One of my business partners and I are in the habit of interrupting people whenever they’ve said something that gets us excited.

Never mind that they’re only on sentence 2 of a 4-sentence paragraph that we will really profit from hearing… Sentence 2 made us think of something interesting that we have to share right now!  Fortunately, John and I trust and like each other enough that we can interrupt the interrupt with something like, “Hey, John — Amy’s still talking!”.  Said with a smile, it usually gets a giggle and a shut up.

The key to the trust is that we know that we have each other’s interests in mind.  When he interrupts, I know he’s not shutting me down to make me look bad — he’s shutting me down so I can get what I want.  And he always does it with a smile.

In today’s New York Times, there’s advice for meeting leaders on how to stop “blatherers” from monopolizing meetings.

But what if the leader is the monopolizer?

Help your colleagues help you by giving them permission (or orders!) to interrupt you when you’re taking the meeting where it doesn’t need to go. And help both yourself and them by telling them what kind of language will get you to stop, without accidentally making you mad.*

Excerpt from the NYTimes:

Q. One or two blatherers always end up monopolizing the discussion at meetings, and running everything off the rails. How do you get them to stop?

A. Monopolizers need to be reined in because they rarely have the self-awareness to stop talking themselves, said Glenn Parker, a team-building consultant in Skillman, N.J., and co-author of “Meeting Excellence.”

It’s O.K. to interrupt a monopolizer, Mr. Parker said. But be polite about it, perhaps by validating what the person has said. You might say something like this: “I think you’re making a good point. Let’s see how the rest of the team feels about that.”

Then turn away from the talker, preferably to another part of the room, and ask someone else his or her opinion on the topic.

Similarly, he said, if a monopolizer or anyone else goes off on a tangent, you can say something like: “I may be wrong here, but I thought we were supposed to be dealing with customer complaints. If you all agree, let’s get back to the agenda.”

– Phyllis Korki, “Another Meeting? Say It Isn’t So“, Career Couch, New York Times, July 20, 2008

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A dog with colored spots. A dog wearing running shoes. A dog with a gas mask.

In Capturing Attention by Triggering the Mind, marketing expert Max Sutherland, PhD uses ads with these three dogs to show one way that advertising can capture the attention of consumer eyeballs that are more likely to whiz by an ad than to stop and look:

The formula is simple. Take any familiar object and change it somehow so that the ID scanner in the mind’s eye instantly identifies it but at the same time says ‘hang on a second….something’s wrong’… When something doesn’t quite fit, [the mind] ceases the automatic processing and the bell is rung to recruit additional attention and processing.

While Sutherland’s article doesn’t specifically point to attention deficit disorder as a root challenge for advertisers, the parallels are obvious. Consumer eyeballs in an advertising space are programmed to keep skimming. It takes something special to make them stop.

But Sutherland emphasizes that stopping to pay attention isn’t enough:

Remember that getting attention is one thing. Registering the brand is quite another. Too many ads go for attention but fail to register the brand.

This is an essential second point.

For ADDexecs in business, Sutherland’s observations are useful two ways:

1. We learn more about how our own brains work, and can try new techniques for capturing and directing our own attention when it might wander, and

2. We learn how we can design our own advertising (or other communications) to cut through ADD in the marketplace (or in our own colleagues).

We’ll visit some more of Sutherland’s articles in the near future, to highlight their application to the business life of adults with attention deficit disorder. Meanwhile, we encourage you to check out Sutherland’s website Advertising and the Mind of the Consumer.

“Cover your mouth with your hands, then sit on your hands.”

– a tried and true method for staying out of impulsive or compulsive trouble.

I used to have a note taped to my desk, as a reminder to me.  “Shut up and be nice,” it said.  It worked as long as I didn’t have my desk covered in papers.

“I write lots of notes in meetings. That’s how I keep my mouth shut.”

– Adam S., marketing consultant

When you were in second grade (or high school, or grad school), were you one of those hand-in-the-air “ooh! ooh! I know! call on me!” kids?

Apparently, that kind of thing doesn’t always go away.

There’s a quote somewhere about “you have two ears and one mouth so you can listen twice as much as you talk.” Hard sometimes to do in meetings where the things your colleague (or clients or staff) are saying keep giving you ideas you want to share.

But, obviously, sometimes you need to let the other person keep talking. Even if you’re only half-listening. Because half-listening but looking like you’re listening is almost always more politically welcome than half-listening but obviously not listening because you’re talking!

So use your pencil. Write down what you really want to say so it gets out of your body (where it’s making you twitch for however long it’s confined there). Then, later, you can share your brilliant thoughts when they’re done talking and finally ready to hear what you have to say.

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related: (1) I now know that when I want Adam to listen to me, I should hand him a notepad and a pen.

“No” is one of our power words. How do you say “No”?

Professional organizer Ramona Creel has a list of twenty ways. Here are seven of them, good for the office and for all the other places that people want some of your professional time (homeowners association board, anyone?):

I DO NOT HAVE ANY MORE ROOM IN MY CALENDAR

* be honest if your schedule is filled
* “filled” doesn’t have to mean really filled
* know when you are scheduled as much as you are willing and stop

I HATE TO SPLIT MY ATTENTION AMONG PROJECTS

* let people know that you want to do a good job for them
* but you can’t when your focus is too divided or splintered
* you will be more effective if you focus on one project at a time

I NEED TO LEAVE SOME FREE TIME FOR MYSELF

* it’s okay to be selfish — in a good way!
* treat your personal time like any other appointment
* block off time in your calendar and guard it with your life

I WOULD RATHER DECLINE THAN DO A MEDIOCRE JOB

* know when you aren’t going to be able to deliver a quality product
* the reason doesn’t matter — not enough time, wrong skills, etc.
* whatever the reason is enough for turning a request down

LET ME HOOK YOU UP WITH SOMEONE WHO CAN DO IT

* if you aren’t available to help out, offer another qualified resource
* helping to connect people is a valuable service to offer
* make sure the person you refer will represent you well

NO

* sometimes it’s okay to just say no!
* just say it in a way that expresses respect and courtesy
* leave the door open for good relations

THIS REALLY IS NOT MY STRONG SUIT

* it’s okay to admit your limitations
* knowing what you can handle and what you can’t is a skill
* your time will be more efficiently spent on something you do well

Click here for -> the full twenty.

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