Most of us spend our time focusing on what we perceive as weaknesses when what we really need to do is spend 80 percent of our time focusing on what we do best.  That’s one of the reasons I left my corporate job to start my own business in the first place.  If I’m feeling too stretched and its having a knock-on effect on my family, chances are I’ve fallen prey to something that is keeping me from focusing on what I do well.

• Third, weave together a support solution.  The evidence on business ownership suggests that people who have family and friends who have started businesses are more likely to do so themselves. I truly believe that there isn’t any problem that I’m facing that some other woman has not also experienced.  In all of the research I did for this essay, one common theme rose above all others: the support system I weave around myself is critical to my success.    This support system allows me to share the burden of child-rearing and entrepreneurialism with my spouse, my childcare provider and my colleagues.  It also allows me to focus my intuition and passion on the business activities that are at once enticing not only for their profitability, but also for their interest and beneficial impact on others.  Finally, this support system allows me to meet and learn from some of the most interesting and dynamic women and men in my field. 

So I'm going to stick with it - at least for today. Maybe my experiences will benefit another woman in my shoes and I’m willing to bet I can learn a lot from some of you.  If you have any suggestions for me I’m all ears.

Tracey Collins is guest-writer for The SmartGirls Way.  She is President and Founder of Mirror Group Consulting; a consultancy focused on content, executive coaching and change management.  

Women Do Focus Differently

by Tracey Collins

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When it comes to splitting one’s focus on many different activities, women are better than men at more accurately and efficiently completing the important tasks. So are women better able to focus on multiple tasks because of evolutionary practice and social expectations, or is it because of the way a woman’s brain is hardwired?

Here at The SmartGirls Way we’ve been exploring an emergent theory in gender brain chemistry related to the corpus collosum -- a little part of the brain that handles communication between the two hemispheres.  The corpus collosum is biologically more active in women than and in men and this is one theory as to why women can split their focus more efficiently.
 
When comparing women to men, it is believed that men think with ‘tunnel vision’ (using single cues to solve a problem) while women use their minds to synthesize multiple cues from the environment.   Perhaps this focus is what allows my husband to visually call-up obscure facts when consulting patients in his medical practice.  This same deep-dive focus may also explain why he has a more difficult time transitioning from one task to another in the midst of our domestic ‘background’ noise.

Two recent studies (one in the UK and another at the University of Missouri) found that women are better at honing in and keeping track of the details that matter because they are more spatially aware of their surroundings.  Unlike men who tend to focus their brains like a laser on a problem, a woman will direct her thinking like a spotlight that expands in a circle all around her.  When this spotlight is working effectively -- and with purpose -- women have been proven to posses the ability to better plan ahead or reflect upon a problem while simultaneously juggling other commitments, than men.

This is why - even when there is a lot happening around us– we can suddenly hone in with clarity on a business problem or make a snap connection to another solution, business connection or idea.

Spotlight scanning allows us to:

• Think more broadly about an issue rather than getting stuck in one place.
• Avoid becoming myopic and create a bigger sphere in which to operate.
• Go beneath the surface of a challenge without excluding ideas that are on the periphery of our awareness. 
• Act with purpose and prioritize the activities we need to devote our attention to.
• Spend more time thinking about the things that make us more effective and/or bring us satisfaction.

This unique ability could lead to a rather protracted and uncomfortable debate about the relative capabilities and attributes of the genders and the different ways that men and women multi-task. Rather than debating or seeking to qualify or vindicate, why not just embrace our inner spotlight.  It’s about time for women to teach men the benefit of taking off the blinders and using the unique skills that women offer.

In particular just imagine how using this spotlight to look at a business (preferably your own) with a broad and “high” view can make a difference. You pass over the wide circle of your market, customers and competitors and suddenly your spotlight illuminates a unique opportunity.  Suddenly you have clarity of purpose.

Tracey Collins is guest-writer for The SmartGirls Way.  She is President and Founder of Mirror Group Consulting; a consultancy focused on content, executive coaching and change management.  

Multi-tasking: The Upside and Downside

by Jean Brittingham

There is a lot of chatter about how multi-tasking is a bad thing. This discussion has arisen from the incredible surge in technology that has enabled us to connect with vast amounts of information at every minute of the day. The amount and diversity of information that flows into our daily lives is unprecedented to the point that people are scapegoating multi-tasking in reaction to the inevitable distraction that results from poorly managed information flow.

But there is a distinction between distraction and multi-tasking. Distraction is what multi-tasking naysayers are talking about. Distraction occurs when you are "on-task" and some bit of information or something interesting pulls you off that task. Distraction can be deadly. It can keep you from meeting deadlines, doing quality work or even completing a thought. An antidote to distraction is discipline, and frankly, some technological savvy. Quick computer fixes include:

• Limiting open programs on your desktop.
• Choosing only two hours a day to respond to e-mail. 
• Blogging and tweeting in prescribed windows—and building dashboards and other tools to help you do that.

The Upside

Today, I want to focus on a well documented distinction between men and women in multi-tasking. Women can and do multi-task all the time. The primary reason we can pull this off is that our brains are wired to do so. This well-developed talent is due to millions of years of evolved focus on lesser tasks while simultaneously doing the primary tasks for the survival of the species--caring for babies and children. A recent study demonstrated that the primary difference between men and women multi-tasking  is that while women didn't necessarily get more done than men when completing the same (multiple) tasks, they tended to make significantly less mistakes.

 

The Downside

 

What this means is that we do tend to take on more than our male counterparts do when we start our own businesses. We often tend to think we can do everything after experiencing success in our lives in handling not only multiple priorities but often simultaneous activities.

While multi-tasking is beautiful when it works, it can lead to overcommitment. Overcommitment will often back us into very tight places trying to be all things to all people in a rapidly shifting environment. We have a tendency to hold on to our obligations on all fronts--family, friends, social, and community commitments. In entrepreneurial settings, overcommitment is even more problematic because we're often working to the bone to fund our business since women have a harder time getting venture capital or loans for start-ups.

Sometimes we can pull it off. But usually, this type of overcommitment will slow us down and in the worse case scenario—it will cause us to lose motivation.

The antidote as I said is discipline, and the discipline is to prioritize. We need to multi-task where it counts. Make a list of the things in your company, business, and life that only you can do. It's still a big list--I know it is.

Now, pull off the most important 20% of that list. This will be hard, but you must make yourself do it. What are the things on that list that are critical? What are the things that no one else but you can do? These things should be strategic. The kind that build your business and sustain your life while you are getting it done.

Next, give most of the other two lists away. Get someone else to do them or accept that they wont get done for now.

Always remember, you are not a bad person if you don't do everything for everybody. You are not expected to do more, be more and give more than others to achieve success in your business, your family and your life.

Letting things go may be the only way you will achieve success.

Multi-tasking is a skill and as women entrepreneurs, we do it better than many others. Just don’t let it be your enemy. Remember, you’re not just in charge of your business; you’re in charge of yourself.