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Attention is the foundation of all communication. Like the old saying about if a tree falls in a forest and no one hears it, does it actually make a noise? It determines how much of your message they get, how they perceive it, and how much they remember.

Have you ever had the experience of having someone hang on your every word, giving you their full attention in a sincere effort to profit from what you’re saying? Feels great, doesn’t it? But how often does that happen?

We all know that time is money, but I would submit that attention is worth even more. Getting time on a busy person’s calendar is hard enough, but getting their full engagement during that time is much harder; the temptation to multitask, to glance at their email or to be distracted by more pressing concerns, is extremely tough to overcome.

How big is the problem?

You don’t need statistics to convince you that most people nowadays go through life in a state of what Linda Stone calls continuous partial attention, where they are constantly scanning their environment for more information, stimulus or novelty, but here are a few:

• In 1968, the average length of a political soundbite on national news was 43 seconds. By 1988, it was down to 10 seconds and down to 7.3 seconds in 2000, although it has since ticked slightly upwards from there.
• The average length of time that a doctor will listen to a patient before interrupting is only 18 seconds,
• In one study, workers spent an average of 11 minutes on one project before switching to another, changed tasks every 3 minutes.
• When interrupted we take 25 minutes to get back on task, and 45% of all interruptions are self-generated.

But those numbers are misleading. Watch a teenager on a video game and you will see incredible absorption in a task. The fact is, everyone can give full attention when they want to or have to. The trick is to make your listeners want to or have to hang on your every word.

How Attention Works

Attention is a system that comprises three parts:

• An alert system that is constantly scanning the environment for relevant information.
• An orienting system which directs us to get more information from the stimulus.
• An executive system which processes the information and figures out what to do with it.

In general, you need to stimulate the alert system, guide the orienting system, and influence the executive system. What increases attention? Novelty, threat, emotion, self-interest.

How to Grab and Keep Attention

So how do you compete in what Thomas Davenport calls the Attention Economy? When quantity is unlimited, quality is more important than ever. deliver maximum value for minimum effort, or increase the Return on Time and Effort (RoTE). Put another way, you can either increase the payoff from attention, or reduce the cost.

You increase the payoff by focusing on the listener’s needs above your own, and showing them how you can improve their outcomes in some way. That means that you must prepare carefully, taking the time and making the effort to understand your listener’s needs, to view the situation from their perspective, and to give them a compelling reason to not want to miss a word of what you say.

You also have to reduce the cost of attention by reducing their expenditure of time and effort. Time is the first and most obvious cost, so you want to ensure that you craft and deliver your messages as concisely as possible, and make sure you deliver your main point first while attention is still fresh. But just as important as time is the mental effort you require from your listeners. Make it easy for them: do the work of gathering, analyzing and interpreting the facts so that they don’t have to.

Grab their attention

The first few seconds of any talk are prime cognitive real estate, so you have to grab their attention right from the start. The best way to take advantage of this is to do something slightly counter to expectations.

Avoid opening amenities. If you’re giving a presentation or speech, they already know who you are from the agenda or the introduction. Don’t spend time introducing yourself or thanking the audience for being there. These opening amenities are like the fine print on an ad; no one pays attention to them.

Make it relevant. Your presentation has huge opportunity costs when you add up the value of the audience’s time investment. Step 1 is to have something relevant to say, but Step 2 is just as important—tell them right up front what’s in it for them to listen. The best story I’ve heard about this is the tax accountant who told his audience of senior executives: “I realize there’s nothing particularly interesting about tax law, but I can promise you this—ten minutes of listening just might keep you out of jail.”

Surprise them. We are lulled by the familiar, but we instantly notice something that breaks the pattern. Tell them something new or different. (But keep it relevant.) 

Keep their attention 

Use examples from their own experience, not yours. This will require some work on your part, but it’s worth it. They will understand you better and appreciate the effort.

Be concise. Despite your best efforts, the simple fact remains that we are all squeezed for time these days, especially in an economy in which companies are trying to do more with fewer people. Don’t presume on your listeners’ time any more than you have to. Figure out what they need to know to make their decision, and leave out all the stuff that you think is cool to know.

Front-load your message. During the Civil War, journalists learned to get the gist of their story into the first paragraph, because the telegraph lines could be taken over at any time by military traffic. Your audience’s attention can also be hijacked at any time, so get to your point quickly.

Pay attention to your listeners. Don’t get so focused on getting out the content, or in looking at your own slides, that you don’t watch the audience carefully. Eye contact will enable you to monitor reactions and adjust as needed if you see people are losing the thread or being distracted.

Tell stories. Stories have narrative movement; listeners are compelled to stay with them to see how they end. You see it all the time on the evening news: a piece about unemployment, for example, will feature a struggling family trying to make ends meet. Just make sure they are relevant and short.

Variety. For longer presentations, don’t get stuck into a predictable pattern. This applies to your voice, your slides (e.g. endless bullet lists), your evidence, etc. Move around once in a while.

Give them a reason to listen to the end. At the end of the podcast, I reveal the secret message that I promised at the beginning.