The NASPP Blog

It’s the eve of 4th of July and most of us are already in holiday weekend mode. Recognizing that attention spans may be running short today, I’ve decided to keep it light, but still touch on something important that I’m co-presenting at our upcoming 22nd Annual NASPP Conference: how to communicate successfully when attention spans are shorter than ever, and the variety of communication mediums are greater than ever. This summer we’ll be featuring a host of guest blogs written by speakers who will be presenting at the Conference. Today I’ll add to that content by interviewing myself (a first for me!). I’ll be playing the role of interviewer and interviewee. Let’s get started.

What’s in a Name?

NASPP: I don’t think we’ve ever had a session at a conference with a title quite like yours: “Gone in 60 Seconds: Communication for Short Attention…Ooh Candy!” – certainly one that didn’t mention candy. Is this a play on a movie? What’s the significance of the title?

Me: I can’t claim credit for the title – that was the creative product of my co-panelist, John Hammond. But I will say that the title pretty much sums up our presentation concept – we are riddled with so many distractions every day and our stock plan participants are no different. They could be viewing or reading your communication and then something distracts them and they are gone. Gone in 60 Seconds is catchy – but in reality it’s even less time – the average attention span in 2013 was 8 seconds – less than that of a goldfish! Speaking of goldfish, I recently got one and he is really smart – when it’s feeding time he wiggles his little body and…

NASPP: Uh, I think you are getting distracted. Back to the interview.

Me: Oh yes, sorry! It’s just when I mentioned goldfish, I got to thinking about mine and…you know, it’s funny, as I was writing this blog, I saw how many times my mind would shift and start thinking about other things. I was looking a the curtains in my office and I’ve been meaning to get an area rug to match them – I wonder if I should look for one online now that I’m thinking about it.

NASPP: Ahem. The interview?

Me: Oh yes, Gone in 60 Seconds. Oh, wait one second, someone just sent me an email that I need to respond to. Be right back.

Me: Okay, I’m back. What were we talking about?

NASPP: Okay, let’s start back near the beginning. So the initial focus of the presentation is the fact that participants are more distracted than ever and the time to get the message across is less than ever. Is that right?

Me: Yes! Absolutely! That’s the biggest challenge – with all the complexity around stock plans, taxation, administrative procedures and other compliance, there’s a lot to say in a very short amount of time. The question becomes how do you do that before their focus shifts to the “candy” or the email, or whatever else is going to distract them. Did you know that the average American adult checks email 30 times an hour? All this talk of candy makes me crave sugar right now. Can I offer you some chocolate?

NASPP: Uh, no, thanks. We’ve established that people are short attentioned these days. So what is the solution? How does a company get the message across to participants?

Me: I remember years ago deciding to “video tape” a presentation for ESPP that I had done over and over again each quarter (we had quarterly enrollments in that company). We hired a video crew to come in and video tape the 30 minute presentation. We posted it on our Intranet and it saved me a lot of time in having to do repeat presentations. That seemed to work back then. However, the world has changed – a 30 minute video on ESPP likely wouldn’t work today. The median of most popular viewed YouTube videos is something like 2 minutes. Our news segments on the evening news are getting shorter (41 seconds for the local news story). There’s a reason for this – the average person won’t stay focused for longer than that. The key has become disseminating information in short, digestible chunks. Our co-panelist, Anthony Pettinelli of GlaxoSmithKline is going to be demonstrating how his company is doing that – via short videos aimed at tackling very specific topics. You don’t have to cover the entire RSU plan in a single communication or video. It’s time to break it down. Wow, I didn’t even get distracted! I am passionate about communications, so I must be in the zone now.

NASPP: Sounds very interesting. We’ll look forward to your session at the Conference! Thank you for your time today (and you realize we could have gotten this interview done much faster if you hadn’t been so distracted!).

Me: Thank you! I’m working on it – but sometimes the “candy” is just so tempting!

Wait, don’t move on just yet – I have a short quiz for you! Please help us learn more about distraction!

Wishing everyone a safe and fun 4th of July weekend.

-Jennifer