Team Mindfulness: what is it and why is it important?

As the renowned management guru Peter Drucker might have said: ‘culture eats mindfulness interventions for breakfast’.

Training an individual to be mindful cannot make up for a toxic work environment.

We often set out to address issues of stress, anxiety, burnout and disengagement in our workplaces without recognising the effect that overall team and organisational culture play in creating stressors in the first place.

Team Mindfulness is all about teams (and ultimately organisations) becoming aware of themseves as teams (and organisations). Mindful Teams turn their attention from time to time not only to their collective goals and targets, but also to their inner culture. They’re able to ask “How are we doing – together?” or “What’s it like to work here?”

In a conversation hosted by Michael Chaskalson, Megan Reitz and Chris Nichols discussed the subject with an engaged online audience. A stimulating and wide-ranging conversation drew on themes from Michael and Megan’s book Mind Time, as well as their Harvard Business Review article ‘Why your team should practice collective mindfulness’.