Name: Dr. Jackie Kane
Date registered: December 4, 2012
Jun 14
Recently, I seem to be seeing lots of articles on this topic of multi tasking. I reasoned that there is so much press about this topic is because the increasing number of distractions we are confronted with on a every second basis, mostly from our pocket electronic devices.
I used to think that I was a mistress of multitasking but I discovered about 20 years ago that I really wasn’t that good at multitasking. I discovered that in many telephone conversations when I was keyboarding that I would miss chunks of the conversation and would have to ask people to repeat things, particularly when they asked me a question about what they had just told me. I learned that if I would more fully pay attention, the conversation would go quicker, would be more efficient, and I would be able to deal with the whole issue by asking more probing questions to reach a more satisfactory conclusion.
There is information that states that we can multitask but what we are really doing is paying attention to what we are doing serially. When we go back and forth between tasks, we lose focus and momentum. I am sure we have said to ourselves, aloud or to ourselves, after an interruption or switching back to a task, “where was I?” There are suggestions that we really are losing time and our energy gets diverted.
What I have been reading lately tells me that we lose some of our facility for multitasking as we age. I just know that the more I pay attention with minimal distractions particularly television, that the more I can accomplish in a shorter period of time and with greater satisfaction with what I have done.
How successful do you believe you are at multitasking? What would happen if you really focused on one task for a specific time? Would you get more done?
Feb 26
When I first thought about writing this post, I was going to say that no one enters a doctoral program without having some question they want to answer or they really want to dig down into the nitty gritty of something. Then I thought about a little and realized that I do know some people, not many, who just want the credential for whatever reason. If the latter is the case for you, the advice that I am going to give here will probably not be useful to you.
The basic thing is to “begin with the end in mind.” This is the advice that I give to anyone starting a doctoral program. Hopefully, you are in a department at an institution that has the resources to allow you to pursue your interests and/or answer your question.
As a doctoral student, myself, I observed students who did not know what their dissertation topic would be even at the end of completing their coursework and passing their comprehensive exams. It took them another year or two to decide on their topic. This was time added on to the time to them completing their doctoral program.
I started out wanting to answer the question: “Why they are not more Black women college presidents?” I had observed that at any point there were no more than 35 Black women college presidents of the 3,000 college presidencies in the United States.
In looking at the institutions I could attend I started by asking questions of the faculty I had access to, if in their view that there were support in the department for me to do my research. I didn’t sense any hesistancy on their part and so I decided to proceed.
As I progressed in my program every choice and decision I made was in support of answering the question. Not everything was a straight connection, but I was able to use each outcome to further define and develop my own research. However, your question may change but you will at least have a focus and the change will be from a specific base and hopefully, fueled by your interests and/or question. Bottom line, you will still be engaged in your research and not just doing some research to earn the credential.
So again, “begin with the end in mind” and let that take you were it may with your dissertation.
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