Track This: Where and how you spend your focused attention; time, energy and attention.

The most important metric or currency of  these days seems to be our focused, attention time, composed of time, energy and attention (TEA). The modern audience of potential customers, partners and fans, for your business and mine, is actively searching for ways to spend less time consuming anything where there is a low perceived value. These are called low information diets. These diets have different needs, like tools that block ads and social networks. Or management programs that provide analytics and visual breakdowns of where they are spending their precious available TEA. The point is, measuring in terms of TEA, is really important.

At Heroik, we’ve been asking our clients where they are pouring their TEA (Time, Energy and Attention) for over 8 years. We work to make their businesses more efficient, and free their TEA so that it can be poured elsewhere. We also pay attention to the TEA of their customers.

Measuring where and how you’re spending your time, energy and attention, and comparing it with the results earned, can help you make better decisions and invest wisely. The TEA metric is a powerful business tool that helps you:

• Measure the return on sweat equity and whatever demands your attention
• Helps you to create more effective processes
• Find more time to invest in customers
• Identify activities that deepen relationships vs. make more noise
• Be more considerate and respectful for other people’s TEA

With Customers: It’s important to invest some TEA in developing  and serving potential and existing customers. Content is an easy example, investing a little TEA to provide an audience with useful information can go a long way to a fruitful and profitable relationship.

Reflecting on where you pour your TEA can help you identify waste. For example, over-estimating the value of social media engagement can cripple a business. If you spend too much time flirting on channels that don’t convert, this can significantly take its toll on the clock, your enthusiasm and of course your wallet.

The TEA metric also allows you to create more effective processes. Process is about creating effective activities and standards that lead to greater efficiency. The standards and repeatable steps in your workflow also make it easier to automate, delegate and liberate your TEA. We use this concept to help our clients identify waste and inefficiency.

It all starts by looking at your efforts through this lens. In terms of strategy, you can create an actionable process around the quality and frequency of your work to eliminate waste and inefficiency, which will give you back the important commodity of time. More time can translate to more freedom. Use your new strategy to achieve a higher level of freedom.

Ask yourself: Where are you pouring your TEA (Time, Energy and Attention)?

3  Emerging TEA Trends

• Awareness of the new currency of TEA (time, effort and energy) is leading to more sophisticated consumption habits. Content creators drew so much attention to the attention economy that the modern audience is now adapting as it becomes more aware that the world is competing for this commodity.

• The word count and thickness of the book matters less. One book weighs as much as another on the iPad. Quantity matters less than quality and TEA required to understand the content. People are paying as much for the cliff notes and summaries as they are for the complete work. This is but one example of the attention metric.

• Continued Increase in audience resilience, scrutiny and filtration. This applies to everything, especially content, and means there is a growing value placed on being mindful of the TEA metric. By being aware and having a regard for others’ TEA, you’ll be on the cutting edge of value creation.

No easier or more practical example can likely be found than that of the content we create and share. If you pour your TEA into building something in alignment with your values, and emphasizing those that you share with your target audience, you’ll notice a few things:

• It feels easier because it is easier. You’re not spending energy faking it. You’re gaining energy and supercharging your batteries by sharing what comes organically while in alignment with your audience
• You grow faster because what you have to say, and how you say it, resonates as honest and true with your crowd
• Creative ideas for refinement and growth come easy, because you’re not distracted or vulnerable to the snake oil tactics that serve at best for the short-term

If you enjoyed this post and want to explore more implications of the TEA metric and content creation, be sure to check out our book “The Heroik Power of Headlines“. You’ll get plenty of practical advice on how to more successfully leverage it in your business.