Are You Tuned-In?

John is being interviewed for a position that he is well qualified for. However, before the interviewer has finished the question there is an answer. This is followed by another answer followed by a question ‘Did I answer your question?’ Considering that the question was never finished, it makes me wonder, hmm?

Carole received an email from her supervisor on delivery date of her program. She responded copying Jim, George, Bob and Sue on where they were with their schedules and why they had not delivered some items to her; answering a question by spamming others with three other questions. Does this sound familiar?

Operations, Sales, Business Development are finally getting together for a day of discussion and negotiations on key deliverables. Noise is high, cross conversation is rampant followed by silences, shrugs and smiles. Studies have found that a smile of delight is 6.3 seconds longer than a smile of frustration and it even uses different facial muscles. Did we even notice?

In the age of instant gratification and fueled by instant responses made possible by all-connect world of e-devices, we have mastered the art of eye rolling. We give the cursory eye contact and then roll away to our iphone, ipad, blackberry or whatever ‘smarts’ we are carrying around with us. Our average attention span halved in a decade, from 12 minutes to five minutes (in 2008), according to a study commissioned by Lloyds TSB Insurance. We are continuously flipping stations, not tuning in to anything. We text while we walk, while we talk, while we watch TV, while we drive, while we write emails and the list goes on. What is unique, and we have probably missed that too, is a person who still has the ability to look and keep looking.

The problem has finally grown in magnitude that the need for a course to teach or correct it has come up. Colleges and schools are instituting a ‘wire free’ week. Parents are talking about a ‘no screen’ day per week. Yale's medical program, Wharton's management program are focusing on mandatory courses on enhancing observational skill to diagnose better, to judge business situations better. The goal is to regain what we lost. To master again what we were the masters of. We have become synonymous with that dog walker where the joke is always on who is walking who?

This was a picture shown to medical students at Yale recently as part of their mandatory “Museum Intervention” coursework. Observe this picture and ask yourself this--Is Mrs. Guthrie taking out the flower from the vase or putting it in? Idea is to increase the observational capacity. There is no redness, no apparent pressure, in Mrs. Guthrie's fingers as she holds a flower. The conclusion matters less than the collection of detail. They are trying to slow down the students who have have an urge to come up with a diagnosis immediately to stop, observe, think instead of trying to guess at a quick diagnosis.

Surgeon Richard Selzer, in "Letters to a Young Doctor," wrote: "I have seen sorrow more fully expressed in a buttocks eaten away by bedsores; fear, in the arching of a neck; supplication, in a wrist. Only last week I was informed by a man's kneecaps that he was going to die. Flashing blue lights, they teletyped that he was running out of oxygen and blood." The Yale intervention may not endow students with Dr. Selzer's acute empathy. But a three-year study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association showed that, afterward, they are 10% more effective at diagnosis.

"Wait" is a very powerful tool: it’s that extra millisecond the baseball slugger knocks the ball out of the park, or a comedian's ability to "time" the punch line, the innovative company's ability to hang on to creative ideas for months, or years before they pay off.

The essence of intelligence would seem to be in knowing when to think and act quickly, and knowing when to think and act slowly. Taking some extra time to think about when to take extra time could pay off handsomely.

Oh, in that desert shot of camels above, look carefully, do you actually see the camels?