Citations:wear too many hats

English citations of wear too many hats

Verb: "(idiomatic) to try to fill more roles at once than is realistically possible"

						1963 1986	2011
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• 1963 — Cameron Dewar, "Too Many Hats for 'Jennie'", Billboard, 10 August 1963:

  She is asked to be a comedienne, dancer, stunt woman, singer and dramatic actress — and the truth is that she is trying to wear too many hats.

• 1986 — Norman O. Unger, "A Sporting Chance…", Jet, 28 April 1986:

  And speaking of busy boxers, recently dethroned WBC champ Pinklon Thomas has finally admitted that he was wearing too many hats before losing to Canadian Trevor Berbick. He was so busy playing manager, trainer, and fighter that he failed to live up to the words of a record he recently cut: Hanging On To Promises.

• 2011 — George H. Seaberg, Where Angels Fear to Tread: One Man's Journey in Starting His Small Business, WestBow Press (2011), →ISBN, page 89:

  I was wearing too many hats and didn't have a well enough trained staff to handle all our customer needs.