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08-16-2010, 11:45 AM
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Executives and Stress
More than three-quarters of working men and women say they'd gladly trade some of their income for more time flexibility to have a personal life. No wonder. The number of people suffering from burnout has almost doubled in recent years. And yet companies are not exactly tripping over themselves to respond. Busy execs must make their own personal truces between the relentless pressures they feel at work and what they know they need for themselves.
After almost a decade of researchers dropping mind and body nuggets into the mainstream media, few people doubt that career stress, when it remains unrelieved by strong relationships and self-care, will damage both physical and emotional health. But what can someone with an eye on a top executive spot do when the demands pile up and the competition seems willing to go those extra miles? Here are four basic strategies culled from executive coaches, counselors and consultants who work regularly with high-pressured execs: Get Physical Execs must pay attention to their bodies with regular exercise (cardiovascular, strength training and flexibility), good nutrition, physical touch and deep breathing. It's a business imperative to put the names and numbers of massage therapists and personal trainers right next to financial advisors in the "essential numbers" section of the address book. Keep Connected Executives must pay as much attention to their relationship balance sheet as they do to the accounts at the office. A useful strategy is to ask for regular feedback from friends and family about the "intimacy quotient," another essential kind of IQ. Most over-busy, under-connected execs are shocked to find that the people at home have just gotten tired of waiting for them, leaving them either in the doghouse -- perpetually -- or very much alone. They haven't figured out what cutting-edge psychological research shows: Resilience on the job comes mostly from having strong, supportive relationships outside work. Go Inside One astonishing recent medical finding is that time spent in mindfulness activities, such as meditation or prayer, keeps people healthy, more alert and better able to concentrate on work. Chicago Bulls coach Phil Jackson was aware of this when he began practice and games with meditative time-outs. Obviously, it worked. It's the same in any field. When busy execs don't take the time to get centered in themselves, they undercut their performance, and ultimately, that of the company. As Dr. Harold Bloomfield observed in his book The Power of 5: "It's no accident that the word deadline contains the word dead; the human body is not well-suited to time-struggle." Hurry sickness is deadly for both careers and people. Click on the Big Picture A career always sits in the middle of a life -- hopefully a "whole" one -- with room for playing, relaxing, creating and, of course, plenty of laughter. Dr. William Fry of Stanford Medical School recommends laughing 100 times a day to stay balanced and keep one's mind clear. Most high-level career failures can be traced to the inability of harried leaders to see things in perspective and make informed judgments about what's really important. Burned-out execs don't have the emotional reserves or the clarity of thought to stay ahead of the challenges. Bad business decisions and bad personal decisions come from the same myopic place. When executives ignore these four rules, they shortchange everyone, including their companies. When they take the time to maintain this program, they increase their power enough to keep up with the competition and experience real joy in their lives. Why would anybody do it any other way? 
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