The Lost Art of Attentiveness

Attentiveness is the difference between a good a great leader.

Poor attentiveness almost always equals poor leadership. Watching people interact with the world around us is incredibly telling in this regard. Consider a recent experience I had at Hartsfield-Jackson Airport, in Atlanta.

I was dumbfounded. Truly dumbfounded and probably more bothered than I should have been, considering what was happening was not any of my business. Yet, as person after person ignored the two signs, five people, plastic-wrapped food, and active mopping happening while the Delta Skyclub crew turned over the food service area from breakfast to lunch, I found myself personally invested in the undoubted frustration of the Delta staff.

I was sitting there when they put out the signs. I was sitting there when the staff made the very public announcement over the loudspeaker, “the upper food area would be closed to turn it over for lunch. Lunch is available, however, in the lower area.” There were only about twenty steps between the two areas, mind you. But for what seemed like an eternity, though only about twenty actual minutes, I sometimes watched but mostly heard the staff people repeat the same refrain. “Excuse me, ma'am (or sir), but this food area is closed for the next several minutes while we turn it over for lunch.” 

Over and over and over again, they came. The staff gently turned them away, and they complained as they left. The most dramatic of these people had to be the at least fifty-year-old male who stomped his feet and slammed the small, unused paper plates he had grabbed—to get food that the staff had obviously wrapped in plastic—into the garbage can.

Several things came to mind as my blood pressure went up at the sight of their privilege-induced tantrums, and my wife quite literally rubbed the palm of my hand like Black Widow often did to the Hulk. The primary thing that came to mind is that great leadership lessons are happening right before me. For example, how many of us realise what a vital role is simply to pay attention to what is happening in a moment? 

Paying attention is a leadership superpower that we often overlook.

I estimate that more than fifty percent of our organisational pain points come down to a lack of basic attentiveness, either of the point leader or one or more of our teammates. Whether you are trying to understand what financial decisions lay before you in a small business or fortune 100 company or clicking one slide through to the next in a worship gathering (I see you ministry leaders), or discerning a path forward for staff growth and development, often our loss of the art of attentiveness is the source of whatever pain point we feel. 

So much of what we suffer organisationally—and sometimes personally—does not come down to intelligence, education, or aptitude. In general, as a culture, we do not pay attention, which is costly in great and small ways. 

Inversely, remarkable things can happen when we practise the art of paying attention and actively engaging our environment, even a moment, with intentionality and presence. Discouraging, downright infuriating things can be largely avoided. 

Where do you go from here? 

First, be honest about how well you pay attention to people and environments. If you know you struggle with attentiveness, you are now aware and able to monitor your presentness and tap into the superpower so many overlook. 

Second, challenge your team, the people you lead, or those who lead you to do an attentiveness audit. How many balls have been dropped, opportunities missed, or chaos great and small navigated because someone(s) was not paying attention?

Lastly, commit yourself to attentiveness. Listen to announcements in public places, notice people's body language in your meetings, examine every environment you enter and take note of the significant and not-so-significant elements therein.

If you tap into the art of paying attention, you will become a better leader, and wherever, whomever and whatever you lead and participate in will be better too. Everything will flourish more if you intentionally dial into the world around you.

The alternative, of course, is being a grown man who throws a tantrum because he cannot get a Delta-made barbeque chicken slider from a food bar that is clearly closed. No one wants to be that guy, so don't be that person! 

Today, be the person and leader you aspire to be--attentive and transformative. Accept nothing less of yourself, and watch everything around you get better.