Is Multi-Tasking Possible?

Published April 2, 2013

The need for proliferating laws to try and stop (mostly unsuccessfully) texting and cell phone usage while driving is just one illustration that multi-tasking has become epidemic in our society. Yet successful multi-tasking is a contradiction. We can do one thing at a time successfully, not many different things at the same time and do them well.

This is a particularly relevant warning for lawyers. Consider the common scenario of sitting in a meeting where lawyers have smart phones in hand, checking text messages or sending new ones while they are ostensibly participating in the proceedings. Such multi-tasking often means that the lawyer is missing something important in the live dialogue as it is going on. An inattentive lawyer who misses a key point in a meeting risks arousing client ire – or making a mistake due to inattention that could have major negative ramifications for a client.

Such attempted multi-tasking can also have major negative ramifications for a practice. Technology has conspired with traditional attitudes to make many solo practitioners believe they truly can go it alone. The flexibility offered by word processing and billing software, voicemail, email and other electronic tools is real, but it can become dangerous when combined with the entrepreneur’s “I can manage 100 cases by myself” mentality. Too often the result is an overwhelmed practice that is either headed into the hands of the state bar disciplinary system (where 60% of complaints involve practice management and quality issues), or into insolvency.

Lawyers have time management software, Outlook calendars, personal digital assistants and many other technological tools to help them manage multiple tasks, but many still claim to have too little time, or are overwhelmed by the need to balance client, practice and personal priorities. When this happens it makes many lawyers feel that they should do even more to multi-task. Yet trying to do too much at once defeats successful multi-tasking; it can instead create self-defeating fear and paralysis when tasks become overwhelming.

Lawyers facing such an impasse should take the time to think things through as the equivalent of a deep breath that restores perspective. Unless we’re aware of what technology can consume from what we offer as lawyers – our time and advice – we cannot fully exploit what it can add. Technology facilitates multi-tasking … but multi-tasking can jeopardize good lawyering.

Categorized in:

Audience type: Administrators, Associates, Large Law Firms, Small Law Firms, Sole Practitioners