Monday, February 11, 2019

Notes from AONW 2019 "Cultivating Attention" session, Wednesday 2/6 11:30 am

We looked at four challenges to effectiveness that teams face and how cultivating the skill of paying attention can help overcome those challenges. These all have their source in the normal functioning of the human brain:
  • Distraction (caused by inherent busy-ness of the brain) requires stable attention so teams can focus on what's important.
  • Silos and factions (caused by the inherent tribalism of the brain) requires connectedness so teams can collaborate effectively.
  • Jumping to conclusions and making assumptions (caused by the inherent bias of the brain) requires open-mindedness so teams can make good decisions.
  • The fight/flight/freeze response (caused by the inherent reactivity of the brain) requires self-awareness so teams can find resilience in the face of change.
Teams can find their way to these qualities over time (one participant described a team that developed them by working together for seven years). I provided a brief overview of ways from my book, Cultivating Attention, to get to better attention more rapidly using specific techniques for developing present-moment, non-judgmental awareness.  Examples include watching your breath, noticing your team members with curiosity and openness, reflecting on the operation of bias in your thinking, and being aware of how the body sensations of reactivity influence cognition. These practices can all be done by individuals: but the real key is to find ways to provide flexibility and individual autonomy so they can be embraced by whole teams of diverse people with varying priorities and preferences. We agreed that this team-level implementation needs to be:
- Facilitated by an outside person who is not enmeshed in the dynamics of the team.
-  Highly customized to the context of the team: its culture, personalities, business and technical environment, and leadership.

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Joseph H Anderson Consulting, LLC
(206) 351-5607

Cultivating Attention: the Paradoxical Secret to Team Success now available from Amazon. Learn more.

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