How can you protect your team's attention?

How can you protect your team’s attention?

Protecting attention and creating a sanctuary for judgment means designing a work environment that enables something increasingly rare: allowing the group to think clearly, so that action does not become pure reaction.

1. Start by naming what you want to protect

Before adding another rule, ask your team one simple question: What kind of attention are we missing most right now? Is it the attention needed to make decisions? To listen? To create? To tackle deeper issues? To learn? To repair tension? To escape permanent urgency?

This clarification matters. A meeting-free morning, an email charter, or a quiet-time rule can all be useful—but fragile. What gives a rule weight is the intention behind it. Without that intention, protecting time quickly becomes an abstract measure.

For example : “We protect two hours every week for issues that require perspective.” Or: “We protect this meeting for making decisions, not for retelling the entire backstory.” The right starting question is not, “How do we free up time?” It is: “What kind of attention do we want to make possible?”

Published by Françoise Tollet

She spent 12 years in industry, working for Bolloré Technologies, among others. She co-founded Business Digest in 1992 and has been running the company since 1998. And she took the Internet plunge in 1996, even before coming on board as part of the BD team. 

How can you protect your team’s attention?

1. Start by naming what you want to protect

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