Tag Archives: focus

Random thoughts – keeping you on your toes, Uncategorized

Strategic Decision Making

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My last post was about making good decisions.  Building on the main idea of that post today I will add some ideas that support the long term planning view versus fearful knee jerk reactions.

Just read the other day an interesting point about how succeeding does not require winning every time.  Achieving your goal is underpinned by deciding to focus on the overall outcome not steps along the way.

Roger Federer Example

At a recent convocation in Newfoundland, tennis star Roger Federer noted how his individual point win loss record was only 54%.  That is he lost one of every two points.

Yet his overall lifetime tournament win record was 80%.  The point was his strategic focus  was on decisions that supported the goal – winning the tournament, not tactical events along the way.

Focus on the Strategic Outcome

Strategy is defined as a plan of action or policy designed to achieve a major or overall aim.  Along the way to achieving your strategic goal it is likely many decisions will be required.

The important take-away for the Federer example or my previous blog about avoiding fear or impulsive actions is to understand losing or having bad stuff happens but this should not deter from achieving your overall objective.

Like Roger Federer by focusing on the end result you can still be successful.  Micro decision making can actually be detrimental.  Don’t overly worry about the present, its the future that really counts.

 

Random thoughts – keeping you on your toes

Stay Sharp

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I watched an interesting Ted Talk the other day by Chris Bailey, “How to get your brain to focus”.   My own key take-away was the potential of leveraging boredom to sharpen your mind.

This led me to research the topic further.  It turns out there is strong scientific evidence that the brain is more active and open to the development of ideas and plans in what is termed the default mode (i.e., boredom).

Not Natural

Given the opportunity for boredom to result in positive thinking and creative, innovative ideas simply by being bored, I wondered why boredom is typically avoided.

Our natural inclination is to be overloaded.  Attention spans are guided by the need for hyper-activity in our brains.  This is how we are genetically wired as a species.

In fact, bouncing from one activity to another or even conducting a number of activities in parallel (multitasking) is easier for us to do than being in a situation without anything in particular to do.

When we are not focused on our surroundings or feel that a day or period is dull or tedious our minds tend to wander.  They do not shut down, in fact, studies have shown in these situations brain activity actually increases.

Boredom with Regularity

In his Ted Talk Chris suggests we sharpen our minds through the practice of boredom for an hour each day.   He suggests his own experience was a significant increase in the developing of ideas and creating plans on how to make them a reality.

In short, he believed, for him, it really works.  Avoiding boredom can be in fact counter-productive.  Not sure if I like the concept because I am lazy or because it is a good idea,  but I am definitely giving it a try.

 

 

Random thoughts – keeping you on your toes

The Universality of Things

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When determining a goal or course of action it makes sense to consider the universal, that is things that are applicable to everything, all cases, everyone.

However, while you can and should consider the universality of things, ultimately to be successful you must focus on the specific.  That is, narrow down the detail and begin there.

Everything and Nothing

The universality of things is so broad addressing it as a whole is really a fruitless exercise.  Taking into account all things as you focus on those that matter at the moment is a much more effective approach.

Broad strategic thinking definitely works best when the broadest context is being considered and is very helpful to define ideas and associated directions.

Actually executing the steps within a strategic concept requires much greater attention to detail if it is to be effective.  Following strategy with tactics enables for everything to be considered but only what matters to be acted on.

Focusing just on everything will most often result in analysis paralysis and ultimately nothing will result.  Nothing worthwhile anyway.

Tailor the Message

Viewing the big picture can be of great value but describing it to others can be overwhelming for them and thus have a very little positive impact, perhaps even a detrimental effect.

Having a solid understanding of how everything interconnects and being able to weave your strategy into the full complexity of the universe is a noble pursuit, however, attempting implementation on such a grand scale is bound to fail.

Remember success lies in the ability to tailor the message with a focus on specificity.

 

 

Random thoughts – keeping you on your toes

The Root of Confusion

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I will hazard a guess that we have all been bewildered or unclear in our minds about something, at some point in our lives if not on many occasions.

Confusion largely results from inadequate communication and unclear objectives and is particularly prominent when the circumstances are complex.

Too Many Cooks

A very common aspect of confusing situations is a multitude of stakeholders, each of whom purports to have a full understanding of the situation.

Feeding the confusion is these multiple explanations offered to add clarity are often perceived to be different or even in some cases are actually different.

Keep it Simple

Avoiding confusion always begins with simplicity.  Clearing away the misunderstood begins by reducing the situation to the fewest components.

To ensue clarity and focus explanations need to be single threaded, that is provided by a single designated knowledge expert.  Using a single point of reference without exception is key to avoiding honest misunderstandings.

Start with the End

When explaining a process or providing how-to instructions the comprehension of others begins with understanding the end result.  It seems to make sense to describe the journey and reveal the outcome at the end.

Perhaps strangely so, this is not the case.  My psychology studies have demonstrated humans achieve understanding much more quickly when they know what the goal is upfront.

Eliminating confusion is a combination of limiting the number of stakeholders involved with explanations coupled with providing clarity of outcome, what does done look like, right from the beginning.

 

 

 

Random thoughts – keeping you on your toes

Maintaining Focus

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The current pandemic represents a significant distraction for everyone.  Pandemic related stories have pushed virtually everything else that is newsworthy aside.

From experience I have found the best results, those achieved most efficiently and of the highest quality are derived from being the center of our interest or activity (i.e., the focus).

 Prioritize

Even with lots of serious highly and impactful events going on around us, being able to concentrate and act on whats really important is a best practice.

 

Dealing with more than one task at time can result in the spreading of your attention to an extent that although everything might get addressed,  important aspects could be overlooked leading to mistakes.

Perhaps surprising, as well, studies haves shown  multitasking can actually result with more overall effort being expended than if each task was addressed separately although overall duration is greater.

Distractions

Recognizing distractions and allocating appropriate attention to them lets you ensure your focus is on the things that matter most at that point in time.

Things that don’t require your immediate attention, albeit worrisome and nagging at you, rising to that call for attention could easily negatively impact the effectiveness of resolving your priorities.

That is, the  things that provide the greatest value at any point in time are the things that are bested served by getting our prime focus.

Pay Attention

If you recognize yourself trying to pay full attention to multiple things concurrently, press the pause button.  Think it through.  What can I change and what is largely out of my control.?  What should I focus on?  Answer the question and act accordingly.

 

Random thoughts – keeping you on your toes

Imagination gone Wild

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Yesterday’s post focused on the benefits of using your imagination.  The principle advocated channeling your imagination into innovative results.

Some great feedback I received pointed out sometimes we imagine things that frighten us.  In these cases, we could visualize nasty things and develop harmful ideas to counter them.

Filtering

With all our ideas and thoughts the process of filtering is critical to help us focus on real priorities.  That is things that matter to us or other people and justify taking consideration for employment in creative and innovative activities.

Filtering your imaginings to separate those that do not provide a value add and those that can be effectively used for the betterment of all (you and others) is not easy but really important.

The Easy Trap

Often we will focus on things that have lower value and impact but overall require less effort.  I can imagine the worse quite easily, worry about it (again with little effort) and classify it as something I cannot change (effortlessly).

Or I can focus my imagination and creativity on things that will make a difference.  Of course, this requires a little effort so I need to be motivated to act this way.

When we are encouraging and nurturing others (and even ourselves) to be creative and imaginative this needs some boundaries and guides to assist our filtering to be focused on things that can be useful.

While not an easy task, guidance to avoid focusing your imagination on the worst probably makes a lot of sense.  Although a little doom and gloom is probably part of the life experience.

 

 

Random thoughts – keeping you on your toes

Believe

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Can you feel sure that something is true and doing so makes it true? That is, could belief become reality simply because you choose to make it so?

This is probably a stretch.  Making the impossible become possible is not a magical activity that is accomplished by a sweep of the wand.  However, attempting to elicit a change without believing it possible reduces the chance of success.

Trust in Yourself

Being sure something is true arises from a firm belief in your own judgment.  How you view your own reliability governs the strength of your belief and the intrinsic power of it.

Proceeding on the basis of blind faith can be risky and trusting in yourself without paying attention to reality could not only fail but also lead to negative consequences.

Self Doubt

It does make sense to temper your self-trust with a dose of doubt and some cynicism.   The trick is not to let self-doubt become the overriding factor in your decisions.

Doubt should be based on objective analysis to the greatest extent possible.  That is, where it makes sense to question whether something is true or whether you are able to make it true, this is best based on the supposition that is supported by some facts.

Accent the Positive

Having a strong belief and letting that drive your outcomes is really just a way to accent the positive.  Focus on the positive is far more likely to drive achievement of what you seek.

And for those that were wondering, this message of positivity is not brought to you by fox news.

Random thoughts – keeping you on your toes

Clear thought

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Clear thought is the bedrock of logical outcomes.  Today’s environment has a multitude of complexities that have developed over-time and can lead to sensory overload. 

As our society has advanced,  so have the associated cultural complexities.  Obvious examples of this are the behaviour changes associated with automation, communication advances and the omnipresent social media options.

Focus

Intuitively, the first step to a clear mind is to focus on nothing.  This is the basic principle of meditation.  This technique causes your brain becomes cleared of all thoughts except what you are focusing on.

As you are focusing on nothing,  beyond involuntary thoughts, which you cannot control, the brain becomes thought free.

Meditation is often thought of a a relaxation technique, this is simply because the elimination of every day sensory overload, which we are all subject to, is nothing if not relaxing.

Clarity without Meditation

Meditation is used only a an example of a mind clearing technique.  It is not always practical to meditate and is best done in a quiet isolated place where you will not be bothered.

The principle of clearing the clutter that burdens your thinking is the same.  It requires focus.  When you are seeking to employ logic, and are not able to find a quite place or time to enter a meditation state, simply focus on the objective.

That is, place all your attention toward the data set you want to understand, parse and resolve.  This singular focus will enable you to follow a logic path to the best outcome.

Random thoughts – keeping you on your toes

Focus on the A

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Experiential learning is a extremely powerful way to identify opportunities for improvement.  Through observation and feedback you can uncover things to change, try or even not to do.

Surprisingly, often the learning is something you already knew and you might  think “ I knew that, why did I ignore my inclination and proceed anyway”?

There is no answer to this auestion, that I am aware of, beyond the fact it is human nature to not always pay attention to your inner thoughts.  Sometime they are just  present to be ignored.

Play to your Audience

The other day I encountered a clear case of experiential learning.  It was about something I understood intuitively, but ignored.

I failed to focus on the audience perspective during a recent information share to a group of colleagues.  I often interract with groups of technologists with a strong foundational knowledge of digital software and infrastructure.

Without thought to the core background of the audience I proceeded on the assumption basic technology concepts did not need to be explained.

Assumptions are Dangerous

Assuming knowledge leads to misunderstanding, confusion and worse disenfranchising the audience such that they are not receptive to any message.

The opportunity to share information for the benefit of all could well be lost because of the simple misstep of assuming rather than confirming, ( i.e knowing with certainty)

Through observation and subsequent feedback it was clear I had been guilty of this simple principle.  This is not to suggest being overly simple but rather tailor the information exchange to match the audiences perspective.

Random thoughts – keeping you on your toes

Focus on the problem not the person

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Years ago I came to the conclusion that often discussions escalate into a focus on peoples personalities, leaving the issue real issue behind.  As a result, it becomes a form of argument.

In this case, the argument is not an exchange of diverging or opposite views about the issues but rather becomes a reason or set of reasons,  focused on the other parties shortcomings.  These are disguised as being about the issue.

Attack

In reality these points are formulated with the aim of explaining why the other person is wrong.   This justification become the topic of discussion and the root cause becomes irrelavent.

I have have learned to recognize the use of a pro-noun typically means the discussion is getting off course.Unfortunately without diagnosing the problem, but focusing on the other people the argument quickly becomes personal and though it probably was not intended it degenerates to attack/ defend, in essence a battle.

Ironically if you pause and focus on the aspects of the discussion outside of the interpersonal, I find the perspectives on the actual problem are usually in sync.

That is, although the conversation may become heated the differences are almost exclusively related to the personal attacks (i.e., your behavioural justifications).

In fact, after careful and reasoned thought, you will probably realize both parties are identifing a identical issue, root cause and solution.  It just sounds like that is not the case.

I have have learned to recognize the use of a pro-noun typically means the discussion is getting off course.  When this happens I stop talking, think about what the issues actually is and refocus the discussion.