Welcome to the Monthly Newsletter by Amer Kaissi
Edition #2, December 2019
For this second edition of “Leaders are Readers,” I would like to share with you “Your Oxygen Mask First” by Kevin N. Lawrence, published in 2017. Lawrence is an executive coach who has worked with many CEOs and executives over the last 20 years. In this cleverly titled book, he argues that most leaders believe that they have no time in their day to take care of themselves. They are conditioned to believe that this is what leadership looks like. Lawrence calls this the myth of martyrdom: the dark lie that makes leaders feel guilty for having human needs. He rightfully points out that leaders cannot steer a company to its greatest potential if they aren’t in their strongest state as individuals. Therefore, leaders need to give themselves permission to put themselves first. It’s about making their needs an unwavering priority, so they are strong and resilient enough to be of service to others.
It might look like this is a book about work-life balance. Lawrence quickly shatters this notion: “Work-life balance is a lovely notion. It may even work beautifully for people less ambitious than you. But it is absolutely inconsistent with the life you’ve chosen, so you need to chuck it. Balance is not for driven people. Dump the notion of work-life balance.” Instead, he suggests that we should strive for work-self-life passion. This approach is about fully experiencing enthusiasm in all aspects of our lives: It is about having the time and energy to fully enjoy work, having time just for ourselves and the things we most enjoy, and having time for the people and personal causes we care about in life.
Therefore, high-performing leaders should not leave their well-being up to chance. They need a system in place to replenish their oxygen, energy and stamina. One of the aspects of this system is to establish Resilience Rituals that set us up for success, no matter what life throws at us. These rituals should include three essential elements: Things we do to take care of our bodies (exercise and sports, for example), things we do to take care of our minds (journaling and meditation, for example), and things we do to take care of our spirits (any personal activities that light us up more than anything). The key is to do our Resilience Rituals all the time: we need to make them a non-negotiable part of our normal routine, no matter what’s happening at work or at home. “Sound like a big commitment? Is breathing a big commitment? Your Resilience Rituals are life giving. Energy giving. They create time and space. So do them. When your strength and resilience are a priority, you’ll have the stamina to give even more”, says Lawrence.
One last point that this book makes is directly related to theme of this newsletter: leaders need to invest time in reading books! “When leaders tell me they’re way too busy to invest time in learning, I tell them being stupid is expensive and dangerous”. The top 10% of Senior Executives read an average of 24 books a year. He advises leaders that as they consume new information, they need to take notes on what they plan to do with it. “If you finish a book or leave a workshop without a list of to-dos (with all due respect) what was the point? You might as well have gone to a movie!” You gotta love this guy!
While this is not exactly a research-based book, I appreciated this executive coach’s insights based on his experience with busy executives. His honest no-nonsense style resonated with me and I believe will resonate with many leaders.
I hope you enjoyed this edition of the Newsletter. Every month, I will share with you one leadership or management book that I am reading, and tell you what I learned from it. Please invite your colleagues and friends to sign up.
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Dr. Amer Kaissi is a Leadership Keynote Speaker and a workplace culture and high-performance teams’ expert
