ABCs for Managers Who Lead: F is for Focus

Research at Stanford University on multitasking, long thought to be something that was a valuable skill, has revealed that the cost of multitasking is the lack of focus. An article in the New York Times from some years back warns that juggling e-mail, phone calls and other incoming information changes how people think and behave. Scientists say our ability to focus is being undermined by bursts of information.

Those who grew up before the era of email and smartphones, will probably remember that they could sit still and read an article or book for hours; that they could focus on a particular assignment without interruption. The age of smartphones and emails, not to mention tablets and having more than one phone, is making this increasingly difficult. Our attention to a constant influx of information is diminishing our ability to focus. This is a trend that severely affects us as individuals.

At an organizational level this has consequences since organizations are only as successful as the individuals they employ. Most of us are now multi-taskers. There was a time that this was considered a useful skill – the multi-tasking employee could do more in a day than the one who focused on one task at a (considerable) length of time. This is no longer the case. Multi-taskers overlook important messages or data – we call this, nice enough, “something fell through the cracks.” In matters other than life and death, this may not be so important, but in the health field matters are often about life and death.

An older problem with focus has been creating problems for non governmental organizations for a longer time. Well-intentioned donor agencies offer interesting roles in large scale projects to small organizations that may not be that clear about their mission and take whatever comes their way as an opportunity to get revenue, develop staff skills and/or become a more important player in their societies. There is a difference between taking on assignments that help to move towards the organization’s vision and those that distract from the vision. The former sharpen focus and build organizational capacities. The latter distract from what the organization is all about and could create an identity crisis.

Focusing well

“Stick to your knitting” is an English saying that refers to doing what you do best. No one can be good at everything. If you don’t know what your organization does best, consult its mission statement as it explains why it does what it does. Your team’s goals and objectives also serve as a focus, but if there are too many goals you may need to focus more.

Ask yourself whether you are focusing on the right things. For example, when asked to review a document, be clear on what is asked of you: are you asked to review the main ideas and logic of the argument or are you asked to copy-edit, then focus on that. For an organization, focus means being aware of scope drift (or scope creep) – moving away from the original intention to something else. Sometimes this ‘something else’ is what we know a lot about and feel more comfortable responding to, rather than the initial scope of work. Or we focus on the means rather than the intended ends. When we focus on measuring things such as quality or sustainability or even the qualities of a good leader, we have lost our focus which should have been on the result we want these mechanisms to produce. In the process, we waste valuable resources such as time, money, and our energy.

Preserving your focus means remaining aware. Sometimes, in our desire to be responsive to others, we may interrupt what we were doing, shifting our focus to things that may be more urgent than important. If we become responsive rather than focused we may end up leaving little time to build up a solid reputation or body of knowledge in anyone domain. Then, the only thing we will be known for is being helpful or responsive.

Attention is like a muscle in the sense that it can be trained. A simple exercise such as focusing on one’s breathing and calling the wandering mind back, over and over again, is what mindfulness exercises are all about.

As with any other excess, too much focus is not good. If we focus too much we may miss out on important signals in our environment that may be alerting us to something we ought to pay attention to. Research has shown (see Goleman video listed below) that ‘mind wandering’ is critical for innovation. It is during such mind wandering that new connections emerge that often promise solutions to old dilemmas. After that, focus becomes important again to build prototypes and test the innovation in the real world.

See for yourself

• How to Improve Your Concentration and Focus on Work – a two minute video from Mindtools with advice on how to help you focus at work
• What Stephen R. Covey Taught Me About Time Management – a two and a half minute video on Stephen Covey’s urgent/important matrix to help you focus your attention to the things that matter
• How to Manage Time with 10 Steps That Work – a short video with 10 tips on how to best focus your work
• Daniel Goleman on Focus: The Secret to High Performance and Fulfillment – Daniel Goleman, of Emotional Intelligence fame, wrote a book about Focus. This very informative talk given in England lasts about one hour. It is full of research findings that touch on focus (as well as its opposite ‘mind wandering’), brain development, impulse control, emotional intelligence and areas of focus for leaders, among many other interesting pieces of information.
• The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People by Stephen Covey – a 7 minute video on Stephen Covey’s Seven Habits of focusing on what is important.