YOU MATTER, YOU MATTER, YOU MATTER!

It's darn hard to keep any perspective at all in your role as CEO.
That's why I write this.  To remind you of blind spots  that your role makes hard to see.

I you are like CEO's I work with your tendency is to see your role as either too important or not important enough.
When you tend to too important, your habit is to carry it all alone, over prepare for all meetings, don't delegate big chunks of strategic work, micro-manage people who, in realty, could give you a run for your money.  When you lean away from being important you under use the authority of your role to guide the company, you don't use your power to inspire and demand high performance, you negate the symbolic importance of your actions.  

It's hard to get perspective just right in the CEO role.
A young CEO (42) of Double Cross Vodka, intimate friend and business partner of our son, was killed in a car accident three days ago.
Through deep sorrow and heartbreak the people in the company want to know
what happens next and they want to know right away.  The CEO presence and imprint provides such security, such grounding for action that there is paralysis without that top leader in place.  

Good or bad in the role.  Too important or not important enough.  You matter to the lives of everyone who works for you.  It sounds old fashioned but you have their lives in your hands. Know it.  You matter. Learn. Improve.  
Take very good care of yourself. You matter.  To others.  That's the needed perspective.  To others.

I AM SO TIRED TODAY--JUST PLAIN EXHAUSTED.

Say that sentence out loud three times.  "I'm so tired today, just plain exhausted!"

If you can't say it or bear to read it then probably you are---tired, just plain exhausted.

It's your job to be optimistic and tireless.  And your role is one of the most demanding and impossible in today's world.  I won't count the ways.  You know them.

So I would bet money that you are beyond fatigued and won't let yourself see it.  Chronic fatigue has become the default position that you live and work from.

I once interviewed  a group of top food retailing executives about their role.
After we finished the conversation, I reacted by saying, "You must be tired all of the time."  You know you have hit a taboo when there is a bodily reaction in a group all at the same time.  It was like I had set off an electric current.  One flinched.  One pushed back from the table.  One stood up spontaneously. You know the famous dead elephant in the middle of the room that everyone pretends isn't there?  Well I had seen it and named it.  Outrage and attack followed.

Exhaustion means less capacity for work, less motivation, reduced efficiency and accomplishment.  It also means lousy judgment.  Poor decision making--too fast or too slow.  There can be a sensation of boredom.  The formal definition is when "energy expenditure outstrips restorative processes".

One of the lousiest places to find yourself is under high, high demand combined with boredom and exhaustion.  And worse, not being able to admit it.
This is the penultimate blind spot of a top leader.  You have too many people depending on you to not care for yourself well.  Will power is not enough and I know you have plenty.  Get some body power to go along with it.

YES OR NO---YOU ARE CONSTANTLY CHOOSING ONE OR THE OTHER

I just said a big "yes" to myself and sat on my balcony in Mexico and read the March issue of Fast Company---the "world's most innovative companies" issue.

I allowed myself to dig in, no scanning.  Still I got up to do little tasks to tone down my excitement, my energy.  And then got mad at myself for doing it. There is such a temptation to run from the energy of YES.  NO is so much more comfortable and controlling.  AND this issue is all about YES.  Every person and company in it is saying YES.

YES creates energy and action and results------if you don't let NO tamp down all that excitement.  

YES to:
--Deciding to just start doing something/anything to solve a problem
--To the possibility of something new working---eventually
--Big important social goals and solutions
--Imagination, seeing that glimpse of different
--Steadfast determination to back-up the dream
--Strength of conviction
--A world view
--Caring about being green, gender aware, culturally hip and enjoying it
--The the pleasure, the amusement, the vitality of innovation
--To the irritations, the failures, the ego-maniacs, the boldness, the brashness, 
   the clash that goes along with innovation.

I would love to hear from top execs about the balance of YES & NO in your day.  How many opportunities do you have to say either?  How many times does the YES make you nervous and reach for control?  How many of your YES decisions are worth a "yes"?  What's your default position?  Yes or no?   

A big YES  is unsettling.  I experienced it just reading about bold (enough to mean something) innovation.  But saying "yes" isn't a feeling.  It's a commitment.  

YOUR SYSTEM MAY NEED A LITTLE MORE PLAY IN IT.

We are back in the business cycle of talking a lot about creativity and innovation.  Tough times seem to bring it out.  Unfortunately tough times also
cause systems to get tight, tighter, tightest.  There is a tendency to contract, to squeeze out any extra, to measure small things to the nth degree as economies struggle   This is the exact opposite from what innovation needs to flourish.

Loose and Tight are important dynamics in a business.
Knowing WHEN to get tight and WHEN to loosen is a leadership art.
And knowing  WHAT to tighten and loosen is essential.

Get tight about what your consumer wants.
Know it to the nth degree.
Get tight and keep good strong boundaries around your strategy.
Know what to say "yes" to and what to say "no" to when it comes to your business model.

BUT keep some play in your system when it comes to HOW to work within your strategy and business model.  I mean play in both its definitions.  Play meaning "ease and room to move" and play as in " fun and lightness".  I have personally seen play move a group from grim gridlock to easy results within three hours.

This does not mean get goofy.  It means give some room for movement and choice and autonomy to your people so that you can have a fluid company that has  a natural innovative, creative process.