Actively Engaged

A couple of weeks ago I wrote a post about the old fashioned conversation.

Lately I have been seeing in myself and others a challenge to stay actively engaged.

What I mean is on conference calls and in meetings we get distracted by things – email, phone calls and other items(shinny objects).

Sadly though we are multi-tasking, the task we are supposed to be at is suffering. So if you should be elsewhere and you are not needed, don’t waste your time go do the other thing. If you need to be there, be there! Be engaged, be involved and pay attention.

  1. Rex Lee Reply

    It does seem that attention spans seem to be shorter and shorter. There are some different ways to overcome this.
    1. Self-Discipline: Forcing yourself to focus, and encouraging others to focus. Being conscious of this is the start.
    2. Avoid Distractions: in our facilitated sessions, there are no windows, no blackberry’s, no cells, no desks, no tables, or even pictures. Just the people, the facilitator, a time-clock and whiteboards
    3. Create Appeal: Appeal to all senses, create excitement, break the norm. For example, in some situations we purposefully don’t provide agendas or reasoning on excercises. The ability to introduce pieces at a time keeps energy high throughout the event.
    4. Adapt the medium & the message: Assume people can’t focus and tailor your messages in small digestable pieces. Twitter is a great example.

  2. Graham Boundy Reply

    What was that you said? Sorry, I just had another e-mail on my PDA…

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