Do you take time to breathe from time to time? And do your people?

Everybody’s running nowadays in the workplace, and in their lives overall. The mantra of everyone’s lamentations is “I have no time”… As a consultant who visits various business environment and other organizations (such as hospital, to name one) I too often see apocalyptic scenes of beheaded hens running around without purpose, all screaming “I have no time, I have no time”, while self-styled leaders complain that the performance of their teams is poor, it’s just not enough. And, well: I’VE HAD ENOUGH OF THIS!

In a recent interesting article by Michal Simmons I found good arguments that confirm my theory and experience: thinking, and deliberate practice in order to learn and improve knowledge, are keys to success much more than the hours worked or, I would say, the miles run with no purpose. I have been among my colleagues entrepreneurs and executives for the majority of my life, and I have witnessed the 16 – 18 hour a day work myth at its worst. Inefficiency in the use of time, is hardly compensated by the use of more time. An effective use of time, has a better quality of life as a first outcome, more lucid thinking, time to relax, feel and get new ideas, time to cultivate relationships and connections.

If you want that your team expresses its best you have to give them time to think, and connect with their brains (both rational and intuitive, please!). Read the thoughts of AOL CEO Tim Armstrong, asking his senior team to spend 10{f62d5d00145dc1761a46bb3b9876f4fb2b6782fa0e48784c716da9a8908fe5e5} of their time just thinking (Just?! What would you want to have your senior team do? Delivering coffee?) If you want your organization to be free to outgrow your capacity to solve problems and make the best of the capacities and intelligence of your people, just take time off to think strategically, which should be the job of a leader, and let go of the luring icon of the “super-busy-big-man”. Here’s what our host, Linkedin CEO Jeff Weiner, wisely wrote.

Why do I call your attention to breathing, instead of thinking? Well, thinking can be tricky in the sense that if we just go “mental”, we can think confusedly and never really connect with our deep knowledge, wisdom or capacity to develop strategies, solutions, innovation. Whereas, if we concentrate on breathing for a few minutes, the thinking calms down, the brain gets easier to lower levels of frequency, the mind becomes less stormy and we can look at reality with at least a sort of detachment. Without a little detachment, and a calm mind, there is little clarity in our thoughts. Certainly a calm mind and some detachment are necessary to start the intuitive emergence of solutions and innovative ideas.

Thus I strongly encourage every leader, and every person by the way, to take some time to breathe every day, more than once a day is much better. You don’t need deep-breathing an hour in order to calm down your mind and get more lucid. One to three minutes is ample enough. This can be the best start for a pause of pure thought and reflection about what you are doing, whether you are following the best priority pattern, what you are prioritizing is really important for you or you’d best pass it on to someone else and concentrate on something which is more properly your responsibility.

Is it the 5-hour-a-week rule to be followed verbatim? Not necessarily. Maybe you are a fast thinker, and your activity needs less study, or maybe you need much more than 5 hours a week. Maybe you should dedicate two hours a day to thinking, reflecting, seeking intuition and clear vision to make sound and winning decisions. I don’t know.

But I certainly stand on the side of those who recommend that we stop with the stupid mantra “I have no time”, because if we really gave no time to people to do things in a way which is appropriate we should not call ourselves leaders. We should accept that we are stupid bullies, unaware that what is paramount in having human beings as collaborators is their brain, their hearts, their wonderful intuitive minds and that such wonders need be given time to express themselves.

Let’s try to give yourself and your team a scheduled time to think about what is going on and what they are up to. Say half an hour a day.

• No phone calls
• No email reading
• No whatsapp
• No operating meetings
• Coffee and fruit juice welcome

When you have made the experience, would you mind giving me a feedback? Here’s my direct email. Enjoy your thinking time.