Achieving Focus

Overview

According to psychologist William James, “genius is nothing but a power of sustained attention.” In this course, participants will unlock their inner geniuses with exercises designed to maintain clarity, create “flow,” and nurture high-performance. We will cover many approaches, including the counterintuitive tactics of “anti-goals” and “not-to-do lists,” deliberate-practice techniques of Olympic athletes, brief guided “mini-meditations” favored by Silicon Valley entrepreneurs, and mental frameworks of military generals and Nobel Laureates. Focusing is a skill that can be trained with personalized strategies to build confidence and reduce anxiety.

Topics

• Making the most of your time at home and at work
• Strengthening your focusing “muscles” to avoid distraction
• Planning and controlling your environment to maximize focus
• Collaborating and prioritizing under pressure
• Facilitating proactive responses to emerging issues
• Mastering the principles of Attention Economics
• Why productive focus ranks among the most important success factors
• The pitfalls of continuous partial attention

Audience

• Anyone who wants to improve their efficiency when working on tasks and projects.

Duration

6 hours

Cost

• $655 (plus tax)

Featured Instructor

Nell van Walsum, M.Sc., PMP, has over 30 years’ experience as an executive, leadership mentor, advisor, facilitator, and instructor. Ms. van Walsum is a scientist, was president of a local environmental consulting firm, and currently works as an independent consultant focusing on leadership and co-creation (i.e. Nell is part of the leadership team of the Innovation Inclusion Hub in Ottawa to promote co-creation of innovation through inclusion). In the past 10 years she has worked for industry, academia, government, and NGO’s, in North America, Europe, Asia and Africa.

Sessions