Today I´m bringing you a quote I came across this week, taken from a book on team management called Software for your head .I have to admit that I haven´t read the book itself, even though it looks really interesting, and at least the title is very much aligned with the spirit of this blog 🙂

Whether the members of a team are dispersed across the world or crammed shoulder-to-shoulder in rows of cubicles, distance is always the central issue among collaborators. The remedy for distance is presence. Of course, it is easier to spot distance-related difficulties in a geographically dispersed team, and people are more likely to attribute team problems to miles rather than minds; regardless of geography, the primary task with any team is that of surmounting distance. The distance that must be surmounted, though, is the psychological distance (or the "headgap") between people rather than the amount of physical space between their bodies..

Jim & Michelle McCarthy – Software for your head

The book was written over twenty years ago, and if this paragraph was probably already true back then, I would say it´s even more so nowadays, both inside and outside the workplace environment. We live so distracted in our life in general, our attention is usually so disperse, that we find it difficult to be truly present with the person in front of us at any given moment. We are often there without really being there. Or we´re only half there, devoting just a small piece of our attention to the other person. And the worst part is that we´re now in the habit of living like that, we consider it normal, and we use all kinds of excuses to justify it.

But when we make the effort to be truly present, leaving all distractions aside for a little while, the difference doesn´t go unnoticed. Connections become deeper, shared moments become more valuable. And if we are at the workplace, communication likely becomes more efficient, greatly helping to get the work done.

So wherever we are, let´s remember that the best present we can give others is our presence, our full attention, during the time we spend with them. Family, friends, work colleagues, whoever it may be. And then distance no longer matters.