“But what do I do during this crisis for my business?  I can’t take a vacation now!”

I was speaking with a group of business leaders about taking vacations and sabbaticals away from your regular work.  It’s healthy to both disconnect and explore life in other ways.  There are times and seasons when this is more difficult.

Very senior leaders in times of crisis don’t get to take a 2 week vacation to “unplug.”  Yet they have to craft practices which give them endurance.  Let’s look at some historical figures for ideas

Winston Churchill kept us his daily patterns throughout the war with Germany.  He had an eccentric love of afternoon baths, disappeared from his office to talk with citizens on walks during the London bombings (much to the dismay of people trying to keep him safe), took a nap almost every afternoon (he would work late into the night after dinner), took random afternoons away from his war office to travel back to his home (Chequers) to paint and lay bricks and putter with manuscripts.  But there were only a couple of days in the entire war that he, as Prime Minister, did not work on official correspondence, reading reports, phoning international and domestic leaders, etc.  He only missed a few of the weekly face-to-face updates with King George while he was traveling away from London.  Overall he was incredibly productive in his work life.  He had a long-established rhythm of breaks and hobbies during the afternoon and evening which gave him space to be productive.

Churchill and Franklin Roosevelt famously spent a couple of days at Marrakesh (in Morocco) after a conference there planning the invasion of Italy.  Even then they both kept up with wartime correspondence.  When Churchill spent 3 weeks at the White House over Christmas they set up a British war room so he could continue to oversee the global effort. 

The US Presidents in my lifetime routinely get away from the White House for a rhythm break (Camp David is set up for this), but they get a daily briefing and keep up with phone calls and diplomatic visits.  Multiple presidents took exercise breaks; Harry Truman power-walked around D.C., Teddy Roosevelt boxed with sparing partners, Ford and Obama golfed. 

There’s a similar pattern with religious and movement leaders: Augustine of Hippo, Martin Luther, John Calvin,  John Wesley, Mahatma Gandhi, Martin Luther King, Jr., and Lech Walesa were all somewhat like Churchill – they developed ways to shift up the rhythm of what they did in a day and a week, which gave them great sustaining endurance.  All were prolific and spent a great deal of time with people.

There are also these kinds of stories about even the most fanatical of successful CEOs.  They used their time well and paid attention to their energy levels.

Here’s the key:  Build daily and weekly habits which give you endurance.  Experiment. Discover what works for you.  Do this now, and you’re far more likely to be successful as your range of responsibilities increase.

Finally, one absolute recommendation: Take one day in seven to be completely disconnected from your work.  You will find this ancient wisdom a blessing. 

A truly skilled leader exudes a kind of calm in the swirl and uncertainty which influences everyone around.  

An acquaintance told me about a business conference he attended a few years ago. The audience had gathered in one of those big hotel ballrooms. The crowd noisily bantered while waiting for the session to begin.

A Buddhist monk entered the room and sat down on a stool at the front.  He said nothing.  He was motionless. He was a picture of calm alertness.

After a few moments a calm spread through the room.  The monk remained silent for 10 full minutes.  

No one spoke. My acquaintance said you could have heard a pin drop.

The entire room was electric with anticipation by the end of the ten minutes. Every ear was listening, attuned. “I can remember thinking I should make my breathing very quiet,” he told me. Everyone was primed to hear what the monk would say.

There is power in silence. Power in the state of calm.

A related story that Peter Drucker shares in his introduction to “The Effective Executive”:

“Alred Sloan headed General Motors from the 1920’s until the 1950’s.  He spent most of six working days a week in meetings — three days a week in formal committee meetings with a set membership, the other three days in ad hoc meetings with individual GM executives or with a small group of executives.  At the beginning of a formal meeting, Sloan announced the meetings’s purpose.  He then listened.  He never took notes and he rarely spoke except to clarify a confusing point.  At the end he summed up, thanked the participants, and left.  Then he immediately wrote a short memo addressed to one attendee of the meeting.  In that note, he summarized the discussion and its conclusion and spelled out any work assignment decided upon in the meeting (including a decision to hold another meeting on the subject or to study an issue).  He specified the deadline and the executive who was to be accountable for the assignment. He sent a copy of the memo to everyone who’d been present at the meeting. It was through these memos — each a small masterpiece — that Sloan made himself into an outstandingly effective executive.”

It’s not hard to imagine Sloan’s calm, nearly silent demeanor in these meetings having a profound influence on the seriousness and depth of the discussion. 

I’ve often coached leaders that they have positional authority, but it should be the last tool to come out of their toolbox.  Use all your tools of relationship, engagement, and persuasion before you get down to “I’m the boss, do X.”

There’s a related skill leaders should cultivate: in a conflict situation, allow the “loser” options to save face. 

Sun Tzu advised military commanders to always allow the enemy an option to retreat, unless you needed to utterly destroy them.  An enemy force with no retreat option will fight more ferociously because they have nothing to lose. 

Teddy Roosevelt developed the big stick diplomacy model after his famous statement, “Speak softly and carry a big stick.”  The model had 5 parts:

1. Possess superior military capability
2. Act justly towards all nations
3. Never bluff
4. Strike only when prepared to strike hard
5. Allow a defeated enemy to save face

Your organization is not about warfighting or geopolitics, but there is still a lesson for intra-organization conflict:  the best leaders allow the “defeated” party to save face. 

I’ve written about John Boyd’s OODA loop before (Observe, Orient, Decide, Act) as a successful strategy for rapidly adjusting in ambiguous situations.  

This is Boyd’s preferred diagram, which is more complicated than what is usually shown for OODA:

Brett and Kate McKay published an excellent article about the physics, thermodynamics, psychology, and philosophy underlying OODA.  I recommend it for your reading pile.  

OODA works well because of its strong foundations.  Principles, bedrock stuff.  Therefore OODA is fractal and broadly applicable.

These are excellent times to become good at OODA!

We all need to operate successfully in two circles:

Circle of influence – the set of things which we can directly affect through our decisions and actions

Circle of concern – a large set of things which affect us, our organizations, and everyone we care about

This is my mental picture:

Your Circle of Concern is large and has a dotted-line edge because expands with no conscious effort on your part.  Your Circle of Influence has a finite range, though you can expand it through hard work. 

When stressors come, when you find yourself fretting over possibilities, ask yourself “Is this in my circle of influence, or circle of concern?” 

Our collective experiences demonstrate two mistakes to avoid:

1. Ignoring the Circle of Concern altogether.  We must pay attention to evolving situations and possible scenarios, to anticipate and avoid problems where possible.
2. Fretting so much about things in the circle of concern that you fail to execute within your Circle of Influence.

I strongly recommend you consciously structure time and discipline your mind to spend 80% of your energy in your Circle of Influence.  Execute well.  Work to expand your influence. 

Also, teach this concept to people in your Circle of Influence!  It will be a blessing to them. 

There are many factors going into why a person is selected for a different role in the same organization, including promotions.  Not all of these are under your control.   It’s tempting but unhelpful to craft a narrative that makes someone else the villain.   

Instead, I encourage you to consider the common characteristics of people who most often are given new and better assignments: 

• High Energy, High Output
• Owner Mindset – takes responsibility for projects and results
• Superior project execution (both small and large)
• Versatile toolbox to generate solutions
• Frame events positively; find path forward around obstacles
• Embraces change and models behavior changes
• Uses feedback to improve performance
• Proactive, frequent and skilled communication about work underway
• Impress people with meeting prep and follow-through
• Broad skill base with specific depth of skill/experience (T-shape)
• Expanding personal networks;  referrals come easily when the question of “Who can ______?” surfaces
• Make the boss and team stronger

You can shape these.  You can consciously work at these each week.  Paint the portrait of what you want to be, then do the necessary work to move in that direction.

Professionals do not assume other people understand the value they bring; they articulate it.  

For example, professionals often serve as linchpins in key conversations, broker alliances of shared values, and work out problems in advance of critical meetings.  It’s a mistake to say, “I coordinated that.”  Instead, describe the result of your coordination effort.  Supporting logistics is honorable and necessary, but you’re executing more than what an entry level admin assistant can do, right?

This might be something like:

• Eliminated all but 2 possibilities for a decision-making meeting to keep them focused on selecting the best outcome
• Tailored the agenda and provided written updates in advance so the quarterly review required 1 hour instead of 3 hours
• Secured verbal commitment for a new contract by introducing 2 people to our VP of Sales
• Suggested a contributor help draft a white paper about a step-change improvement to our manufacturing process
• Provided concise statement of the problem and obtained stakeholder’s approval in advance

Don’t assume people, especially your busy boss, automatically grasps the significance of what you delivered. 

(I served under a VP for several years who forbade anyone from using the word “coordinate” in a goal or a job description.  At first I found this quite irritating, but I did profit from the push for clearer thinking about the value delivered.)

We build playbooks around pre-wiring and designing meetings, and have guidance for how to run a meeting. Professionals know is another whole level of play beyond the mechanics.

Listen for what’s not being said. To the extent you can, sense the body language – who looks comfortable, who doesn’t? Who is exerting dominance, and who submits (it’s not always about positional power)? Is there a rhythm and flow to the energy over the couple of hours? Were you in the hotseat, how would you handle that tough question? What might have happened that didn’t happen?

This may sound woo-woo, but leaders with great potential (that’s you) study the “meta” aspects of meetings. Naïve people believe that a meeting is just a meeting; it’s actually a focal point in a complex thread of human interactions.

You’ve heard the story: “Cortez burned his ships at the shore and told his men, “The only way home is by conquering the Aztecs!  No other option!” to motivate them.

Didn’t happen.

Cortez arrived in Mexico with 12 ships.  He ran 9 ships into the sand – which meant they couldn’t be used against him.  He kept 3 for the return journey, but pressed all the sailors into his invasion force.  He also kept a master shipbuilder on his invasion team.  One reason he ran ships aground was to prevent any of his crew from heading back to Cuba to report to the Spanish authorities that he had launched an unauthorized expedition against Mexico; Cortez had only been authorized for trading, not a military expedition.  (Source: John Coatsworth, director of Harvard’s Center for Latin American studies)

Even had he burned the ships, it would have been crappy leadership.  

Leaders need to take calculated risks, and have backup plans.   A mentor of mine describes a portfolio of business work like this: “One long-shot and three fish in a barrel.”  Don’t bet everything on a single long-shot.  Getting the fish in the barrel is still work, but high probability, and will cover your costs and carry you forward.  Fish-in-the-barrel work can also give you insights and experience that helps you achieve a long-shot.

The long-shot is a desirable objective that is higher risk but much higher payoff.  The most challenging risks are time-oriented; this is why startups are so concerned about cash burn rate – can they make it to a point where they’re bringing in revenue?  Often a long-shot is an exercise in overcoming limiting fears. 

A final comment about the value of long-shot work:  Life is too short to settle for only fish-in-the-barrel work.  You’re made for great things.

We build playbooks around pre-wiring and designing meetings, and have guidance for how to run a meeting.  Professionals know there is another whole level of play beyond the mechanics.

Observe the whole.  Listen for what’s not being said.  To the extent you can, sense the body language – who looks comfortable, who doesn’t?  Who is exerting dominance, and who submits (it’s not always about positional power)? Is there a rhythm and flow to the energy over the couple of hours?  Were you in the hotseat, how would you handle that tough question?  What might have happened that didn’t happen?

This may sound woo-woo, but leaders with great potential (that’s you 😊) study the “meta” aspects of meetings.  Naïve people believe that a meeting is just a meeting; it’s actually a focal point in a complex thread of human interactions.