The scarcest resource in present day organizations is the attention of their employees. This is the essential thesis of "The Attention Economy: Understanding the New Currency of Business", recently named one of the top 10 business books of the year by Amazon.com. The book was written by two noted Accenture (formerly Arthur Andersen) consultants, Drs. Thomas Davenport and John Beck, and published by the Harvard Business School Press. The book has been well promoted, and the ideas are gaining widespread acceptance.

Economic systems are typically based on the competition for scarce resources. Most of the book discusses various techniques for competing for the attention of others. The authors also suggest a breakdown of attention into various subtypes and present a method for modeling these types as they relate to a particular task. Davenport and Beck state that brainwaves would probably be the best way to measure attention, but they do not suggest any way to increase the supply of attention.

Neurofeedback offers a new technological approach that can increase the supply of attention. If it is properly presented to corporations as a performance enhancement tool--not in a medical or therapeutic context--there should be a huge market for this combination of product and service. The recent downsizing of many corporations, which increases the demands on the attention of the remaining employees, also increases the need for training that enhances efficiency and optimizes performance.
Jonathan D. Cowan, Ph.D., is the President and Chief Technical Officer of NeuroTek, LLC. He has developed the Peak Achievement Trainer specifically for performance enhancement training in athletic, corporate, military and educational contexts. He is actively involved in developing new Peak Achievement Training programs for these markets