For years, many caregivers sought to achieve a “balance” that allowed their work responsibilities and family demands to peacefully coexist. Surely, many felt, it must be possible to excel in or, at the very least, feel satisfied with both realms.

Commonly touted solutions often suggested simple fixes to this complex problem: if only they could define boundaries, communicate more effectively, or find the right support, then work-life balance would naturally fall into place.

But then COVID hit, and the collision of work and home life created a tipping point. The pandemic’s shift to homeschooling and virtual work led many working parents — especially women — to take a step back in their careers, or to leave the workforce entirely. Exhausted caregivers left their jobs in record numbers, and organizations are still feeling the effects today.

While offices have reopened and women’s employment numbers have since bounced back to pre-pandemic levels, senior organizational leaders continue to grapple with how to attract, develop, and retain women leaders (and ways to support working parents or other caregivers in general).

For those with caregiving responsibilities whose jobs can be done from home, many say that they want to continue working remotely at least some of the time. A study from the Pew Research Center reveals that 71% of employees who work from home at least sometimes say this helps them balance work with their personal lives.

Increased flexibility in the workplace comes as a long-awaited relief for working parents who struggled even before the pandemic to juggle both parenting and leadership responsibilities.

Is the idea of “balance” more attainable at last?

Organizations Must Lead the Way to Support Those Balancing Caregiving & Leadership

Certainly, flexible work arrangements help, but the golden notion of “balance” probably still feels beyond reach for many caregivers and working parents, and for good reason: we consider work-life “balance” to be a faulty metaphor.

It’s simply not possible for parents and caregivers to be fully present for their employers and their families all the time, while also taking care of their own health and wellbeing.

And the truth is, caregivers shouldn’t be forced to seek this equilibrium without organizational support.

If your organization is reconsidering how it’s supporting working parents and caregivers, you’ll want to ensure that you’re creating an environment where all your employees can thrive by offering equitable family leave policies, hybrid and remote work options, and ample growth and development opportunities.

For companies to support working parents and attract and retain top talent, they must be willing to acknowledge the juggle between parenting and leadership responsibilities, connecting leadership and employee wellbeing. It starts with managers who can create environments where others thrive — reducing stress and burnout while increasing morale and productivity, yielding people who thrive and a workforce that is flourishing. ​​

Here are some specific actions that organizations can take to signal they’re serious about supporting working parents — and all employees who are caregivers.

Supporting Working Parents, Caregivers & All Employees: 5 Tips

Specific Actions That Organizational Leaders Can Take

1. Offer fair and inclusive family leave policies.

Workers now have more bargaining power. Companies don’t want to lose talent, so employees can often enact change by calling attention to archaic and inequitable leave policies, courageously asking for the support they need from their organizations. While these conversations are useful, we still believe the onus and impetus to adopt more inclusive leave policies should fall on employers, not on employees. Specifically:

• Organizations are charged first with recognizing that families come in all shapes and sizes. To create more inclusive policies around time off from work, “maternity leave” policies should be reframed as “parental leave” — or even better, caretaker or family leave — to reflect an expanded definition of caregiving. Providing care for a family member isn’t limited to biological mothers and new babies, and caregiving for children often includes fathers, grandparents, adoptive parents, spouses or partners, etc. Leave policies should also cover an employee taking time off work to care for any family member — including aging parents, sick partners, adolescent children, those with special needs, etc.
• Further, managers should normalize actually using the available leave to focus on caregiving. Simply renaming your maternity leave policy to a “parental leave” policy is not enough; senior leaders should also actively encourage new fathers and domestic partners to take the available leave (and model this behavior themselves where applicable). This signals that your organization is serious about enabling employees to bring their whole selves to work and helps combat ingrained stigmas and societal expectations that a mother’s role as caretaker is more essential than a father’s.

When organizations offer inclusive family leave policies, they’re better able to compete for talent and retain strong performers. That’s why both company language and culture should be explicitly and intentionally inclusive, so that taking time away from work to care for a family member seems (and actually is) equally accessible.

2. Be a champion for flexibility by extending it to all employees.

Flexible work policies aren’t effective (and can actually be quite harmful) when they’re only available to a select group, or in specific scenarios. While many talent managers might acknowledge that a new parent on their team just returning from leave might need additional flexibility in their schedule, it’s important that managers remind employees that flexibility is available to everyone.

According to research, people without children sometimes feel they’re expected to pick up extra work while colleagues with children are granted increased flexibility. This dynamic not only inequitably burdens employees without children, it also creates an environment that positions flexibility as an organizational weakness instead of a strength. But the opposite is actually true.

In addition, many employers realized in the early days of COVID that they don’t have to trade flexibility for productivity. On the contrary, studies revealed that productivity actually increased as many employees shifted to remote work. With this in mind:

• Don’t assume that your organization should resume the same work arrangements after the pandemic as before. Many things have changed in recent years, so carefully consider the necessity and impact of return-to-office announcements. Evaluate the potential impact to all your employees, including those who are balancing caregiving, parenting, and leadership.
• Offer employees as much autonomy as you can in determining work schedules and locations, including remote and hybrid work options. Regardless of whether they have children, employees who have the freedom and flexibility to schedule when and where they work are more productive with the time they have. You’ll improve employee retention post-pandemic with flexible work arrangements that enable a greater sense of control, leading to more engaged, productive, and loyal employees.

3. Support Employee Resource Groups.

Also known as “affinity groups” or “business networking groups,” Employee Resource Groups (ERGs) are formed by employees who share common characteristics. Within these informal groups, members provide one another with support, career development, and professional networking. In recent years, such groups for caregivers have gained popularity, as working parents and others struggling with balancing family, caregiving, or parenting and leadership challenges found they needed a network for support and advice.

Your organization can help ERGs become even more impactful through your support. Here are a few ideas:

• Assist ERGs in being inclusive and in achieving specific goals; for example, providing resources, learning opportunities, and connections with other working parents or caregivers throughout the organization.
• Share ERG goals and immediate wins with your executive leadership team to encourage senior-level sponsorship and engagement.

4. Offer flexible opportunities for leadership development.

When working parents and other caregivers are feeling challenged by work-life conflict, leadership development can give them new skillsets and mindsets to adapt and show up in the ways they’d like to — both at work and at home.

For example, our flagship Leadership Development Program (LDP)® introduces participants to the idea of a button with 4 holes as a symbol for holistic leadership. The button helps participants remember that leaders are most effective when they understand how the 4 elements of their lives — self, family, career, and community — are woven together in an interconnected way, working in tandem to strengthen their leadership and enrich their lives.

• Offer training and professional development opportunities that build capacity and resilience. Incorporating vertical development as well as horizontal development can aid those who are balancing caregiving and leadership through the process of reconciling colliding perspectives.
• Avoid overwhelming their already full schedules. Acknowledge training as an important business priority, and provide participants with the space and time needed away from work to focus on their development, as well as to integrate the learnings into their daily routines. Working parents and other types of caregivers need options for how they engage in leadership development opportunities, including the format that best fits their needs. Whether it’s face-to-face training, virtual development programs, asynchronous learning, or a combination of formats, providing flexible development opportunities in a variety of modalities will help your employees balance parenting and leadership demands, while improving engagement and retention of your talent.

5. Support employees who choose to “power down” and stay the course.

Some caregivers, particularly women, may choose or be forced to step away from their careers entirely for a period of time to focus on child-rearing or other family needs. This was common before the pandemic, and data shows that COVID accelerated the trend, as it disproportionally impacted women, with remote schooling in particular causing many women to step back from their careers or leave the workforce, either temporarily or permanently.

• When an employee expresses a desire to step back, leaders can signal support for working parents by supporting this decision and also offering an alternative. Caregivers may not need to leave their organizations entirely, if they can adjust the demands of their roles. People managers can show compassionate leadership whenever and wherever possible by providing opportunities for parents or caregivers on their teams to reduce their hours temporarily if needed and enable them to stay connected through professional networks. To ensure caregivers avoid losing momentum in their careers when doing this, managers should have candid conversations about what the “powered down” period will look like, when it might end or be reviewed, and how they can support working parents or caregivers when they do ease fully back into work.

Learn 10 specific tips for juggling parenting and leadership in our book, Kick Some Glass: 10 Ways Women Succeed at Work. Co-authors Jennifer Martineau and Portia Mount explore the “power down” alternative for mothers to accommodate childbirth and child-rearing, balancing caregiving and career. The “power down” advice is widely applicable as a way of supporting working parents and caregivers in general.

• Organizations can also pair younger employees with more senior mentors and sponsors who are willing to provide guidance and support, as well as advocate on their behalf. While mentoring at work is beneficial for all employees, such programs can be especially critical in supporting and retaining talented women leaders. Learn more about how and why sponsoring and mentoring women leaders is so important.

Help Caregivers Bring Their Whole Selves to Parenting & Leadership

While many companies around the world have publicly made claims about supporting working parents in the past few years, many have not followed through and lack measures that actually change their policies, processes, and culture.

To show your internal and external stakeholders that you’re genuinely committed to making real and sustainable change, your organization must evaluate your current practices and make upgrades where necessary — including addressing outdated leave policies to better support those struggling with caregiving, parenting, leadership, and workplace responsibilities.

Properly supported working parents and other caregivers will become better, healthier leaders at work, at home, and within their communities — leading to positive impact for your organization that’s much greater than an annual retention report might reveal.

Ready to Take the Next Step?

If you’re interested in supporting working parents and enabling caregivers at your organization to stay and thrive, thereby attracting, retaining, and engaging more talent, sign up for our newsletters to get our latest research, tips, and insights on leadership.

The post Supporting Working Parents: 5 Ways Organizations Can Support Parenting & Leadership appeared first on CCL.

Imagine one of your shirt buttons: round, with 4 holes, holding your shirt safe and closed. Picture the thread that weaves between the holes, from one to the next, to the next, and so on, connecting the holes to each other and creating a tight attachment. The button may be pulled and twisted as you fasten and unfasten it, but when the 4 holes are interlaced well, the button holds securely to the fabric.

We’ve used this metaphor of a button as a memorable symbol of what truly holistic leadership looks like ever since the start of our original and now world-renowned Leadership Development Program (LDP)®, back in 1974.

The 4 Facets of Holistic Leadership

Like a button that relies on all 4 holes to secure it, those who take a holistic leadership approach find strength from weaving together 4 key facets of their lives:

• Self,
• Family,
• Career, and
• Community.

Now, we admit the button metaphor isn’t a perfect one. If you were to design a button to represent your own life — one hole for self, one for family, one for career, and one for community — it’s unlikely that each hole would be the exact same size. Unlike buttonholes, which are identical and symmetrical, in reality, these 4 facets of your life may be in flux or vary in proportion, especially over the course of your career.

But achieving balance doesn’t mean devoting equal attention to each part of your life at all times. In fact, we often say that “balance is a faulty metaphor,” because true balance requires understanding the importance of each facet individually and being intentional about how you prioritize your time and energy in each area.

Our decades of research have consistently found that leaders are most effective when they’re able to lead authentically. When leaders bring their whole selves to their roles, they’re better able to integrate their personal values and sense of purpose into their everyday actions, and support those they lead to do the same.

That’s why all our leadership programs now emphasize building self-awareness about personal values and understanding the ways these 4 elements of your life influence each other and work in tandem. This enables you to approach leadership holistically, with a values-based approach that leads to optimal outcomes.

How to Be a More Holistic Leader

Explore Each Facet of Your Life for More Holistic Leadership

While we may be able to compartmentalize certain behaviors — for example, committing to not checking work email while on vacation with family — theres no such thing as compartmentalizing our careers, our families, our communities, or even ourselves. All aspects of our lives are intertwined, interdependent, entangled, and overlapping.

Most leaders recognize the importance of making time for these 4 facets, in a general sense. But it’s easy to lose sight of good intentions, especially when to-do lists feel endless.

To bring a holistic leadership approach to your own life and be sure your behaviors are aligning with your intentions, take some time to think about how you want to show up as a leader and as a person. Ask yourself the following questions to boost your self-awareness and clarify your values and visions as they relate to each facet of your life.

1. Self:

• What energizes you?
• What gives you peace?
• How are you actively designing your desired future?
• What will you do to better prepare yourself to help others?

2. Family:

• Who are the people who love, support, and honor you? Who nurtures the greatness that resides within you?
• Are there people you need to grow closer to, or types of support and relationships that you need to nurture more deeply?
• Are there people from whom you need to distance yourself, in an effort to better manage your own energy and wellbeing?

3. Career:

• Are you just making money, or are you also making a difference?
• What do you want to give to your teams? Your organization? Put another way, what do your teams and organization count on you for?
• What is your hope for the future? What will you do to live into that hope?

4. Community:

• How do you serve others?
• How are you building connections to others?
• Are you establishing roots in the place you live?
• Are you helping to build a thriving community, whatever that means to you?

Integrating the Facets of Holistic Leadership With Intention

During the COVID pandemic, any lines that once existed between self, career, family, and community have become even more blurred. For many people who were used to devoting their attention to work while they were in the office and devoting their attention to their families when they were at home, the pandemic meant they no longer had the luxury of that clearly defined boundary as they shifted to remote work or began leading in a hybrid work environment.

Especially in the absence of physical barriers, it’s important to remember that the goal of holistic leadership isn’t to distribute time and effort evenly among your commitments. Rather, you want to make sure your behaviors align with your values. When you have to transition quickly from an urgent work call to a child’s homework question, are you behaving in a way that shows your child you value the time you have decided to take with them?

If you can clarify your values as they relate to these 4 facets of your life, you’ll have a north star to guide your behavior and determine if you’re acting in accordance with those values and living with intention at all times, even when something unexpected comes up.

Bring Your Whole Self to Leadership: 3 Tips

How to Live Out Holistic Leadership

Now that you’ve clarified your values, take the following 3 steps to adapt how you live out those values as you move through your day and make decisions about your future.

1. Define how you currently devote your energy and attention.

Think about sketching a picture of your personal button. If you were to draw in the 4 buttonholes proportional to your time and attention, what would that look like today? How are you supporting your own self-care?

When you think about how you currently spend your resources, don’t overlook your mental energy — your most valuable asset that fuels your enthusiasm, motivation, drive, and physical energy to live a full life.

2. Ask yourself how you want to allocate your energy in the future.

In 2 to 3 years from now, it’s unlikely that you’ll want those buttonholes to be the same proportions. As your life evolves, your priorities will shift. Take time now to set achievable goals that align with your values and priorities. Ask yourself the following questions to help you define your goals:

• Self: What can you commit to for yourself?
• Career: What is one thing you can do to increase your positive impact at work?
• Family: What do you commit to do to love, support, and honor those you consider family?
• Community: What skills, talents, and/or abilities do you have that you can give to your community?

3. Determine the adjustments required to make appropriate shifts.

In terms of balancing wellbeing and leadership, you give life to what you give energy to. If you were to look at your calendar, you’d ideally see a collection of rituals and patterns that reflect your values. Maybe your calendar shows you consistently set aside time to exercise each day. Maybe you work earlier or later certain days. Maybe you do a lunch date with your spouse every Friday. Maybe you call your parents every so often. Maybe you serve on a community board for an organization you care about or spend time volunteering on the weekends. Being very intentional about how you spend your time gives you a sense of control and ensures you’re really living your life in accordance with your values.

If rituals and patterns that matter to you aren’t a part of your life right now, and you’re committed to staying accountable and making them a part of your life going forward, you may need to verbalize your commitments to others. Does your supervisor understand that it’s important for you to leave at a certain time every Wednesday to coach your child’s soccer team? Does your family know how important your morning walk is to your mental and physical health?

Communicate your values and priorities to the people in your life so they can help you follow through on your commitment to being a more holistic leader.

Why Holistic Leadership Matters

“Heavy is the head that wears the crown,” Shakespeare’s Henry IV famously said to summarize the burden of kingship. In other words, it can get lonely at the top.

Most leaders can relate to that sentiment. Being in a leadership role, especially as you move up the organizational hierarchy, means dealing with a lot of leadership stress. Left unattended, that stress can cause failed relationships, career derailment, and poor health.

But if you understand that you aren’t defined solely by your career — that it’s but one aspect of your life, and is enhanced when you make time for every other facet of your life — then you’ve laid the foundation for overcoming burnout and becoming a truly holistic leader.

And as over 1,000,000 global alumni of our Leadership Development Program (LDP)® over the past 50 years will tell you, the button and its 4 holes can be a helpful symbolic reminder of what holistic leadership looks like, and that only by taking care of yourself, as a whole person, can you weave the life you desire and leave the legacy you want — as a person, and as a leader.

Ready to Take the Next Step?

Leaders better understand themselves and learn to practice more effective and holistic leadership through our transformational, world-renowned Leadership Development Program (LDP)®.

The post How to Practice Holistic Leadership appeared first on CCL.

As news headlines proliferate about what today’s employees want from work and how much organizations can expect from their people, purpose is emerging as a critical success factor. Purpose in leadership supports improved individual and organizational outcomes.

Purpose-driven leadership means helping employees find personal meaning in their work and fostering a deeply committed workforce that thrives on shared goals and aspirations. Purpose-driven leaders model value-based decision-making, take time to learn what truly matters to their employees, connect work to a greater objective, and help employees understand their organization’s mission and find ways to personally connect to it.

But purpose, just like organizational culture change, doesn’t thrive without intentional effort. To create a sustainable purpose-driven culture, managers must embody and promote a sense of purpose in their leadership, daily operations, and decision-making.

Why Is Purpose in Leadership Important?

So, what are the benefits of purpose-driven leadership? First, purpose helps create a shared sense of direction, alignment, and commitment; builds belonging at work; fosters greater organizational performance; and increases persistence through challenges.

In fact, purpose is often one of the main drivers of employee engagement and satisfaction. Our research with emerging leaders around the globe suggests that purpose is one of the greatest predictors of whether young professionals pursue leadership positions and, for those in a leadership role, whether leaders feel empowered to make a difference.

In addition, purpose-driven leaders are more likely to develop and maintain strong relationships with their direct reports. Articulating a clear, inspiring vision that resonates with others is key.

Purpose-driven leadership creates space for alignment of goals and values between individual employees and the overall organization. When employees understand why they’re carrying out their work, they care more about what they accomplish. (Though critical for all employees, value alignment is especially key for younger generations in the workforce. Organizational mission and vision can be an important deciding factor in recruitment and retention — especially among younger Gen Z and Millennial workers.)

Finding purpose in day-to-day work also makes employees better equipped to navigate challenges and persist, even through difficult tasks.

Purpose Is Universal, but Not Uniform

6 Things That Drive a Sense of Purpose

While the desire for purpose is a fundamental human need, what employees value and derive purpose from is not. Research suggests that purpose can arise from a range of sources, such as:

1. Utility: Work is practically relevant to our goals and aspirations, either now or in the future.
2. Personal Development: Work facilitates opportunities for self-growth, developing either skillsets or mindsets in personally meaningful ways.
3. Impact: Work empowers us to make a tangible and positive difference in the world, contributing to the greater good of society, our communities, or those close to us.
4. Identity Reinforcement: Work reinforces our sense of self, aligning with the core elements of who we are.
5. Intrinsic Interest: Work is inherently fun and energizing, offering enjoyable experiences that naturally appeal to our interests.
6. External Rewards: Work leads to a desirable payoff, from a paycheck to a promotion.

As varied as the unique experiences that individuals bring to work are the ways they find meaning in it. Take, for instance, being asked to help start a new Employee Resource Group at an organization:

• One person may jump at the opportunity because it helps display leadership potential (utility) and is accompanied by an additional stipend (external).
• Another might agree because they see themselves as someone who advocates for wellbeing (identity) and wants to support work colleagues (prosocial).

Both employees may be taking the same purpose-driven leadership action, but they have different reasons for doing so. Without exploring their unique drivers, leaders simply cannot know why employees choose to engage at work.

Each Finding Their Own Meaning Is Critical

Why is it important to know what your employees value? Because telling them where to find meaning can backfire. In one study, researchers conducted a series of experiments teaching college students a new mental math technique. They found that telling students why the approach was valuable undermined how well they applied it and how interested they were in using it in the future. Importantly, this impacted the least confident students the most.

Consider a parallel at work. If a sales director tells his regional leads exactly why they should care about a new system for tracking leads, there’s a stronger chance that buy-in and performance will suffer if those reasons don’t personally matter to the employees. If employees have an opportunity to identify why the system is useful to them and make connections for themselves, by contrast, they’re likely to use the program more frequently and effectively.

As a leader, you want each person on your team to be able to determine for themselves why and how their work connects to purpose, rather than dictating to them why it’ll be valuable. When your employees have autonomy to find their own meaning, a culture of purpose is easier to cultivate.

To be clear, this doesn’t imply that leaders should avoid sharing their own reasons why work is meaningful. Modeling conversations about purpose can help employees find their own meanings. The critical piece is to allow individuals the freedom and permission to consider and discuss their own purpose, so their reasons feel relevant and personal to them.

Implementing Purpose-Driven Leadership at Your Organization

2 Keys for Cultivating Greater Purpose in Leadership

It’s one thing to say that purpose is important, and another to create a culture of purpose-driven leadership at your organization. While few people disagree that purpose in leadership is important, it’s not ubiquitous. If leading with purpose was easy or intuitive, everyone would be doing it.

So, how can managers embrace and embody purpose in leadership and their everyday work? Here are 2 essential keys to cultivating an environment where managers and employees can connect and find purpose in leadership and in their daily work.

1. Weave organizational mission, vision & values into your communications.

Remember that employees have to know the organization’s overarching purpose before they can make connections to it for themselves. Values may drive your organization’s decision-making at the most senior levels, but they’re easy for employees to overlook in the midst of projects, deadlines, and day-to-day activities. So, it’s important to speak often about your organization’s mission, vision, and values to give employees ample opportunities to connect and align their own values to their tasks and projects.

Make purpose more salient for them by effectively and intentionally communicating the vision, mission, and values of the organization — and by reinforcing these again and again over time.

TIP: Model finding connections between organizational values and your team’s (or your own) projects whenever possible. Some specific practices to try:

• Seek out opportunities to build purpose alignment into existing structures at work, such as during annual reviews or all-staff meetings. Invite your senior leadership team to provide examples of leading with purpose (both personal and organizational) in public settings, company-wide communications, quarterly retreats, and team meetings. Personal, specific, and meaningful stories are most effective at signaling a commitment to purpose and catalyzing greater buy-in and alignment. Make a point of bringing powerful real-life experiences to the forefront; sharing examples of helping others or bettering a community at large through corporate social responsibility efforts can be particularly helpful.
• Consider asking colleagues directly what parts of the organizational mission resonate most for each of them. You can open the door for deeper exploration by modeling; simply take 5 minutes to think about or list your personal values, current work activities, and note the specific, meaningful connections you see between them. Share as much of this as you like and use it as a discussion-starter to learn more about what matters most to others. When new employees onboard or move into bigger roles, intentionally engage them in team meetings or one-on-one conversations about how their work might fit into the bigger organizational picture.
• At the beginning and / or end of projects, build in time for team members to reflect on how the project contributes to the organization’s overall business objectives and mission. This can be part of the conversations for setting team norms up front, or used as an exercise during an after-action review or “lessons learned” session after the fact.

When weaving organizational purpose and mission into conversations, remember that employees need dedicated time to reflect on the connections for themselves. By building in intentional opportunities to find meaning, purpose-driven leaders signal to employees that finding purpose at work is a valued part of the organizational culture.

2. Understand what drives your team members.

The more you know your employees — and create opportunities for them to connect with one another and the larger organization — the easier it is to help reinforce their sense of purpose. Seek to understand the perspectives of your direct reports through a lens of showing compassion and respect, as each individual brings a different set of experiences and aspirations to work.

Compassionate leadership means being aware of the feelings, thoughts, and needs of others. Compassion enables leaders to understand and respond to the unique needs, perspectives, and emotions of their teams, fostering a more supportive and inclusive environment. Beyond the obvious feel-good value of showing compassion, managers who show empathy in the workplace toward those they are responsible for are viewed as better performers by their bosses. It’s a “win” for all involved.

Purpose-driven leaders also understand and leverage the power of identity. This involves both creating an environment where team members feel psychologically safe at work to share their personal experiences and understanding the way that employees view themselves with respect to work. For instance, our research suggests that simply identifying as a leader is associated with greater confidence and engagement in the workplace and can be cultivated by support from others.

TIP: Help employees recognize and embrace the many different reasons they might find meaning at work. Some specific practices to try:

• Share your own reasons that you find your work meaningful, providing examples of several different sources of purpose. Speak in the first person (using I, we, my, our, etc.), and encourage them to do the same. Include details and examples to help build more specific and meaningful connections and invite them to share their personal “why” with one another (and you).
• Make space for whatever they share about their perspectives and experiences, remembering that purpose is universal — but not uniform. Normalize that there is no “right” way to find meaning at work. As conversations unfold, actively listen for what matters most to your employees. You may want to keep notes for yourself on what you learn about each person’s purpose so you can refer back later, especially if you manage a large team.
• Use this information to help make work more personally relevant for each individual. Importantly, after gaining a better understanding of what drives each of your employees, keep that top-of-mind going forward when interacting with them, assigning tasks, and planning growth and development opportunities for them. That way, you’re motivating employees in a tailored and personalized way.

By working from an understanding of what is individually meaningful to each of your team members, showing compassion for their experiences and perspectives, and using this information to tailor your interactions, work assignments, and development plans for them going forward, you signal support for employee wellbeing and create an environment where colleagues feel valued, respected, engaged, and eager to contribute — ultimately driving your team and organization forward.

A Closing Word on Purpose in Leadership

Organizations that focus on purposeful leadership — with managers who help their direct reports find meaning in their work and connect their personal values to the organization’s — have a better chance of attracting, engaging, and retaining talent and enabling the enterprise to meet business objectives more effectively.

Ready to Take the Next Step?

Equip your people managers with the mindsets and skillsets required for purpose-driven leadership. Partner with us to create a customized learning journey for your leaders using our research-based modules. Available leadership topics include Authentic Leadership, Emotional Intelligence, Listening to Understand, Psychological Safety, Self-Awareness, Team Leadership, Wellbeing, and more.

The post Purpose in Leadership: Why & How appeared first on CCL.

You’ve most likely risen through the ranks by operating at the top of your game — producing stellar results and proactively tackling even the most complex challenges. But what does it take to succeed once you’ve actually made it to the top? What do you do when the broader organization is now looking to you for direction and guidance?

Individual performance simply isn’t enough at the senior executive level. To perform effectively requires perspectives, leadership skills, and spheres of influence that can vary dramatically from those you used to reach the executive suite in the first place.

In our work with many thousands of senior executives around the globe, we’ve found that those who produce the greatest sustained impact on their organization excel in 5 key areas:

1. Building an effective executive team
2. Developing resilience
3. Promoting collaboration
4. Expanding personal influence
5. Encouraging feedback and engagement

Building an Effective Executive Team

Getting the best out of your senior leadership team is challenging. It takes a savvy executive team to tackle the “tough stuff” organizations face — from a market downturns or failed business strategies to untapped opportunities for growth. Senior executives need to be able to work together in lockstep to determine the best strategy, communicate their plan, and align the organization behind a path forward.

Many senior teams, though, simply don’t know how to work together effectively. Structural issues in particular can be a significant barrier. Since each team member typically represents a particular function or region, there can be a lack of clarity about when they think about the organization and when they need to rally behind a broader, enterprise-wide perspective.

Ego can also be an issue. If you’ve made it to the top, you are likely accustomed to being a star in your own right — and so are other members of your senior team. How do you take individuals with a high level of skill, proficiency, and ego and turn them into a cohesive unit?

It’s the same challenge faced by Olympic basketball coaches. They recruit the best pros they can find — each a high-profile personality — and must convince them to leave their egos at the door. It is a big challenge, but magic can happen on the court — and in the board room — when high-performing individuals become a high-performing team.

TIP: Identify your team’s shared purpose.

Does your executive team lack a sense of shared purpose? That was the case at a global pharmaceutical company. The executive team found itself struggling to decide whether it should even exist. Some thought each of the company’s business groups should simply operate autonomously, without an overarching corporate strategy.

With the support of executive leadership coaches, the team found its footing and its purpose. Senior leaders began to think beyond their previous business and functional silos — collaborating to transform the company’s operations globally.

Today, the team is proactively pursuing strategies that are making the company more agile and better able to respond to an increasingly uncertain and complex marketplace. Concerns about business group autonomy have been set aside in favor of shared strategic initiatives that are moving the broader company forward.

Developing Resilience

Few senior executives consider personal health and fitness to be part of their already demanding job description. Actually, the reverse is true. Regular exercise, healthy eating, and a good night’s sleep frequently come last — sacrificed at the altar of the job.

When personal health and fitness take a back seat, though, the impact may be far broader than you think. If you suffer from an illness, look physically unfit, or lack the energy and stamina to meet the demands of your work, it can impact how you are perceived by your team. Depending on your job role, it can even create uncertainty among business partners and shareholders.

Good health and leadership are more closely linked than you might think. A few proof points: Research conducted by CCL shows that leaders who exercise are consistently rated as more effective than those who don’t. Waist circumference is also a factor. Studies show leaders with abdominal obesity are more likely to be negatively rated by superiors, peers, and direct reports.

But how do you find the time to focus on your personal health and fitness? The threshold may not be as high as you think. Experts say even 15 minutes of intense exercise 3 times a week can make a difference. So can getting up and moving more during the day. Taking the stairs and making other small, incremental changes can help you stay active. When coupled with healthy eating, you can increase your energy level, shore up your immune system, reduce the risk of disease, and sleep more soundly. You will have the resilience you need to lead over the long haul.

TIP: Consider holistic lifestyle changes to increase resilience.

One executive recently shared with CCL how working at the senior level had amplified his stress level. He was traveling more, suffering from frequent jet lag, and struggling under the demands of his new role. He decided to make holistic lifestyle changes to improve his personal resilience — and he says it has made all the difference.

He began to eat more healthfully and adopted a rigorous exercise program. He also began to notice the symptoms he experienced when he veered off course, including spikes in irritability. He used that awareness to keep him focused on making smart choices day in and day out.

The impact of the changes? He reports greater energy levels, better composure, and better clarity of thought. He is sleeping more soundly and is better able to handle stress. “My personal effectiveness has definitely increased,” he says.

Promoting Collaboration

Organizations today are often structurally complex, with multiple business entities and functional support teams in key markets around the globe. Employees must navigate through a tangle of direct and indirect reporting relationships that connect them to their team, their customers, and the broader organization.

Supervisors in the middle of these structurally complex organizations face one overriding obstacle: getting things done when everyone doesn’t report to you. How can you cross organizational boundaries and pull together teams with the right skills and the right knowledge if others think “it’s not my problem”?

As a senior executive, you are in the position to lead by example — demonstrating how to work collaboratively to knock down barriers. And if you don’t, the organization may fail to respond effectively to important challenges and opportunities. Unfortunately, working collaboratively is something that doesn’t come naturally to many senior leaders. Think about your own experience. You likely have been rewarded and promoted based on your individual achievements, including your command of your functional responsibilities and your speed at producing results. But collaboration involves the opposite skillset.

Individuals who are skilled at spanning boundaries and collaborating routinely slow down and take a clear-eyed look at the organizational landscape. They are able to spot important connections, understand the perspectives of others and determine which relationships they can leverage to get things done.

TIP: Establish a culture of collaboration.

Executives who successfully model collaborative behavior often are great storytellers. They look across the organization for examples of collaboration successes and then share them broadly — describing the challenge, the barriers faced, and how those barriers were set aside in favor of the greater good.

Even if storytelling doesn’t come to you naturally, with practice it can become second nature. That was the experience of a CEO who began to work intensively on promoting a collaborative culture within his organization. He told CCL that the more he focused on collaborative successes, the more it changed his perspective.

Promoting a collaborative culture through illustrative examples is great, but ensuring your team is leading by example is what makes those stories even more authentic and impactful emblems of success. Therefore, executives should also ensure that their executive team is intentionally striving to work collaboratively toward their shared goals.

Expanding Personal Influence

While building influence is important at all levels in an organization, it is particularly critical at the top. As a senior executive, you are entrusted to set direction and to act as the proverbial North Star for your organization. But will folks come along for the ride and support the strategies you map out?

Great executives are intentional about their leadership image and use personal influence to build consensus around their plans, inspire commitment, and empower their team to succeed. They know what motivates other people and how to get folks to follow what they are saying and doing. They bring together individuals with differing viewpoints and are able to align them as they work toward a shared goal.

They also know that developing influence isn’t a one-way street — a matter of outlining your vision and expecting others to blindly support it. Influential leaders understand the importance of dialogue, and they spend time listening, not just talking. As a result, others feel validated and valued, and are more likely to join in.

Credibility is also an important factor. Each of us assesses leaders based on their track record, what we know about them, and whether they have historically delivered what they’ve promised. We ask: Can I depend on you? Will you do you what you say you will do? Focusing on an alignment between your actions and your words is fundamental to broadening your personal influence.

TIP: Find your seat at the table.

An HR vice president for a major corporation described to CCL how changing her personal perspective helped her to build and extend her influence. She had always thought of herself as a functional resource supporting the company’s executive team. She attended their meetings as an invited guest to bring an HR point of view to their deliberations.

She came to realize, though, that in order to have a real seat at the table and to influence outcomes, she needed to become more authentic. She needed to show up as herself, not as her HR role, and to share her broader thoughts and perspectives. She also needed to act like a true member of the team, not as an invited guest.

After making changes that broadened her influence, she was promoted to chief human resources officer — a role that reflected her new perspective and the valuable contributions she was making.

Encouraging Feedback and Engagement

Giving and receiving feedback is one of the key skills leaders at all levels need to master, and it becomes even more important — and scarce — as you move up the ladder.

Teams that are really good at both giving and receiving feedback tend to have a high level of trust, candor, and sharing. Modeling effective feedback practices yourself can create those safe conditions and make it more likely for feedback to happen up and down the organization. Getting feedback can give you crucial information about what’s working, and how you might become more effective. But unless encouraged to do so, few individuals will feel confident enough to provide feedback to a senior executive. Giving feedback effectively can help you keep your team engaged. People need to feel they are seen, valued, and are making a difference. Providing feedback shows you are actually noticing their contributions.

Too often we give feedback only on extremes in performance — the huge successes or the dramatic failures. To be effective, feedback needs to be a more routine part of daily interactions. Each of us constantly scans our environment and makes assessments. We simply need to be overt, intentional, and articulate at sharing what we observe as we move throughout our day. Remember, people are more sensitive to criticism than praise, so give more positive feedback than negative. It’s easier to incorporate feedback when we are noticed more for our positive contributions, versus our shortcomings. Try to catch others doing things well and let them know their hard work is appreciated.

TIP: Deliver effective feedback that really works.

Learning how to deliver effective feedback transformed the work of an audit team led by a senior executive with a large global law firm. One managing partner told CCL that teams dreaded the audits and were traumatized by detailed reports cataloguing the mistakes they were making.

When the audit executive adopted a new approach to feedback, the experience was transformed. Positive findings became an important part of the discussion and were featured in each audit report. Looking at the positive results as well as the negative had a huge, curative impact. The team was better able to hear and respond to things they needed to work on after receiving positive affirmation for things they were doing well.

It’s Different at the Top

Do you have the skills to produce a sustained impact on your organization? Leading an organization can be a powerful and humbling experience. As a senior leader, you play an enormous role in the success of your organization, and you need to excel in these 5 ways.

Our team of leadership experts offers a variety of development opportunities tailored especially for leaders like you who are working at the senior-most levels of an organization — whether you’ve just arrived or have been there for some time. We can help you broaden your impact and produce results that truly matter to you and your organization.

Ready to Take the Next Step?

Build the senior leadership skills needed to succeed at the highest levels of your organization. Learn more about Leadership at the Peak, our premier leadership development program for senior executives.

The post Accelerate Your Leadership Impact: A Leadership Guide for Senior Executives appeared first on CCL.

Organizations and senior leaders often try to improve profitability and productivity by demanding more — asking people to do more with less — more hours, more projects, more email, and more output. This is more true now than ever.

But always focusing on “more” may be a mistake, as it can lead to overwork and burnout.

After a certain point, additional hours spent working don’t necessarily translate into additional productivity.

A common assumption is that the more hours people work, the more productive they are, and the more profitable the organization will be. At first glance, using hours-worked as a proxy for effectiveness and productivity seems to make sense, because when people are working more hours, the presumption is that they are creating additional value.

The problem is, every additional hour of work doesn’t equate to an increase in productivity, and can instead lead to overwork and ultimately, burnout. 

In fact, working too many hours actually impedes productivity, both for individuals who are working too many hours and for their teams, resulting in a substantial decrease in effectiveness. Excess busyness and long hours can actually produce more errors, lead to declines in employee health, and lead people to emphasize reactiveness over proactiveness.

The costs of overwork are there — they’re just hidden. People who work too many hours don’t get enough time to recover. Without enough time to recover from work, the resulting exhaustion impedes productivity, leads to accidents, illness, emotional dysregulation, and mistakes.

The reason behind the diminishing productivity can be explained by what social scientists call the effort-recovery model. This model emphasizes that recovery is essential after a period of extended effort to prevent burnout. Insufficient recovery can result in diminished performance. Rest provides the fuel necessary for hard work and prevents burnout.

Leadership Muscles Need Rest, Too: Recovery Practices for Leaders

With physical fitness, rest is essential for muscles to recover and grow stronger after exercise. Leadership muscles are similar and require opportunities to recover, too.

Companies can help employees step back and pause to prevent overwork. In the process, they can help increase workforce resiliency, boost energy and passion about work, and reduce costs associated with stress, illness, and employee turnover.

There will always be times when you need to pick up the pace of work and ask everyone to sprint. But to prevent burnout, these high activity times need to be balanced with periods of recovery. The key for any organization or individual to be sustainable and competitive over the long term is balance.

That’s why companies would be better served by giving their leaders opportunities to recover from periods of intense work, so their minds can clear and they can recognize what’s most important.

How to Prevent Burnout & Restore Productivity

Now, more than ever, things may feel uncertain and overwhelming, and you may feel tempted (or forced) to respond by overworking. Yet uncertainty can lead to anxiety, and the nonstop additional work is draining and can lead to burnout.

Engaging in recovery behaviors and practices can help prevent burnout. (They can help in dealing with burnout once it’s already happened, too.)

Recovery practices could be taking a day just to be outside in nature, carving out time to reconnect with friends, or even going on a long walk or run to shed the stress of a tough day. Taking some time out for your mental health is critically important.

5 Ways You Can Recover from Overwork

As noted in our white paper, these 5 key research-backed recovery practices can help to prevent burnout, foster resilience, and help you bounce back from overworking.

1. Sleep.

Sufficient sleep is a biological necessity for our physical and mental health. Sleep can also increase your productivity as a leader. Yet polls consistently find that almost half of adults get less than the recommended amount of sleep.

2. Exercise.

Most corporate workers have sedentary jobs — sitting at a desk rather than engaging in physical activity — and this may be bracketed by commutes also spent sitting. Physical activity can boost energy, mood, cognition, and performance. In fact, exercise and leadership effectiveness are closely linked.

3. Mental Recovery.

Being able to stay attentive and focused is critical to high performance. But that’s increasingly difficult with the ever-present notifications from digital devices and workdays that can extend far beyond the traditional workday. Contemplative practices such as meditation can allow your mind to regain focus and clarity. Mindfulness is a simple way to lead better, and mindfulness exercises can train your brain to be better focused, resulting in clearer thinking.

4. Social Recovery.

Humans are social animals. Connecting, caring, and sharing with others can lower stress levels and boost moods. Organizations need to find ways to encourage positive social interactions on the job and outside of work.

5. Gratitude.

Positive emotions can increase energy and creativity. Work cultures are great at identifying the negative, but could be more intentional about identifying good and meaningful experiences at work. Giving thanks can actually make you a better leader, and can enhance mood and wellbeing, too.

Dive deeper into 8 practices that keep you healthy, focused, and functioning with our book, Resilience That Works: Eight Practices for Leadership and Life.

How Organizations Can Prevent Burnout & Foster Resilience

When practiced regularly, these behaviors can help keep employees happy, healthy, and engaged. But simply telling people to get more sleep or exercise more is unlikely to prevent overwork and burnout, foster resilience, or meaningfully change your workforce’s behaviors.

Here are a few things that HR leaders should consider to encourage employees — and managers — to foster resiliency and make time for wellness:

• Educate people about resiliency. Help people understand that there are specific recovery practices and habits that can help them feel better and perform better. Help them connect these behaviors to their health and improved job performance. Create parameters around the use of email, so that people know they aren’t always expected to respond immediately, especially in the middle of the night. Make sure your organizational culture is sleep-friendly.
• Provide resiliency-building opportunities at work. Financial incentives, an onsite gym, or reimbursements for fitness classes can make it more likely employees will exercise. You may want to provide your people with access to formal resilience training.
• Consider contemplative practices. An increasing number of large organizations, from Google to the U.S. Army, are using mindfulness programs to help people learn how to pause and quickly regain focus. Mindfulness programs can be offered a variety of ways, from self-guided online courses to on-site classes. Mindfulness and breathing techniques can be employed at home, at your desk, and even in meetings. For example, you may want to educate your teams that the commonly-shared advice to “take a deep breath” doesn’t actually help with stress; instead, people should focus on lengthening their exhales in order to calm their nervous systems.

In summary, HR leaders and organizations have a key role to play to prevent burnout by supporting their people; minimizing overwork; and helping to educate about, and encourage, recovery practices.

Ready to Take the Next Step?

Support your team in challenging times by providing access to our resilience training solutions, which will help your leaders avoid burnout — and burn bright instead.

The post Recovery Practices to Foster Resilience & Prevent Burnout appeared first on CCL.

• PODCAST

Lead With That: Bryan Johnson and the Role of Perspective in Leadership

In this episode of Lead With That, Ren and Allison discuss entrepreneur and venture capitalist Bryan Johnson and the leadership lessons we can glean from his business and health-related endeavors. Notably known for his pursuit of everlasting youth, Johnson has become an emerging figure in the longevity and anti-aging space. With a global audience showing interest in his journey, many wonder what the implications of this path may be, and what this signifies on a larger scale about the role that perspective plays in leadership.

This is the 5th episode in our special Lead With That series, “Manager Madness,” where we discuss public figures, real or fictional, who embody leadership through both their actions and ability to inspire others. Our listeners voted in a “Manager Madness” bracket on social media stories to rank which leaders they would want to work with the most. Over several months, Ren and Allison will be chatting about each of them one by one until we reveal the winner.

Listen to the Podcast

In this episode, Ren and Allison discuss entrepreneur and venture capitalist Bryan Johnson. Johnson is known for his unrelenting journey toward everlasting youth and anti-aging, and people wonder how his endeavors will impact humanity. Ren and Allison explore what this can teach us about the importance of perspective in leadership, and lead with that.

Learn More

Interview Transcript

Ren: 

Welcome back to CCL’s podcast, Lead With That, where we talk current events and pop culture to look at where leadership is happening and what’s happening with leadership.

[Siren sounds]. Not even old. The second time in a row, Allison, Manager Madness continues again where we, one by one, discuss public figures, real or fictional, randomly pitted against one another to see who comes out on top.

This time, Bryan Johnson and his search for eternal youth. I actually don’t know how much is known about this guy, but for some he’s a pioneering figure in the realm of longevity and biological enhancement. Frankly, I’ve been calling him “Bryan Johns” for many months before I realized that it’s Bryan Johnson, the founder and CEO of the company Blueprint and self-proclaimed rejuvenation athlete.

He’s gained a lot of attention recently for his pursuits of eternal youth. They’ve garnered a spectrum of reactions, from supporters hailing him as a visionary trailblazer, and detractors cautioning against the potential pitfalls of his ambitions.

Johnson, renowned for his groundbreaking research in cellular rejuvenation and anti-aging therapies, stands as a beacon of innovation in the quest for perpetual vitality. Most recently, not unlike a Bond villain … Is that a thing anymore? Do people know what Bond villains are? Anyway, Johnson has gone to a small island off the coast of Honduras to undergo a $20,000 gene therapy treatment to reverse aging, saying, “I’m traveling to a remote island for an extreme medical procedure that could change the future of humanity.” That’s my emphasis, but you get it.

Partnering with the biohacking firm Minicircle, Johnson will undergo a follistatin gene therapy. I’m pretty sure that’s how it’s pronounced. Don’t at me. And this treatment’s shown promising results in animal testing, even enabling a mouse in one study to live 30% longer than its peers after going through the therapy. As Johnson says, “I left my mother’s womb 45 years ago, and I’m biologically age hundreds of different numbers.”

So with a global audience captivated by his discoveries, Johnson has experienced both admiration and scrutiny. So, amid the optimism, ethical dilemmas and societal implications loom large. Johnson’s relentless pursuit of eternal youth raises profound questions about equity, access, and the potential ramifications of extending human lifespan. So come along, then, as we look at Bryan Johnson’s journey toward eternal youth, exploring the scientific frontiers he pushes and the moral boundaries he challenges.

Welcome back, everyone. I’m Ren Washington, and as usual, I’m joined with Allison Barr. Allison, what age would you want to be forever?

Allison:

What age would I want to be forever? Do I have a choice in this? I don’t know that I want to live forever.

Ren:

Well, you don’t have to … Yeah, okay, fine. So what age would you like to be until you die?

Allison:

Oh gosh, Ren, what age do I want to be until I die? Let’s see … 35 was pretty fun, but I’m also kind of happy where I am right now. I’m going to assume that, just because I’m that age doesn’t mean that things won’t change around me, and that, well, life won’t progress. Right?

Ren:

You’ll be like a Highlander. Yes. The things that you love will wither and die as you look 35 until your body ceases.

Allison:

That sounds awful, actually. What about you? What age do you want to be?

Ren:

I don’t really know. The reason I bring it up is because Bryan Johnson, he has 18, as one of his major markers of age or youth, and he’s always trying to recruit this biological age 18. But I don’t know if 18 would be my favorite. I feel like in my early twenties I was really vibing it, but maybe I think just … my handsomest, whatever age that is.

Allison:

Okay. Your handsomest, interesting. Say more about that. Why would you choose your handsomest?

Ren:

Oh, I mean, because I really don’t care. And I mean, living forever, like you said, sounds kind of weird, nor do I have a desperate desire to lower my age. But I mean, sure, aesthetically maybe, why not? Or I guess biologically, ooh, maybe as the handsomest my organs have ever been in their mature state.

Allison:

Yes, we are all aiming for handsome organs, Ren. Yes, life goals.

Ren:

I mean, and that’s why I think some of Bryan Johnson’s thing is interesting. Like he says, “I’m multiple biological ages,” and he kind of determines his age by organ age. And so different organs on his body are different ages. His one ear is 65 years old, but his other ear is in its 20s, and he really loves the fact that some of his organs are even younger than his 19-year-old son’s organs. And so, I don’t know, it’s kind of a wild thing once you dig into it.

Allison:

Yeah, it is. And we’ll get to it, probably. You’re making me think of what some people’s responses were when I posted to my own social media, when I knew we were going to record on Bryan Johnson, “Do you know who Bryan Johnson is? And tell me your thoughts.” And some of the comments were hilarious, and some of them were curious, and you’re leading me to one comment, which was, “that guy sounds like he has too much time and money on his hands.”

Ren:

Yeah. Well, some might say time and money well-earned. I mean, this guy does spend time and money on this, but maybe before we get into those details … pulling back a little bit, just from a high-level standpoint. From what you know about Bryan, from what you’ve researched, working for him now in his pursuit of eternal youth, what would you be excited about if you had to work for Bryan Johnson? What would you be worried about if he was your boss? 

Allison:

One of the things that I found … let me pause. Admittedly, I didn’t know who he was when we decided we were going to record an episode on him. So that is the first thing I want to confess. I didn’t have any idea who he was. So I went to his social media, I Googled him, did all the things. I read an interview with him in which, I think this was in Fortune magazine, they asked him, “What do you think about all the people who criticize you?” Because he does get some criticism. And what he said was, “I really like that they engage with me and they’re offering me perspectives that I didn’t have before. And I love it, and they speak up because they care.”

Whether or not he truly means that, I’m going to assume that he does. Having a boss who truly welcomes perspectives, I would really enjoy that. On the flip side, you asked what I might not enjoy. The environment that he’s in, the industry, rather, I would not want to reinforce the standards that he is reinforcing of that kind of company. So I would not want to work for that type of, I’m air quoting “company,” because what he does is up for debate. But you might categorize it under the wellness industry.

Ren:

Okay. I was going to ask, what do you think the company does? And so that’s an interesting idea. I don’t know if I would consider him just a prototypical capitalist. The man is incentivized by some of the biggest incentives now, which is money and beauty. And so I think probably he fashioned Blueprint, or his organization, the Blueprint Protocol, and I guess his … what did I call the business? What is it? Yeah, it’s also, the company is itself called Blueprint. I imagine he probably would fashion himself as like a scientific explorer akin to an astronaut, I bet Bryan would, if you really pressed him to it, based off of the things that I’ve heard him say.

But it’s interesting to think about the wellness. And maybe that, for me, goes into what I’d be worried about, is that … what I’d be worried about in working with this guy in pursuit of this, that I’d be perpetuating things that, I think, talk about the wrong stuff. Are we talking about eternal youth, so he can continue to cultivate wisdom for many more years, to then share it with the next generation so they don’t undergo our problems or mistakes? Or is he cultivating youth to have a 6-pack until he’s 80? It’s a worthy question. However, I would be excited to work with him to get cut in on the Blueprint Protocol for a discount. I got to imagine he’s got some stellar coupons.

Allison:

I would hope so. I mean, he spends, in theory, and he’s been interviewed and so he has said this, he spends about $2 million a year on his protocol. And so, to your point, he’s peddling eternal life. I mean, he has 4 principles of his, I would say his business, but really what his beliefs are, that we’ll get into in a minute, and one of them is to never die. Additionally, there’s an underlying message from him that if you want to be healthy or youthful, you need the money to do that. So if you are poor, or even middle class, you need not apply.

He apparently spends, like I said, $2 million per year. He takes 61 supplements a day. He fasts. He stops eating after 12:00. That kind of lifestyle … you do you, Bryan. You do you. That kind of lifestyle is not accessible to most people. And his approach and, I’m air quoting, the “research” that he does is based just on him as the test subject and only him. So I caution people, because there’s no real empirical evidence that his approach actually works for anyone else like it works for him.

Ren:

Yeah. I think you have to be an informed consumer to navigate these waters, but that’s just the reality in the American healthcare system and the wellness industry, like you said. There’s a lot of snake oil.

So he talks about sharing his stuff for free, and I think before I maybe start to poke holes in the idea, I will honor that. You, right now, could benefit from the $2 million a year that he spends in cultivating. And I think $2 million … like the paying for his doctors and all the people hours that go into the synthesis of data. But ultimately it comes out to the Blueprint Protocol, which you can find on the home page in his website, giving you a rundown of all his diet, the food that you can buy, the whatever, not assessments, but the extra materials that you can do and all of the extra supplements that you can buy to kind of do the Blueprint Protocol.

I was watching one documentary, I think it came up to maybe $1,500 a month for these 2 guys, though they couldn’t get some of it. Like, you can’t find fresh-squeezed pomegranate juice just everywhere. So I think there are some barriers to access, but some of the principles are natural raw foods, clean diet, no drugs, limited alcohol. I mean, he was drinking 4 ounces of wine but then stopped just because he couldn’t afford the calories. I think he’s logging under 2,000 calories a day. So some of this stuff, I’m kind of like, I mean you could access it principally, but maybe that’s more smoke and mirrors than real.

Allison:

And it’s just tricky. Like I said, this is based on who he is as a human being. It works for him. And again, Bryan, you do you. I think the wellness industry codes a lot of things and uses language that is nondescript. Like what is clean eating? I hear that a lot, right? Make sure you eat clean. Okay, tell me what that means. And if you’re going to say organic, for the sake, some people will say, oh, that means organic. Or some people will say, don’t eat processed foods. Okay. How realistic is that for people? And not only in the economy, the type of economy that we live in, but you could live in a food desert. You could have been born into a system where you have to work 4 jobs a day and … et cetera. We all have different life experiences.

We all have different health experiences, too. There are certain foods that might work for me, Ren, that don’t work for you, et cetera. So I just think it’s a little bit dangerous. It’s interesting, because I listened to him speak and I can see his draw. I can see the appeal. He’s welcoming, he’s kind, he’s thoughtful. He makes for a good public speaker. You want to listen to him. And I caution people because, again, what he is selling works for him.

Ren:

Yeah. And I think there’s a balance that I am really keen to continue to explore with you, because personal agency is a big thing for me. And I really believe that a lot of what ails many of us, but I’ll just talk for myself … A lot of what ails me is when I am feeling like I’m lacking my personal agency. And then often I feel resolute, or a little bit more grounded, when I’m able to maintain some personal agency. But then I think it brings up this question like, well, is agency real? You raise up some interesting questions, like what is clean eating? And I would simply say clean eating is no boxes, no wrappers, no bags. But then you raise an interesting question, well, how in the hell could you do that if you live in certain cities in America or you work 4 jobs?

Because no boxes, no bags, no wrappers means that everything’s produce, everything is fresh, everything needs to be cooked or eaten raw. And sometimes life does not afford that kind of reality. And so it is interesting, I think for Bryan Johnson … he says, this all comes down to free will, which is an irony I think, because he said some of the inspiration behind all this was he was learning how to fly, and he was in the flying plane and he turned the autopilot on and it was just super steady. And when he had the sticks in his hands, it was all wobbly and wavery, and he was like this human reaction. And he said, “Hey, how could I get myself out of the process?” And so it’s interesting, he would say, I believe in agency. And so I’ve cultivated this process so I could remove my human element from my own wellbeing. So there’s a lot of polarity images in this, I don’t know, maybe no problem, but a lot of truths.

Allison:

Yes. And where I go too, in what you just said is again, he makes for a very influential public speaker, and he’s good at it whether he’s trying to or not. He’s very measured in the way that he speaks. He never claims that this will work for everyone. I couldn’t find any evidence that he says this will work for you. He says that it might. And what you just said … gosh, I’m going to paraphrase, and please correct me. He said, taking the human element. What did he say? Taking the human element out of?

Ren:

Out of his wellbeing.

Allison:

Out of his wellbeing. What does that mean? That’s a concept that means nothing. If you say that in a public speaking, you’re trying to inspire people. “Oh, yeah.” I can see people getting jazzed by that. He has a cult-like following in LA, which does not surprise me. But okay, what does that mean?

Ren:

I think it means that if you follow his diet and you follow his plan, you, too, could have 18-year-old lungs now, like he does.

Allison:

Okay.

Ren:

I think that’s what he’s saying.

Allison:

But I think you get my point. I hope. To me he speaks in concepts that are fluffy, and they appeal to people, and they do. Whether or not he’s trying to, I don’t know, they’re preying on people’s insecurities. They’re preying on, like you said, a capitalist environment that makes a lot of money from people feeling bad about themselves. Aging is a natural thing. And personally, I just don’t want to mess with that, right? Aging is normal. We’re going to die. It creeps me a little bit. It makes me uneasy, to shoot for a target to never die. What does that … I don’t want that.

But you talked about agency. I went rogue there for a little bit. Let’s come back to that. Can you tell me what agency means? If there’s somebody who’s listening who’s never heard that word before, what does that mean?

Ren:

Making your own choices based out of your own desires.

Allison:

So, do you think that’s real?

Ren:

Well, and I think that’s an interesting question, because then you have to dig into what are your choices, and are they yours, and what are your desires, and are they yours? And it was interesting. You said that Bryan’s preying on people, and it made me think. Is he, or is he just the prey? Because Bryan doesn’t have anything … he’s rich, he’s wealthy. He’s wealthy enough to go to a secret island off of Honduras just to try something that did well in mice. He spends a lot of money, and I don’t think he’s trying to make more money. I think he might be a victim of the systems of reward that are in place: this idea of make money, make beauty, do those things or you’re not worthy.

And so then I go, okay, is agency real? And for Bryan, it’s all agency. So maybe he’s talking about the truth, that part of his human mechanisms he can’t control, so he removes them to then have no control, but all to meet the ends of the society he’s inside of. So probably, the deep philosophy of me says, no, agency is a fallacy. Free will is an illusion. Even the concept for some people isn’t even practically real. Like you said, in a food desert, I don’t have the free will to get fresh vegetables. That’s not even a choice. So the concept of, “well, take control of your health” is illegitimate. So, I’ll draw a line. No, agency is false. What do you think?

Allison:

Okay, fair. Well, I think if we simplify it to choice … and I know that’s not what you’re doing, but for the sake of the conversation, if we simplify it, do you have choice? Then there is a spectrum. Do I have a choice right now to quit my job? I don’t want to, by the way, just hypothetical. Do I have a choice to quit my job? Yes, I have a choice. Technically, of course I have a choice to do a lot of things. However, there are consequences to choices. And so the consequence to me quitting my job is very different than Bryan Johnson throwing away his business, or to the person who’s born in a food desert, for example. Very, very, very different.

And so, I think when we talk about agency, it’s important to talk about consequences. And that, to me, would be the difference. Now, you mentioned Bryan Johnson being a victim … I see where you’re coming from. And if he didn’t want to make money, if that was not his MO, then he wouldn’t have a business. Why does he have a business then?

Ren:

Well, I didn’t say he was a victim. I said he was prey.

Allison:

Tell me the difference.

Ren:

Well, I was thinking more in maybe … a predator and prey, there is no victim or victimizer. It’s a natural cycle. It is an environmental reaction. And so I don’t know if he’s … because I’m hardly here to say that this gorgeous, 18-lunged-aged individual is a victim of his own demise. I think he’s just prey to a system that … he has a job because he’s told to. He’s making money because his identity and his value are wrapped up in these concepts. He’s desperate to stay young and pretty forever because he likely has never … Well, I don’t know. I think that that is a manufactured, emblematic existence of our American Western culture: youth, beauty, and money. So, he’s not a victim; I think he’s just prey to the incentive and reward structure that we inhabit.

Allison:

Yes. Thank you for clarifying. And pardon me for misspeaking or misquoting you. What’s interesting is to me, though, in addition to what you said, is that his 4 principles are to not die, which is what you hear of most when you hear or look into what he’s doing. The second one is don’t kill each other. The third is don’t destroy the planet. And the last one is don’t underestimate aligning with AI, which I think is interesting.

And so what I’m curious about is his principle to not destroy the planet. And one might argue that as a billionaire, if that was truly his principle and mission, that he could be doing some things differently with the resources that he has to not destroy the planet. Maybe he is; maybe I hadn’t found that. I did Google to see what kind of sustainability he was contributing to. Couldn’t find much, couldn’t find anything. So if it’s out there, and I haven’t found it, my apologies, but I didn’t see anything that he’s doing that supports that principle.

Ren:

Well, I mean, he’s investing in the biggest sustainability project ever. Life. No, yeah. I don’t know. It is interesting. I mean, he reminds me … it’s like the Bruce Wayne / Batman thing. He’s this uber-wealthy billionaire, and instead of spending his money on just feeding, like, a few thousand children every day and trying to build their neighborhood up to not be in food deserts, to have access to the stuff he’s talking about. Instead of creating infrastructure like that, he’s in his bat cave trying to get younger.

So there is an irony; but again, I think I have perspective, and maybe our job gives us that, is that I look at that and I shrug my shoulders. The realist in me goes, I can’t be angry at a man for doing exactly what he’s been trained and conditioned to do. And then maybe that’s sort of what the problem is that we started with is, you were fearful for working for him, is that doesn’t this perpetuate the kind of conditioning where we value eternal youth projects over making our neighborhoods safer?

Allison:

Right. Yeah. I mean, so I’m in Colorado Springs, and what immediately comes to mind is that the unhoused population here has grown significantly, continues to grow. And so, by Bryan Johnson’s MO, am I to tell somebody who is unhoused and struggling, to drink olive oil and take 61 pills and whatever, get a blood transfusion, which he did. He transfused some of his blood with his 17-year-old son, which I have a whole lot of questions about regardless. It’s irresponsible, in a way. And he’s very … again, I’m saying this as a fact, not as a judgment. By the way, clarifying. I’m not angry with him. I’m not angry at all. But he posits that everything that he does is very individual in nature.

So again, factually speaking, it’s centered on self. And I don’t mean self-centered in a judgment way. I just mean very literally it’s centered on you as an individual, where a lot of obstacles that people face that cause them to decline in health are systemic. And so, it’s just not accessible to people. It’s just not. And so I do, again, I understand the draw. I understand why he has this cult-like following, because he’s found the secret. He has. And if you don’t investigate how he’s gotten there, it’s very appealing. It’s very, very appealing. And have you heard much about his mini-mini-feud with Elon Musk? 

Ren:

No, I don’t think I have.

Allison:

Well, Elon Musk was criticizing him. This is a few years old now, but I thought it was just interesting, an interesting juxtaposition of 2 billionaires in how they approach things. Elon Musk was criticizing him, and he was asked what his response was with regard to the criticism. And Bryan Johnson said, the difference between me and Elon Musk, I will nourish you and drink your blood while he will fire you and leave you to die. So I thought that was an interesting statement to make. What’s your thought to that?

Ren:

I feel like Bryan’s right on time with any idea of if he’s a monster or a vampire. Probably not the best line though. I feel like vampires aren’t as popular as they used to be. Drink your blood. And I do remember you mentioning that phrase to me before, and now I think my second pass at it, maybe he means that he cares about you enough to consume your essence for his betterment. Surely that’s what he means.

Allison:

Surely, surely.

Ren:

That’s weird. That’s weird.

Allison:

I care about you so much, Ren, I want to drink your blood.

Ren:

Yeah, I don’t want to judge anybody, but that seems like a strange comment. Yeah, I mean, I guess maybe it’s the many shades of truth, because he’s not wrong. We’ve talked about the issues at Tesla and how that’s a lot of inhumane treatment. What’s more humane, someone trying to solve aging or someone who is going to fire you by a robot boss?

But I think, too, you highlighted … yeah, there might be a truth that he’s trying to do something that might make a difference for some people, that might change humanity, like he says. But for whom? You’re right about it. I think about Colorado Springs, and I think … I was just driving underneath our highway, I-25, and under the underpass turning onto it. And like in many major cities or nearly major cities, it’s a place where those who don’t have much find space to gather with one another.

And I think, yeah, what would it look like for me to walk over there and say, “Here’s a month of the Blueprint for free. In order to maintain it, though, you’ve gotta cobble together $1,500 a month going forward.” Who is going to live forever? If you’re listening right now, it’s like, if you’re the owner of your organization, they seem to be the prime candidates to access the Blueprint Protocol. And I’m like, what does it look like if our bosses never died? What kind of future does that have?

Allison:

That’s fair? Yes, that’s fair. And I just also want to highlight, again, some of the things he does, not in criticism, but just in fact so that people can understand. The amount of wealth that this man has affords him a lot of different things. For example, he goes to bed at 8:00 pm. I think he aims to sleep 9 hours a day, I think. If I’m mistaken on that, I apologize. But he does aim to really have good sleep hygiene, which is also something that we talk about in a much different way with regard to wellness and caring for oneself, right?

Sleep is important. We can all agree on that, but who has that access? And Bryan Johnson specifically, for a period of time, spent 30 minutes a day sitting on top of an electromagnetic machine to strengthen his pelvic floor, because his need to use the bathroom at night was interfering with his sleep. So I am only saying that because, A, I don’t even know if that works. But, B, also, just for the sake of us understanding … this contraption, and I quote, “feels like 2 small hands repeatedly punching you in the sensitive region in quick succession, typically for women who were hoping to rebuild strength after birth … Johnson wanted to use it to strengthen his pelvic floor to prevent himself from urinating frequently.”

Ren:

Sounds like he has a 56-year-old prostate. It seems like it’s not working that well for him.

Allison:

I mean, maybe. But the point is, what Bryan Johnson is doing is likely not accessible to most of us. And he has play money to … this might be something that works, it might be something that doesn’t work, who knows. But most of us are just trying to get our work done in time to eat dinner; to say hello to maybe our roommate, family, neighbors, whatever, what have you; get some fresh air; and hopefully get 6 hours of sleep. While, I think, what is it? 75% to 80% of leaders right now wake up in the middle of the night due to rumination from stress because of their jobs. So it’s just a little, a lot, unrealistic.

Ren:

Yeah. Well that last comment around waking up in the middle of the night about your job might be a different podcast, around self-importance and managing that. I think if anyone thinks they’re self-important, it’s Bryan. Bryan thinks he’s really important for humanity. I think leaders think they’re often too important for an organization that I think, you often aptly say, will very quickly think of them objectively, which is to say, they are just another piece of the machine.

And so I guess, then, my reaction that I’m starting to dig up here is this idea of, aren’t we just products of our environment? Aren’t we just continually doing the things that we think we ought to? Bryan Johnson and his pelvic floor stimulator … I feel like we’re going to get flagged for adult content here, but it’s like an impulse buy. It’s like you said, he’s got play money. He’s at the end of the counter. He just went to his $20,000 gene therapy, and they’re like, “Oh, hey, we also got this nice little other thing that punches you in the genitals very softly for a few minutes.” I’m like, all right. This guy’s like, “Sure, sounds interesting. I’ve been peeing in the middle of the night and I got to stop that.”

It’s like, but how driven is this guy? And now we dig into it. How driven is this guy at all by his own choices? That’d be really interesting. You know what I haven’t heard about? His therapy team. Where are the psychologists and other people that are talking to him about … why do you want this? And to what end? Yeah.

Allison:

“To what end” is interesting, too. But if I could, can I ask you to clarify, and you said this might be another podcast, but I want to clarify because I may have misunderstood what you were saying about self-importance and rumination somehow being parallel.

Ren:

Well, I think part of what I might see in professionals when they ruminate, which is to say, thinking over and over again about something negatively that kind of perpetuates more stress, is … a colleague of ours, Pete Ronayne in our Burn Bright resilience stuff, awesome guy, brilliant dude … And he said this thing to me that stuck with me forever. He’s like, “I’m going to go on vacation, and I’m not talking to anybody, and I’m going to challenge the myth of my own indispensability.” I think we look around, and we walk around, and we treat ourselves like, well what if I’m not here, what would happen? I kind of shrug my shoulders. Like, the exact same thing that happened before you were here.

So I think sometimes leaders get too wrapped up in their own role in things, and that’s part of what they ruminate about. And I think personally, self-importance is a hot button for me. It’s something that in personal and interpersonal and professional relationships, I know I lose some emotional regulation. And so when I see that, or see players like Bryan Johnson talking about, “I’m going to go to this island. That’s going to change humanity.” It’s like Oppenheimer and Truman talking about who changed the world. And how many millions of people have to die to prove it. It’s interesting. That one might be a bridge too far, but anyway.

Allison:

I bring that up, and I understand what you’re saying now. And I want to clarify for our listeners, too, that rumination does not always mean self-importance.

Ren:

No. Yeah, absolutely.

Allison:

And I’m only saying that because there are very severe mental health illnesses that cause rumination. Some of them not severe. Some people have OCD. Right? You can’t control your thoughts. I’m only saying that because I don’t want anyone to hear that if you can’t sleep at night and you ruminate, it means you’re self-important, which I know is not what you’re saying, Ren, but I don’t want you to be a soundbite. I know that’s not what you’re saying. Okay. But anyhow, I digress on that. Thanks for clarifying. And I want to come back to what you said too about earlier Bryan Johnson going to Honduras, was that right, for his —

Ren:

Yeah, it’s a small island off the coast.

Allison:

Whatever. I know where it is. Thank you.

Ren:

No, not Honduras. The island that he’s going to.

Allison:

Oh, okay. Thank you. So I read a little bit about that this morning. I think the first time we talked about Bryan Johnson, I don’t know if this is a new story. I don’t know, but I just became privy to that too. And what I thought was interesting too, again, perspective taking, right? This is a very important leadership skill, is the [ability] to look at all sides of things and take different perspectives, because people on this island are being displaced, and people on this island are calling it a billionaire’s playground, and resources are being taken. So again, you just had a quote that made me think of that, right? Because it’s to what cost?

The way that Bryan Johnson speaks, it seems genuine, and it does seem like he believes that he’s doing the right thing. It seems that way. However … consequences, right? There are consequences to your choices. And are you focused on you as an individual? Are you at all focused on the collective? Are you at all focused on humanity? Because there are costs to being so individualistic in nature, and one of them is the resources that he and, I suppose, other billionaires are taking from this island.

Ren:

Yeah. Well, it makes me want to dig in more into the organization that works there, and Lord knows why it’s just off the coast of some country like that, because of maybe regulations. But Minicircle, it does feel strange, about this group of oligarchs trying to find how to extend their existence. But some of what you made me think there is … so we talk about, is agency real? And we’ve talked about this before too. Is altruism real? Or does it matter if altruism is real? Does someone have to do something for altruistic means to then make a positive impact on the world?

And I guess I could see, in the potential or in the polarity of it all, that a synthesis of certain vitamins, minerals, diet that could indeed strengthen your eyes, your heart, your lungs, your liver. These are important human questions, especially in an American system where our diet is trying to kill us every day. That maybe if someone looked at that and said, I can’t do it all, but I could do that mushroom quinoa dish he does every day, that’s not impossible. And I always say, what if we make one impact on one person’s life, then we’re doing our job. And what if he changes one person’s life? Then would it be worth it? I don’t know.

Allison:

I don’t know either. Right? And I went down a rabbit hole too, which I’ll try not to take us down. But doing well, doing good for others, is also subjective. Bryan Johnson’s ideas started from a mission trip in which he was so inspired to revive humanity and save humanity, and his intentions sound lovely. And there’s criticism too. I want to be careful because this is not, I am not saying this, I am saying there’s wide criticism from some around mission trips as well, doing the opposite of what they intend to do. So it’s tricky. It’s just tricky. How do you navigate that? I don’t have the answer, but what I think is doing well, doing good might be different from you, Ren.

Ren:

Yeah, undoubtedly. And there might be moments where it happens to align perfectly, and then there might be moments where it doesn’t, and then all of a sudden we’re looking at each other baffled, like, I thought we were aligned utterly. Our values were so perfectly synced right there. And wasn’t it interesting, I think, I don’t know, how do you ground this conversation back into your lived experience, listener, whether you’re eating or pursuing your own eternal youth, or whether you’re just trying to work with someone who might be really self-important. But that’s an interesting question, Allison, around maybe just … and again, it’s like it’s a major theme for me, just investigating the righteousness of our own perspectives, but then also being willing to seek others so we can add to our perspective. 

Allison:

Yeah, it’s a tricky balance, polarity, whatever you’d like to call it. And I think if I could ground us in something tangible that leaders might take, it is around that perspective taking. I was struck by Bryan Johnson’s comment around, “I welcome these comments. It means that people care.” And I think he’s onto something there. Now I’m not talking about those folks who name-call and bully. That’s not what I’m talking about, especially on the interwebs. However, at the workplace, especially if you are a leader, stepping back and asking for feedback and taking perspective, and even for those of you who might have employees that tend to complain, there’s usually a request or something that’s cared about within that complaint.

And so I think it might be worth investigating, for you as a leader, to ask your teams, ask those who you manage, what’s not being said that we should talk about? Or what am I not considering here with this? What perspective do you have? Especially when we are in an environment right now where things are changing quickly and so fast that we often don’t even realize it. With AI, with supply chain, with global shakeups and global obstacles that are impacting our business, it is very important to be able to step back and take a perspective.

What might you leave our listeners with today, Ren?

Ren:

Well, it’s interesting. The pursuit of perspective … because it wraps me around, again, the agency conversation that we had. And one thing I didn’t say yet, and just a couple small quotes that really got my head spinning around in this documentary was, in summation, this guy and his editor went through the Blueprint Protocol for a month. They lost some weight, they got healthier. They were like, I could do some of this, though I couldn’t do all of it. But the reflection was like, what does it look like? What does the world look like when we make the best choices? What does it mean for our health or happiness when we’re no longer making decisions out of desperation or an impulse? Now even the richest man in the world, trying to be young, bought an impulse pelvic floor machine. I mean, maybe not impulse, but he seems pretty impulsive when you talk about it. He just goes to the next thing, like this could work, this could work.

I don’t know if any of us are free of desperation or impulse. And so maybe, if it’s not too esoteric for you, as you start to collect or try to keep perspective, try to log your feelings of desperation, try to log your feelings of impulse. Recognize and maybe put a little space between you and the lizard brain. Because I think so much of our reactions are … And, like rumination, it’s this flight-or-fight, it’s this animal response. I think that’s really what Bryan’s doing. It’s a long-term, animalistic reaction. “I don’t want to die. I want to stay together. I want to stay alive forever.” And so he’s like a fear-based animal almost, despite his calm response. And so even if you’re doing something perfect for yourself, maybe just log this idea of desperation, or impulse, or even frustration — if you can hear people walking around above me, I’m in my new studio, so. Just, you know, log what you’re feeling, and then move forward.

Allison:

Yes, and I’ll leave you with one comment that came from my social media, that I also think is a translation to leadership. Somebody commented when I asked, “Do you know who he is? What are your thoughts?” Someone commented, “I really like that he’s transparent about what he does, especially to his face and body. At least he is honest. So many people are not, and it makes the rest of us feel like we’re doing something wrong by not looking the way that he looks.” So transparency. Again, we’re talking about somebody who’s changing the way that he looks, which is different from leadership for the most part, but transparency and honesty will go a long way with those folks that you manage, I would presume.

So I think, Ren, this was an interesting conversation, and Bryan Johnson continues to evolve, and who knows what he might be up to next, what country he might be going to? I suppose we can maybe come back to him in a year and see what’s happening.

In the meantime, to our listeners, thanks for tuning in. Let us know what you think. What are your thoughts on Bryan Johnson? What do you think about his 4 principles? You can find us on LinkedIn. Let us know your thoughts. Let us know what you want us to talk about next. And a big thank you to our CCL team who works behind the scenes to get our podcasts up and running. One more thing to our listeners, you can find all of our episodes and show notes on ccl.org, and we will look forward to tuning in the next time. Thanks everyone.

Ren:

Thanks Allison. Thanks everybody. See you next time. Find Allison eternally young on TikTok.

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The post Lead With That: Bryan Johnson and the Role of Perspective in Leadership appeared first on CCL.

When most of us think about the effects of our eating and lifestyle habits, we consider how certain foods help us slim down or bulk up, make us hungry for more, or leave us satisfied. But have you thought about foods and habits that fuel your brain and boost its health?

The brain is a blood-, glucose-, and oxygen-hungry organ. It requires 15% of our total cardiac output, 20% of our total oxygen consumption, and 25% of our total glucose use. The circulatory system is essential to maintaining good brain function. Factors that improve blood supply help the brain; conversely, factors that impair blood flow hurt the brain.

The brain is also a fatty organ, meaning it’s susceptible to the ravages of oxidative stress and inflammation. Food, sleep, and stress all play a role in helping or hurting the reduction of oxidative stress and inflammation. Your brain health is also linked to your overall health. And good health and leadership are connected, too, as health is key for effective leadership.

So what can you start doing now to improve how you fuel your brain to improve its function?

How to Use Food to Fuel Your Brain

Eat More Unprocessed Foods & Plant Foods

All plants, including fruits, vegetables, nuts, beans, and spices, make chemical compounds that enhance a plant’s ability to survive. When we consume plants, these compounds aid in combating oxidative stress and inflammation.

Some of the plant foods studied most for their positive effect on brain health include:

• Blueberries
• Strawberries
• Grapes
• Blackberries
• Walnuts
• Green leafy vegetables
• Green tea
• Turmeric
• Saffron

All of these have been shown to have beneficial effects, such as improving working memory, staving off or reversing cognitive decline, increasing neurogenesis, and boosting the ability to manage complex learning tasks.

Plants are also rich in antioxidants, which help to delay or prevent certain types of damage to cells. Studies have shown that antioxidants may help to counteract free radicals and delay and reverse some of the symptoms of aging, such as memory loss.

Antioxidant-rich foods include:

• Dark leafy greens
• Berries
• Spices & herbs
• Beans

Fiber has also been shown to be helpful for brain function by helping to regulate blood glucose levels. One study found the presence of fiber in the diet is associated with higher alertness ratings and less perceived stress.

Foods high in fiber include:

• Beans and legumes
• Cooked whole grains
• Fruits and vegetables, such as apples, berries, broccoli, and kale

As we share in the “Fit to Lead” portion of our our Leadership at the Peak training for C-suite leaders, eating more unprocessed, antioxidant-rich, and high-fiber foods will fuel your brain and ultimately make you healthier and more effective.

Eat Fewer Processed Foods & Animal Products

Similarly, the closer we can get to eating foods in their natural form, the better. Many foods today are marketed as “healthy,” but can actually be highly processed and not ideal for us to consume.

When at the grocery, try to shop along the perimeters of the store where most of the unprocessed foods are kept; the inner aisles should be shopped sparingly. When buying packaged foods, look at the ingredient list to see how many ingredients the item has and make the best choice with your diet with nutrition in mind. It’s a good rule of thumb to fill your plate with as many fruits and vegetables as possible. These foods are nutrient-dense, fill you up, and will fuel your body to perform at its best.

Fresh fruits and veggies are great, but don’t be afraid of frozen produce! It’s often harvested and frozen at the peak of ripeness to maintain nutrients. They’re convenient to keep on hand and can provide the base for quick and healthy meals.

When you eat well, you feel better, and that can have a tremendous ripple effect into other areas of your life — including work and relationships. As you begin to replace processed, less healthy foods with wholesome, nutrient-dense choices, you’ll be amazed at how your mental clarity and overall outlook will improve, which are key for holistic leadership.

Other Things That Fuel the Brain

3 Additional Research-Based Recommendations

While healthy eating is a key aspect of helping our brains function at their highest capacity, it’s important to remember that there are other ways you can make time for wellness to increase your leadership potential. A lack of exercise or sleep, or too much stress, can all contribute to worsened cognitive performance in the short term and to weaker brain health and less effective leadership in the long term.

The same factors that increase our risk for heart attacks — elevated cholesterol, diabetes, high blood pressure, obesity — have also been shown to increase our risk for dementia, mild cognitive impairment, and Alzheimer’s disease.

If you focus on improving your habits in these additional areas, you can better fuel your brain health, become a more resilient leader, and in turn boost your leadership effectiveness.

1. Exercise.

In our research, we asked more than 1,500 senior leaders if they think exercise affects how they perform. About 88% of leaders said exercise “clearly impacts” their performance, and 12% said it had “some” impact. Nobody said it had zero impact.

When asked how exercise impacts performance, respondents said it improved energy and helped with stress. Many of the responses also had to do with brain performance — clearer thinking, improved problem-solving and focus, increased alertness during the day, improved mental clarity and creativity, and better mental health were among the benefits cited.

People also said that exercise improved their mood, outlook, attitude, self-confidence, and sense of wellbeing.

You don’t have to aggressively train to see cognitive benefits from exercise — even walking a few times a week can make a difference. That’s why we say a leader’s best bet is exercise. But sessions of more than 30 minutes seem to have the most positive impact. And if you struggle to find time for exercise, remember that any activity that you enjoy that also gets your body moving is a win-win!

2. Manage stress.

What gets our brains into trouble is prolonged stress that’s measured in days, weeks, and months, rather than minutes. Stress and burnout stem from rumination, the tendency to let your mind churn over and over around emotional upsets.

Stress and its hormonal byproducts profoundly affect the brain. Protracted elevations of cortisol — which is released by your adrenals as a stress response — are detrimental to good brain function.

Probably the biggest moderators of distress are control and predictability. As control goes up, perceived distress goes down — and so does cortisol. The reverse is true: as your perceived level of control goes down, the distress and cortisol go up.

For leaders dealing with uncertainty and anxiety, coping strategies like mindfulness, relaxation, reframing problems and shifting toward more positive self-talk, and clarifying areas of control are even more important. It also helps to breathe correctly. You may have heard well-intentioned suggestions to “just breathe” when facing stress. But actually, you shouldn’t “take a deep breath” when you’re stressed, as in reality, your exhale matters much more than your inhale in managing stress.

3. Sleep.

Like exercise, sleep can make you a stronger leader for sure. Sleep is critical for good health, mental sharpness, and consistent energy. We can last longer and function better on no food than on no sleep.

Exactly how much sleep you need varies from person to person, but you’ve probably heard that the sweet spot seems to be in the 7–8 hour range. Only about 10% of the population can function optimally on less than 7 hours.

Getting a solid night’s sleep can certainly be an ongoing challenge with work, travel, and family demands. It can often come down to a trade-off between extra sleep and other healthy habits, but guard your sleep time as much as possible, because being tired at work is a roadblock to effective leadership.

Fuel Your Brain for Better Leadership

Start improving your brain function today by shifting your diet to be more plant-forward, while prioritizing other healthy lifestyle changes, and you’ll soon find yourself showing up as your best self, delivering at peak performance, and living with greater intention both at work and at home. You can start today by considering these questions:

• Why is fueling my brain and boosting brain health important to me?
• What can I do in the next 24 hours that will support fueling my brain?
• What routines do I need to create to be successful, as a leader and as a person?

And remember, even small adjustments to your food intake and daily routines can help you boost your brain in ways that will pay off in all areas of your life. It’s all part of promoting wellbeing for yourself and others.

Ready to Take the Next Step?

Healthy foods and habits can fuel your brain and lead to more effective leadership, as we share in the “Fit to Lead” portion of our leadership training programs. Give your organization’s executives highly personalized and holistic leader development with our Leadership at the Peak training for C-suite leaders.

The post Foods & Habits That Fuel Your Brain Health appeared first on CCL.

Janice Marturano lived a high-energy, high-pressure life as a vice president and deputy general counsel at General Mills. Looking to restore her personal equilibrium during a rocky time, she discovered mindfulness meditation.

To her surprise, mindfulness and leadership quickly became intertwined.

Within weeks of beginning a morning meditation practice, Marturano became more aware of how she acted and reacted at work. She used mindfulness practices to become more focused in her conversations and decisions. Her days became more productive and priorities were met. Mindful leadership was making a positive difference in the quality of her work.

The Importance of Mindful Leadership

Now more than ever, being engaged in mindful leadership matters — not in some weird new-age way, but in a “this could make you more effective” way.

So often, we believe we can get more done if we switch to autopilot and get through the day in a distracted, but somewhat scripted, routine. Sound familiar?

It’s not that such scripts are bad, but an unchallenged overreliance on them can be. Why? Because opportunities are missed and mistakes happen when we’re disengaged from our lives. It can be dangerous to get too comfortable and stop paying attention, letting your mind drift from the present moment to worry about the present or future. As we note in our research paper, waking up to the present moment is critical stopping rumination, stress and burnout and building resilience.

It feels counterintuitive, but slowing down can help you speed up because it can help you see what’s really happening, rather than working from assumptions that may or may not be true. Mindful leadership helps you live with intention, both at work and at home, strengthening your ability to connect to yourself and others, as well as your ability to lead change effectively.

More Effective Leadership Through Mindfulness

When Marturano first started to meditate, it wasn’t a part of her work life. “It was separate,” she says. “I meditated, and I worked.”

Soon, however, she realized that if she incorporated mindful leadership into her day, it would affect the way she was working with her team. “I looked more clearly at how I was spending my day — much of it was spent on the loudest voice, not on what was most important. I was able to let go of things, which allowed my team to have greater responsibility. I had a new ability to hold ambiguity.”

“Before this, I would have many days when I looked at my watch at 6:30 and thought, ‘I don’t know where the day went. I’ve been busy all day, but I’m not sure I could tell you what I got done today.’”

One day, Marturano looked at her watch and realized she hadn’t had one of those days in a very long time. “I became even more curious about this connection between training the mind and cultivating leadership excellence and thought, if more people knew about this, it would help them, the business, and maybe the community.”

Marturano shared her experience with colleagues at General Mills and eventually helped create the company’s Mindful Leadership training. Today, mindful leadership is a way of life at the company. We also teach mindful leadership and other resilience practices at CCL in our leadership programs.

4 Fundamental Skills of Mindful Leadership

According to Marturano, mindful leadership requires the following 4 fundamental skills:

• Focus allows us to sustain our attention as we solve problems. During mindfulness training, participants learn to focus their attention on something specific, such as their breath — and then notice when their attention has wandered and redirect it. Deep breathing, focusing on the exhale, is especially important in times of stress.
• Clarity helps us to see what is — not what we expect to see or what we hope will be. As we practice mindful leadership, we see our own conditioning, biases, and filters. This is a critical part of building self-awareness and leading more authentically.
• Creativity requires spaciousness. When we’re in the midst of busyness and to-do lists, our ability to have space for creativity is limited. Mindfulness creates that needed space for creativity and innovation.
• Compassion helps us to make choices with the understanding that we are all in this together. Compassionate leadership is about showing empathy and a deep understanding of what is, including things that are complex and difficult and cause suffering, in our lives and in our communities.

As you start to make changes towards more mindful leadership, people begin to see there’s something different about your reactivity, your ability to let go, and your courage to say what’s important.

As a mindful leader, you’re more present to being the best you can be, you’re more courageous and intentional, listening to understand to what’s called for now. The ripple effect of mindfulness in leadership can be much greater and more powerful than you might imagine.

Ready to Take the Next Step?

Help your people incorporate mindful leadership practices into their daily routines, creating conditions for peak performance with our resilience-building solutions, so they can avoid burnout — and burn bright instead. 

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