Timeout: A different approach to executive development
“Innovative thinking? We don’t even have time for bad thinking.” -- IBM ad
This recent ad in Fortune magazine aptly describes a pressing problem: the inability of many senior managers to get out from under the crisis du jour and step back. Deprived of sufficient blocks of time to think strategically, and lacking the kind of diverse stimuli important for generating innovation, the leader lacks the fresh perspective to shape the business in ways that make most sense and help advance his or her vision.
Seminars, books and articles telling us how to grow sales, improve marketing, strengthen the balance sheet, and manage one’s time multiply daily. But it’s much harder to find guidance in the business literature for an equally important imperative: deliberately stepping away from the workplace and taking time to reflect on new ideas, trends and ways to strengthen our companies.
"Some leaders don't realize when the intensity of their attention has started waning,” Warren Bennis, distinguished business professor, was quoted as saying in a recent issue of Fortune. “They need to have the energy to freshly reimagine their jobs."
Business owners and CEOs will nod in agreement when innovation is praised, and will say they know that growing a successful enterprise requires spending more time working on the business than in it. But knowing and doing are different things.
How do busy, focused executives – particularly at small and medium-size companies with lean staffs -- get off the treadmill and change the scenery effectively enough to avoid the trap of tunnel vision? Note that we’re not referring here to vacations. Instead, we’re talking about committing to a structured or unstructured period of time, spent largely alone and in quiet, to reflect on the business at the highest level.
The busier people are, the more that they need space, says Barry Keesan, president of WorkSmart Learning Systems Inc. In that space, the solutions to complex problems often emerge. In his years working in leadership development, Keesan has observed that the healthiest leaders are those who take the time to reflect.
Other business people who have taken periodic timeouts say that the results – gaining a strategic perspective, clarifying thinking, formulating new ideas, resolving to make a change -- position one better to sustain a vision and make running a business more energizing, rewarding and profitable.
Job one: Overcoming the obstacles to stepping back
We all say we’d love a quiet week alone in the woods or on the beach, just to think. So why don’t we actually take it? What are the obstacles to making that decision?
For entrepreneurs, the drive to achieve is so strong that most have difficulty functioning when they’re not doing, doing, doing.
John Engels, president of Leadership Coaching, Inc., points out that the Greeks had two words for time: kronos, which referred to linear time, and kairos, or creative time. But our society has only one word, and most of us believe that if we’re not using kronos, we’re guilty of wasting time.
And time, as we all like to say, is money. Many executives worry: Will the business suffer financially if I’m away? If my competitors are busy at their desks while I’m off “thinking,” won’t our business fall behind? Some leaders may harbor fears that their staffs aren’t capable of keeping customers satisfied, making important decisions and putting out fires.
Other senior people resist being alone and quiet for a protracted period because they’re wary about what difficult thoughts and challenges might emerge and require confrontation. Those questions might include: Does my vision for this business rely on unrealistic expectations about the market? Have we overlooked a key market? Is the new opportunity we’re looking at really a distraction in disguise?
With all that going on, who could possibly calm one’s mind long enough to let innovative thinking emerge?
It may help to realize that one of the biggest obstacles is actually an easy one to remove. Most of us are simply unskilled and inexperienced at slowing down and being quietly alone to think. So we must commit to learning it, just as we learned other skills like drafting a budget and managing a team. Unfortunately, in our fast-paced society, and particularly in business, the value of reflection is rarely supported, at least overtly.
To structure or not to structure: What might a timeout look like?
What are some approaches that owners and CEOs of smaller and mid-sized organizations companies can use to step out of the day-to-day demands and refocus on the strategic?
Structure and goals can vary; some may need or want more than others. Some executives may have a clear objective for their timeout: “I’ll use this time to determine where I want the business to be in five years.” Others may choose a looser structure, preferring to see what each day brings, and then finding a way to apply any emerging insights to business challenges.
Some, like Keesan, find that changing one’s environment encourages creative thinking, and he prefers the outdoors for his reflection time.
For some executives, a weeklong timeout devoted to reading the long-neglected pile of books and articles, and conducting Internet research, is an ideal way to jump-start ideas.
Many executives find that travel, recreation, artistic pursuits and hobbies -- when reframed as opportunities to re-imagine their work -- can provide fertile ground for business innovations or greater effectiveness. One executive, who dabbles as an artist, has developed a few successful new products in which his art plays a minor but satisfying role. He also finds that traveling the world and talking with entrepreneurs provides radical new perspectives on how we Americans conduct business and how he might approach certain challenges with fresh eyes.
Donna Gillespie, CEO of Gillespie Associates Ltd., carved out more time to think about her business by stepping back from several community and board commitments, and leaving her training firm for three weeks to travel in Europe.
For those who feel some kind of structure is necessary, the following may be appealing:
- Training for a demanding physical pursuit, such as running a marathon or climbing a mountain.
- Attending a workshop.
- Recording ideas in a journal, and resisting the urge to criticize them out of hand.
- Conducting in-depth conversations with various people about these topics.
The benefits
Perhaps the most important aspect of a timeout is the one that must come first: making the decision to commit the time, without guilt or fear of what may happen when we’re away. Without doubt, the rest and stress relief are beneficial, but more important is the opportunity to see complex issues in a new way, look at new possibilities for meeting challenges and achieving goals, shed outdated habits and thought patterns, and focus more clearly on how one spends the business’ time and energy. Executives who discover that they’re probably not indispensable after all may spawn a new ripple of benefits, as the employees left in charge pursue their own growth opportunities.
If you’ve taken a timeout yourself and would like to talk about the ways in which your business has benefited, please let me know!
