How to unlock the magic of undivided attention.

When I worked in the television industry in 2008, we were at the dawn of cell phones actually being able to do things, and we were experimenting how to involve that second screen in the television viewing experience. I sometimes regret every ‘innovation’ we made in that field.

Today, producers working for streaming services have taken to critiquing drama writers with the line: “This isn’t second screen enough. ” In other words, video-streaming producers are looking for television that can be followed when the audience is only half paying attention.

Can you imagine having to design a lesson for a group of school kids that has to be experienced when they’re only paying half attention?

I don’t think it’s desirable, let alone possible. Here’s why.

On Friday night, 2200 people packed into one of Edinburgh’s stunning music venues to hear two orchestras playing together for the first time. The crowd who might normally stump up their cash to hear the Royal Scottish National Orchestra’s classical repertoire might not always be the same who’d go to a smaller venue to tap their feet to the Scottish National Jazz Orchestra.

And that was the magic.

For 120 minutes, all these people with different passions were focussed on the stage, lost in the sounds of Manhattan (Ellington, Gershwin, Bernstein).

And during a big band arrangement of Rhapsody in Blue, played by all 90+ jazz and symphonic orchestra musicians, the whole audience of 2,200 souls rapturously applauded soloists as they passed over to the next one.

That doesn’t happen in your average symphony orchestra concert. And jazz musos rarely get to solo on top of the emotional swirl of strings.

The orchestras are both world class. But there’s a specific reason we sit packed together in a room to listen to them.

It’s because the focus of everyone around you heightens your own focus on the performance.

When was the last time you sat staring at a band or orchestra on the television without once looking at your phone, or someone else in the room doing the same?

And yet it only takes one person in a room of a couple of thousand to break the focus of everyone.

There are novel examples of instrumentalists trying to make the most of a cell phone interrupting the performance. But Christian Zacharias voices what goes on in every musician’s head at these moments:

“Sometimes it's just too much. I mean if you are in a big moment and the orchestra is playing and you hear faintly in the distance something, you just go on.

“But if the music comes to these moments where it gets more and more silent and more magic and then this thing starts and of course it doesn't stop, then I say ‘no’.

“No, people should realize that music lives on something completely different than being disturbed and thinking this [phone call] is important… If you see someone not being concentrated, it kills everything that this is about.

“This is the rare moment when our minds can go and focus on one thing. We focus on it and we prepare. The least you can do is to honor it in listening and being there in silence.

“But then of course it's also the advantage: afterwards people know now. ‘Hey, actually there is something happening’.”

I gave a keynote in Manhattan in February all about how school directors need to be in charge of providing laser-sharp focus for their teams.

People said they loved the talk (thank you!) but also said that it just isn’t possible to gain that kind of focus in a school.

I know it is possible.

I know it is possible because we can see it in the world’s top performing schools, as well as in our orchestras, Oscar-winning films, political speech-givers and so many other arenas where focus matters if you want to get things done.

And so from Monday June 3 through to Friday June 7, for an hour a day, my colleague Kate Wadsworth and I invite you to gain that laser-sharp focus with us. From Fog To Focus will give you the reasonable excuse to take out an hour a day to work out what you want to focus on for the year ahead.

You can come alone for some clear-headed space, or snap up some places for your leadership team to join you, too. A mini leadership retreat, every day.

We’ll show you that it is possible to work with singular focus. We’ll show you how the best leaders in the world use the superpower of focus to create more ambitious, less frenetic organisations.

We’ll help you see the things you shouldn’t be doing, the areas you shouldn’t be asking everyone else to focus on.

We’ll give you tools to counter overwhelm.

We’ll show you how to communicate consistently about your singular focus. And we’ll catch up with you after summer to see how you’re getting on.

Head into summer and start the year ahead with clarity like you’ve never had it.