We live in a world of excessive digital stimuli. As soon as we turn on our computers or cell phones, we are bombarded with news, information, and activities that are creating a huge addiction to screens. This high amount of hours online, especially for those working remotely, causes many damages to focus and mental health of talented individuals, who end up operating on autopilot, as if they were zombie professionals.
In this scenario, HR plays a very important role in ensuring that technology is used to our advantage, creating connections and maintaining each of our quality of life even from a distance.
The amount of time Brazilians spend connected is shocking. There are more than 90 hours a week immersed in the online universe, according to IBGE data, closely related to the growth of remote work, which has caused us to spend much more time in front of computers performing our tasks. The result of this, on the other hand, is quite negative for our health, increasing cases of anxiety, overload, and to make matters worse, reducing real connections in daily life among teams.
It is becoming increasingly difficult to capture people's attention, making this attention economy highly scarce and valuable in our society. This is precisely where HR comes in as a guardian of the balance between personal and professional life, in naturally busy environments impacted by technological advances – promoting healthy disconnection practices that advocate for boundaries that need to be followed in this digital environment.
Whether through workshops, lectures, mentoring, or other activities, HR must educate leaders about these boundaries online by organizing ongoing conversations about topics such as the importance of not sending work messages outside of business hours, scheduling meetings in advance so everyone can prepare, encouraging breaks during work hours, and promoting internal marketing moments that create initiatives to discuss topics other than work.
These issues need to be integrated into company policies, and not just remain as a "nice speech." After all, digital platforms are designed to capture our eyes and minds, and when this happens at work, we lose what we need most to create value for companies: focus.
We cannot create zombie professionals, exhausted in their routines in the face of this overload of information they receive daily and, consequently, are unable to produce as many qualitative results. They will always be online, but never truly present, which makes attention the most valuable currency the market can have today, even a competitive advantage in the face of such a rare asset to find nowadays.
The human resources department plays an essential role in promoting a more humanized and close people management. He needs to be an attention curator, creating actions that foster and improve relationships between teams and filtering out noise that harms this greater goal. Helping people understand where to focus their energy in their work routines more intelligently, improving not only their performance but also their quality of life and balance between professional and personal life.
