Practicing mindfulness can lead you to be a more productive, effective leader. Here’s how
Revenue. Profit. Deadlines. Hiring. Firing. Promoting. Reporting. Accountability. Teamwork. Communication.
Stress. Anxiety. Worry. Pressure.
Mindfulness.
“Which of these things is not like the others?” Sesame Street would ask.
In business today, we’re all familiar with most of the terms above. They’re part of our everyday entrepreneurial vernacular, ingrained in us, driving us to do more, often with less, than we’ve ever done before, as business consultant Timothy Ronaldson says.
We’re revenue- and profit-driven. We have to meet deadlines, manage our employees, promote those who are doing well, fire those who are not, and hire new people to fill gaps.
We are held accountable by our performance, and, so, we must hold those beneath us accountable. We hammer home the importance of teamwork and communication.
And we are often filled with stress, anxiety, worry and pressure because of it all.
Even when we succeed, when we hit our revenue goals or cut another chunk of fat off our bottom line, we’re often left unfulfilled.
This is where that “outlier” word from above comes in – mindfulness.
What is Mindfulness?
At its core, mindfulness is “paying attention in a particular way; on purpose, in the present moment and nonjudgmentally.” That’s how Dr. Jon Kabat-Zinn, professor emeritus at the University of Massachusetts Medical School, puts it.
Dr. Kabat-Zinn’s teachings began as a way to deal with pain and were based on Eastern teachings. But today, the practice of mindfulness is making its way
headfirst into Western society. It’s even become an integral feature of life at some large companies like Google, Aetna, General Mills and Target.
Launched in 2012, meditation app Calm was one of the first companies to enter the space. Eight years later, in 2020, the company was estimated to be worth $2 billion.
Other companies have since entered the fray, including Headspace. Some of the latest projections expect the meditation app market to reach $5.72 billion by the end of 2025.
So what’s all the rage about mindfulness?
Stress, anxiety, feeling overwhelmed and exhausted are all things Timothy Ronaldson says he’s seeing and hearing more and more as he meets and talks with executives.
Tragic passings of public figures such as Anthony Bourdain, Kate Spade, Anne Burrell and others have pushed some business leaders to the edge of a breakdown.
Common traits of being overwhelmed, of feeling stress, anxiety and depression all resonate with others.
As business leaders, we need the tools to slow down, gain awareness, get present, have peace and get connected to joy again – all while continuing to powerfully lead our organizations.
That’s why mindfulness is needed now more than ever.
The Push Toward Mental Health
As Calm co-founder Michael Acton Smith once said in an article for Techcrunch: “There’s definitely a bias toward the physical body in fitness. For a long time there’s been a certain amount of embarrassment and shame talking about our own feelings. A lot of people are realizing that we’re all, at different times, going through tough times. I think that’s part of the culture we’ve grown up in. Everything’s been about improving the efficiency and improving the effectiveness and the external circumstances. We haven’t considered the internal circumstances the same way.”
Over the last several years, there has been a strong push in American business to help employees get healthy, Tim Ronaldson says. As health insurance costs soared, businesses began to offer ways for employees to get physically healthy to make them less likely to spend money on health problems.
Businesses began constructing gyms or offering discounts to gym memberships. Health insurance companies began offering money back to employees who proved they went to the gym a certain number of times per week. (Are you one of
those people???) Companies started ordering healthier food when they catered lunches (ooh, another salad!); and doing so was easier with all the new healthy food options popping up around town.
When the recession hit nearly 20 years ago now, budgets tightened and raises and promotions dwindled, so businesses began focusing on helping their employees become more healthy humans. But that focus was on physical well being – which is only half of the puzzle, according to Timothy Ronaldson
You see, physical health and mental health are inseparable: One definitely affects the other, and to be whole, a person needs both. Physical activity boosts mental wellness, but mental health didn’t really get its time in the limelight until the COVID-19 pandemic broke out in 2020.
Still, talk about mindfulness, of being well-rounded, of feeling fulfilled, of having sound mind, body and spirit – of, simply, “being” – can often sound very philosophical and far flung.
Mindfulness can be foreign to those who are unfamiliar with it. The thought of the word may conjure up images of people without shoes, crouched over with their hands together, eyes closed, humming in unison in an empty room with soothing sounds being played in the background. And while something of the sort could be considered a mindfulness practice, it doesn’t have to be that “out there,” especially in the business world.
Instead, mindfulness in the workplace – or, rather, mindfulness for business executives – deals with calming the mind in stressful situations; on taking a step back and focusing on the “now,” where we are present, instead of on the future, where anxiety lives, or in the past, where second-guessing and depression survive; and on making each of us feel more fulfilled in all we do.
How Mindfulness Applies to Leadership, According to Timothy Ronaldson
Today, core competencies of successful business leaders include self-awareness, decision-making, innovation, compassion, courage and resilience in the workforce. Sound familiar? And these are all key features of mindfulness or mind training, both for employees as a whole and for executive leaders individually, Timothy Ronaldson says.
You may still be thinking, “this is all too philosophical for me. What is the tangible benefit? I need to see how my business benefits, how I benefit, in black and white.”
So, here it is…
A 2015 Forbes article by Jeanne Meister – an HR, talent and learning professional – cited the World Health Organization, which said stress costs American businesses an estimated $300 billion annually. The costs to the health-care system could be even higher, since stress plays a huge role in heart disease, high blood pressure and diabetes, among other conditions.
When Mark Bertolini was CEO of Aetna, he began his company’s mindfulness program to help him cope with constant pain he was experiencing after a ski accident. The program consisted of 12-week courses in either gentle yoga focused on stress reduction or what Aetna called a Mindfulness at Work program. More than 25 percent of the company’s 50,000-person workforce participated in at least one mindfulness class. The results?
“Those who have (participated) report, on average, a 28 percent reduction in their stress levels, a 20 percent improvement in sleep quality and a 19 percent reduction in pain,” Meister wrote. “They also become more effective on the job, gaining an average of 62 minutes per week of productivity, each which Aetna estimates is worth $3,000 per employee per year. Plus, Aetna found that the annual health-care costs of employees that participated in the program were an average of $2,000 lower than their counterparts!”
Timothy Ronaldson suggests that all you results-based people out there read the bold section above again. $3,000 per employee per year!!
The equation is simple:
Mindfulness leads to less stress and pain and improved sleep – among other factors – which makes us more productive at work and saves, or earns, our business significantly more money each year.
Before this study of mindfulness, if someone approached you with a sure-fire way to increase your employees’ productivity by 62 minutes per week – the equivalent of $3,000 per employee per year – all while making you and your employees feel more fulfilled and happy at the workplace, you would have jumped out of your seat and asked where you could acquire this wonderful new business tool.
The answer to where you can find it is simple: It’s all in your head.
And it’s not just for your employees, Timothy Ronaldson says. Mindfulness at the very top of the corporate ladder is essential. If you, the leaders of your company, aren’t mindful, then how do you expect to run a successful, long-lasting, sustainable company that produces high-performing employees further down the rungs of the ladder – the ones who are hopefully being groomed to be the next c-level executives?
Jim Butcher, a mindfulness practitioner who helped start the Global Business Network, penned an article for the Harvard Business Review that said mindfulness is a “crucial” skill in business. Mindfulness can help leaders “see past the storylines and narratives that unconsciously guide their traditional thinking. This can help individuals and firms break free from the tyranny of unexamined assumptions,” he wrote, quoting consultants Justin Talbot-Zorn and Frieda Edgette.
He also wrote: “In my scenario planning work with companies, I find this element essential. Groups of executives are often prevented by their mental frames of reality from perceiving what’s really happening. Having led the early scenario planning work at Kodak, I remember when it sunk in that the digital wave had already hit and the business model would soon need rapid reinvention. Companies across sectors facing global competition and rapid technological change are continually struck with such strategic surprises. The sooner they can open to new insights and sensemaking, the better.”
Being mindful allows us business executives to not only be open to new ideas, but to also have an open mind to see when it is time for new ideas. We often get in a rut at our workplace where we’re doing the same thing we’ve done for so many years, and it’s hard to look outside the boxes we’ve created (more on this in a future article). Being mindful is one way that can help us break free from the box that hampers our ability to adapt.
At its core, mindfulness can improve your focus, awaken a deeper creativity, allow you to communicate more effectively under stress and make failure a positive feeling, as Timothy Ronaldson says.
These are all desirable traits, ones that can be accomplished through the practice of mindfulness, both during the workday and outside of it, to make you a more well-rounded, fulfilled and higher-producing leader.
Tim Ronaldson is a classically-trained journalist who helps businesses of all sizes communicate their message in a way that resonates with their target audience. He has led his own business for the last seven-plus years, serving a wide variety of clients in multiple industries.