How Should CEOs Deal with
Recently, the health of Steve Jobs, the CEO of Apple, has raised a national discussion.
Many people think that his health is not his private matter because so many others
depend upon him. Some even raise a stock security issue. Forbes has pointed out that
Steve Jobs turned to cancer removal surgery eight months after the diagnosis. Life has
so many unexpected challenges. We have to take care of ourselves. When talking about leadership, people usually do not worry about sustainability at times
of unexpected change, intense stress, illness or injury. Unfortunately, life is full of
unexpected challenges, which can disable our mind, or even take away our success. It
takes a different set of skills to sustain our optimal creativity and health than to utilize
them. It is important to have both. Somehow, we live not only for ourselves, but also for
our family, partners, friends, employees and more.
People tend to count on doctors for their health. However, how we handle illnesses
before and after seeing doctors can mean life or death, recovery or disability. Although I
had excellent medical training, I could have lost my mother had I not questioned the
Intensive Care Unit (ICU) physicians after a tragic auto-accident. She suffered a
cervical-2 fracture. Even after five weeks of intensive care, my mother could not get off
of the ventilator. Her ICU physicians "concluded" that she would be ventilator-dependent
for the rest of her life. My mother, however, refused to live on a machine. I never doubted
the ICU physicians. But at the last moment, I chose to do my own assessment and
found that she did not breathe efficiently. Through a new way of breathing I taught her,
my mother was taken off the ventilator successfully after only three days!
In another example, a prestigious rehab center had some very well known experts in
Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI, or severe brain injury ). These experts concluded that the
poor impulse control secondary to TBI was incurable after they failed to find the cure. A
resident physician with a history of TBI had one unfortunate incident. These experts
linked the incident with her past injury, and concluded that she had a poor impulse
control and could not handle stress. They took away her residency training at the last
minute even through her references from clinical training prior were excellent. Instead of
telling her their reasoning, they told her something else, which has caused her a huge
waste of time and money. In fact, the victim had found a way to correct the impulse
control. But to these experts, if they could not find the cure, no one could! And they
abandoned their own victim when their support was needed most!
Not everyone needs to go to medical school. However, we need general and systemic health knowledge about ourselves and different health systems, for example, what costly
health mistakes to avoid, and how to select specialists. We need to stay in charge,
especially when it is a matter of life or death, recovery or disability. A part of our 4-day
Executive Synergy Program provides hands-on training in this area.
According to a Q2 2008 survey of Vistage (an international organization for CEOs), 100
percent of 2,400 participating CEOs are suffering stress. Stress can come from external
sources, like an uncertain economy. Stress can also come from our body and mind,
such as the examples described above. Stress, while a great motivator, can disable
our thinking and creativity, which are the keys to leadership. Stress can also harm our
health and emotions.
Stress management to many people is limited relaxation exercises, such as deep
breathing, brisk walking, meditation, Yoga and breaks. However, these are not enough
to handle intense stress. Some go for drugs, which leads to long-term problems. We
need to build up our personal relaxation hierarchies, which are the right tools for the right
levels of stress. At The Prince Synergy, LLC, we call it “a knife for a chicken, and a
nuclear weapon for the World War II.” We need a clear mind to look into underlying
causes and figure out our solutions. Different people need to build up different hierarchies.
Another common definition of stress management is “coping with stress” and “positive
thinking.” We don’t have to “live with stress.” We can prevent, utilize, eliminate and
transform stress. We can better manage stress in many ways, business, medical, legal
or even “technical” ways. A CEO suffered newly onset insomnia due to insecurities of her
business. None of her relaxation methods or sleeping pills worked. Sleep is very important
to productivity and wellness. She could not have a real sense of security until her
business thrived, which could take time. She could use her faith, however, as “the sense of security” by placing it into her unconscious level. Afterward, she has been sleeping like
a log every night.
Strong stress management training is even more important at times of extreme crisis,
where the level of stress is highest. Some CEOs tend to check themselves into the hospital.
I had a crisis in 2007, and started crisis management immediately. I used my relaxation
hierarchy to keep a clear mind, and in the meantime, kept telling myself that the crisis was
not the end of the world. Instead of spending time in the hospital, I worked on my solution to
turn the crisis into an opportunity the same night.
Our beliefs, perceptions, standards, visions and expectations can also affect the outcome.
The cases of my mother and the rehab center are also good examples of blindly following
authority figures (such as the ICU physicians), past experiences and assumptions.
What we can see in society and ourselves can detemine how we act and what we can
achieve. I did not value eastern medicine in medical school. After being through family
injuries and some life challenge, I have appreciated its recovery and relaxation power more
and more. I sometimes acupuncture myself and pick up my own herb tea for certain
tiredness and stress. I did not know about the internet or computers in high school. What
I want and can do today is different from what was possible back then. There are many
ways to sustain our optimal levels. We won’t open to them untill we can “see” them.
How we act can also affect our health and potential slowly but profoundly. A star athlete
from Fargo High School joined Stanford on a four-year football scholarship. After he ran
into bigger and meaner competitors, he chose to focus upon his economics major. He has
since built a multi-billion dollar bank. What if he had chosen steroid for temporary gain, or
used drugs to temporary high like many others? He would have to face more problems
down the road, such as systemic injuries or issues related to addictions.
Our mind, body and stress management are one integrated system. We can be limited
internally and externally. The limitations can lead to stress issues in business and health
if we do not take care them efficiently. We can and need to, utilize our full internal and
external resources efficiently, and prosper in business and life.
In summary, the skills to utilize our creativity and health and to lead are different from those
to sustain the potential from unexpected change, intense stress, costly health mistakes
and injury. In this age of intense competition, we need these skills to stay at our optimal
the above in just a few days, and help you build a firewall for your leadership. This is not
only about one key individual, but also your family, partners, colleagues, employees and
more.