The New Attention Deficit
Recently, I texted someone a happy anniversary. Yeah! But my talk-to-text translator screwed up. Ugh! I was so embarrassed!
I knew their name. I said their name. I hit send, all before I stopped to proofread.
Today’s technology is amazing. As I write, my robot vacuum is sweeping up dog hair. My calendar reminds me I have an appointment in 30 minutes, and my email is sorted by my new bestie, Chatty GPT. Talk-to-text lets me send a message without typing a word.
Life is good.
Until it isn’t.
So much for the personal touch.
This isn’t the first time something like this has happened, and it reminded me of a conversation I had with Marcy Stoudt and Michael Muhlfelder, founder of Calm Ocean Sales, on the ABOVE CENTER® Leadership Podcast.
Michael works with sales teams to help build systems that withstand change, market fluctuations, and gaps in sales leadership. Technology has made recording information easier: we meet on video calls, our AI notetaker summarizes the meeting, we add it to our files, but a completed record can be mistaken for understanding the person.
Collecting information is only part of the job. Before treating that information as ready to use, Michael urges teams to “go back and see if it's right,” and what it might have missed.
Convenience makes it easy to assume a task is finished. We know what we mean and assume our AI does too, so we check the box and move on.
Checking also means considering what never made it into the notes. During a Zoom meeting, someone might push back from their desk and fold their arms. As Michael explained, the gesture could signal something—or simply be how that person sits. A summary based on an audio transcript would miss it. Someone still needs to notice, ask a question if appropriate, and consider whether the response mattered enough to document.
That attention is part of communicating: consider what another person means and whether our own words convey what we intended.
AI helped turn my speech into text; it was still my responsibility to consider how those words would be understood.
Maybe that is our attention deficit: we trust the shortcut enough to stop looking.
If my robot vacuum misses a patch of dog hair, I can run it again. When an incorrect message goes to another person, correcting it requires another conversation.
A few seconds spent reading before sending would have been time well spent.
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About the author: As the co-founder and Chief Storytelling Officer of Revel Coach, a career growth platform, Alison Nissen helps leaders perfect their business pitches and online presence through storytelling. Successful executives use key storytelling points to engage their audience and gain market share because they know good storytelling is the best form of marketing, recruiting, and fundraising. Write Your Book NOW! Mastermind enrolling now.
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