9 minutes agoJennifer Moore-Fischer Main Post MooreFischer COLLAPSE
Cognitive Behavioral Therapy is the recommended first line treatment of OCD, especially during pregnancy (Iniesta-Seplveda and Storch, 2017). CBT is also the non pharmaceutical intervention of choice (Viswasam, Eslick, and Starcevic, 2019). And truly, if the risks of pharmaceutical nontreatment versus benefits gained by pharmaceutical treatment are weighed and pharmaceutical nontreatment is risked, then CBT should be heavily encouraged to keep mother and baby as healthy as possible during the pregnancy (Viswasam, Eslick, and Starcevic, 2019).
With the exception of paroxetine, SSRIs (Such as fluoxetine and sertraline) are the drugs of choice to treat Obsessive Compulsive Disorder in pregnancy, though they are secreted in small (considered relatively safe) amounts in breastmilk during breastfeeding (Bharadwaj et al., 2022). Paroxetine is of increased risk and should be avoided in favor of lower risk alternative SSRIs as previously listed (Burton et al, 2022).
Escitalopram (Lexapro) can be prescribed off label to treat OCD during pregnancy if fluoxetine and sertraline etc fail to relieve symptoms or cause significant side effects that fail their trial (Peggy, Cummings, and Mark, 2017). It should also be noted that Buspar is actually a category B drug for pregnancy use risk (Bharadwaj et al., 2022).
The risk assessment tool I woulod use during pregnancy for women struggling with OCD is the Perinatal Anxiety Screening Scale. The PASS screening can be used after a GAD7 indicates moderate to high anxiety, in the categories of: acute anxiety and adjustment, general worry and specific fears, perfectionism, control and trauma, and social anxiety (Bharadwaj et al., 2022). Potential side effects of SSRIs include dry mouth, insomnia, blurred vision, drowsiness, nausea, dizziness, nervousness, headaches, reduced libido, blurred vision (Bharadwaj et al., 2022).
The APA does publish regularly updated treatment guidelines for the assessment and treatment of OCD. They recommend use of CBT and SSRIs for appropriate ytreatment of OCD (Viswasam, Eslick, and Starcevic, 2019).
References
American Psychiatric Association (APA). (2013). Diagnostic and statistical
manual of mental disorders (5th ed.). Arlington, VA: Author.
doi: 10.1176/appi.books.9780890425596.dsm06
Bharadwaj, B., Endumathi, R., Parial, S., & Chandra, P. (2022). Management of psychiatric disorders during the perinatal period.Indian Journal of Psychiatry,64, 414428. https://doi.org/10.4103/indianjpsychiatry.indianjpsychiatry_12_22
Burton, H. A. L., Pickenhan, L., Carson, C., Salkovskis, P., & Alderdice, F. (2022). How women
with obsessive compulsive disorder experience maternity care and mental health care during pregnancy and postpartum: A systematic literature review.Journal of Affective Disorders,314, 118. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jad.2022.06.041
Iniesta-Seplveda, M., & Storch, E. A. (2017). Cognitive-behavioral therapy as an effective,
safe, and acceptable intervention for OCD during pregnancy.Revista Brasileira de Psiquiatria,39(1), 84. https://doi.org/10.1590/1516-4446-2016-1952
Peggy, L., Cummings, N., & Mark, T. (2017). Off-Label Prescribing of Psychotropic Medication, 20052013: An Examination of Potential Influences.Psychiatric Services,68(6), 549558. https://doi.org/10.1176/appi.ps.201500482
Viswasam, K., Eslick, G. D., & Starcevic, V. (2019). Prevalence, onset and course of anxiety disorders during pregnancy: A systematic review and meta analysis.Journal of Affective Disorders,255, 2740.

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article writing

1)Rosh, L., & Offermann, L. (2013). Be yourself, but carefully. Harvard Business Review, Oct(Oct).Links to an external site.
2)Schwartz, T. (2007). Manage your energy, not your time. Harvard Business Review, 85(10), 636.Links to an external site.
3)Quinn, R. E. (2005). Moments of greatness: entering the fundamental state of leadership. Harvard Business Review, 83(7), 7483.Links to an external site.
4)O’Hearn, S. (2005). Overloaded circuits: why smart people underperform. Harvard Business Review, 83(4).Links to an external site.
5)Hamm, J. (2006). The five messages leaders must manage. Harvard Business Review, 84(5), 11423.Links to an external site.
6)CRAIG, N., & SNOOK, S. (2014). From Purpose to Impact. Harvard Business Review, 92(5), 104111.Links to an external site.
7)Heen, Sheila, and Douglas Stone. Find the Coaching in Criticism. Harvard business review 92.1,2 (2014): 108.Links to an external site.
8)KEGAN, R., LAHEY, L., FLEMING, A., & MILLER, M. (2019). Making Business Personal. Harvard Business Review, 94101.Links to an external site.
9)Nimon-Peters, A. (2022, August 31). Youre Nervous About Public Speaking. Psychology Today.Links to an external site.
10)Nimon-Peters, A. (2022). Working with influence : Nine Principles of Persuasion Accelerate Your Career. Bloomsbury Business. Retrieved September 22, 2022. Chapter 9Links to an external site.
Number 9 and 10 dont have pdfs

Be Yourself, but Carefully
How to be authentic without oversharing
by Lisa Rosh and Lynn Offermann

h flj uthenticity” is the new buzzword
\ among leaders today. We’re told to

‘ %bring our fijU selves to the office,
to engage in frank conversations, and to
tell personal stories as a way of gaining our
colleagues’ trust and improving group per-
formance. The rise in collaborative work-
places and dynamic teams over recent
years has only heightened the demand
for “instant intimacy,” and m2magers are
supposed to set an example.

But the honest sharing of thoughts,
feelings, and experiences at work is a
double-edged sword: Despite its potential
benefits, self-disclosure can backfire if

it’s hastily conceived, poorly timed, or
inconsistent with cultural or organiza-
tional normshurting your reputation,
alienating employees, fostering distrust,
and hindering teamwork. Getting it right
takes a deft touch, for leaders at any stage
of their careers.

Consider Mitch, the director of a
newly established department at a major
U.S. university, who was responsible for
negotiating and maintaining links with
other educational and research institu-
tions. Attempting to break the ice in his
first meeting with the dean of a promi-
nent college, he mentioned how excited

October aoi3 Harvard Business Review 135

EXPERIENCE

he was to be at the dean’s school, because
he’d wanted to attend it but had been
rejected. He got a cold stare in response,
and the meeting ended without an
agreement. Mitch thought his comment
was friendly and self-deprecating; now
he realizes that it probably lowered his
standing with the dean, who may have
thought he was either challenging the
admissions process or seeking pity. Mitch
learned that such revelations must be
skillfully deployed.

In our years of studying and consult-
ing on leadership development, team
building, and communication skills, we’ve
come across hundreds of cases like this.
Drawing on them and on more than four
decades’ worth of research in social and
organizational psychology, we now have
some lessons to share. Here we look at the
common mistakes executives make when
they’re trying to be authentic and offer
a five-step plan for moving toward more-
efFective self-disclosure.

Where Leaders Slip
Authenticity begins with self-awareness:
knowing who you areyour values,
emotions, and competenciesand how
you’re perceived by others. Only then
can you know what to reveal and when.
Good communication skills are also key to
effective self-disclosure; your stories are
worthwhile only if you can express them
well. We typically encounter three types of
executives whose lack of self-knowledge
causes their revelations to fall flatoblivi-
ous leaders, bumblers, and open books
and two types who fail because they are
poor communicators: inscrutable leaders
and social engineers. (However, people
often fit into more thcin one category at
least some ofthe time.)

Oblivious leaders don’t have a realis-
tic view of themselves and thus reveal
information and opinions in a manner that
appears clueless or phony. Take Lori, the
director of sales and business develop-
ment for a global software company. She
sees herself as an inclusive, participatory,
and team-oriented manager and likes to

136 Harvard Business Review October 2013

tell Stories about her time as a junior staff
member and how much she valued having
a voice in decisions. But her subordinates
consider her to be highly directive and
thus find her anecdotes disingenuous. As
one employee puts it, “I don’t care if you
make every decision, but don’t pretend to
care about my opinion.”

Bumblers have a better understanding
of who they are but not of how they come
across to others. Unable to read colleagues’
social cues, including body language and
facial expressions, they make ill-timed, in-
appropriate disclosures or opt out of rela-
tionship building altogether. This behavior
is particularly prevalent in cross-cultural
situations when people aren’t attuned to
differing social norms. A case in point in-
volves Roger, a partner in a multinational
consulting firm who was assigned to help
boost meirket share for the firm’s newly
formed Asia-Pacific office. Asked to coach
a team that had recently lost an impor-
tant account, he decided to share a story
about losing his first client. In the United

States, anecdotes about his own mistakes
had always made his subordinates feel
better. But Roger’s Asian colleagues were
dismayed that their new leader would risk
his honor, reputation, and influence by
admitting weakness.

You don’t need to leave your country to
bumble. Take Anne, the general manager
of a cafeteria for an international technol-
ogy company. An extrovert who knows
herself well, she shares her experiences
and perceptions freely. This can be effec-
tive when she’s talking to her staff, but it’s
less so with outsiders. For example, when
an HR manager recently complimented
her on the catering she’d coordinated
for an in-house awards ceremony, Anne
thanked him and went on to disclose that
she’d been concerned because the com-
pany had come close to outsourcing its
food service. Instead of seizing an oppor-
tunity to secure more internal business for
her beleaguered cafeteria, she diminished
her status and worried team members
who overheard the exchange.

Unable to read
colleagues’
social cues,
including body
language and
facial expressions,
bumblers
make ill-timed,
inappropriate
disclosures.

HBR.ORG

Open books talk endlessly about them-
selves, about others, about everything;
they’re too comfortable communicating.
So although colleagues may seek them out
as sources of information, they ultimately
don’t trust them. Consider Jeremy, an
outgoing senior manager with a sharp
mind but a string of failed management
consulting engagements. When people
first meet him, his warmth, intelligence,
and ability to draw them into conversa-
tion make them feel as if he were an old
friend. But his aggressive familiarity soon
wears thin (“I know more about his wife
than I know about my own,” one former
colleague says), and his bosses question
whether he’s discreet enough for client
work. Indeed, Jeremy was asked to leave
his most recent job after he used a key
meeting with a prospective client to detail
work he’d done for several others, not only
outlining their problems but identifying
them by name.

Inscrutable leaders are at the other
end ofthe spectmm: They have difficulty
sharing anything about themselves in the
workplace, so they come off as remote ind
inaccessible and can’t create long-term
office relationships. Aviva is a registered
dietician who expanded her private prac-
tice into a full-service nutritional guidance,
exercise training, and health products
company. Although she’s talented and
passionate, she has difficulty retaining
employees, because she fails to communi-
cate her enthusiasm and long-term vision.
Recently featured on a panel of female
entrepreneurs, she opted to present a
basic annual report and outline her sales
strategy rather than to captivate the
audience with a personal story, as others
had done. Afterward, the other panelists
were flooded with rsums and business
cards; Aviva had lost out on the significant
benefits that can come from appropriate
self-revelation.

Finally, social engineers aie similar to
inscmtable leaders in that they don’t in-
stinctively share, and to bumblers in that
they often have difficulty reading social
cues, but their chief shortcoming is the

way they encourage self-disclosure within
their work groups. Instead of modeling
desired behaviors, they sponsor external
activities such as off-site team buuding.
Andrew, for example, is a unit head at a
financial services firm with an ultracom-
petitive corporate culture. Every year, he
sends his team on a mandatory retreat run
by an outside consultant who demands
personal revelations in artificial settings.
Yet Andrew never models or encourages
self-disclosure in the officeand he looks
the other way if employees exploit col-
leagues’ self-revealed weaknesses to get
ahead. When we asked one of Andrew’s
direct reports about the most recent group
getaway, she said, “I learned that I hate my
colleaguesand my managereven more
than I thought.”

Executives who make any or all of
these mistakes may appear to be simply
incompetent. But their cautionary tales
are much more common than you might
think, and we can all learn from them. In
our work we’ve seen even the most self-
aware, talented communicators err in how,
when, or to whom they reveal a personal
story. Everyone should understand best
practices in self-disclosure.

A Five-Step Path
Let’s retum to Mitch, who blimdered
with the college dean. Chastened by
that experience, he vowed to get better
at revelation. Since then his disclosures
have proved far more effective, allowing
him to establish many enduring partner-
ships. What makes him so successful now?
First, he’s self-aware: He knows who he
is, where he came from, where he’s going,
and what he believes in. He encourages
colleagues to give him feedback, and he’s
enrolled in several developmental training
programs. Second, he communicates
cautiously, letting the task at hand, along
vwth environmental cues, dictate what
to reveal when. For instance, he was all
business at one meeting with a potential
partner until she voiced a concem about
whether her students could assimilate at
his university. Sensing a critical moment

in the negotiation, he decided to tell her
about the challenges he’d faced in an
exchange program during collegetry-
ing to learn another language, make
friends, and adjust to the curriculum. The
story was personal and heartfelt but also
demonstrated an understanding of his
counterpart’s concem and a commitment
to addressing it. He deepened the relation-
ship and sealed the deal.

Mitch arrived at effective, authentic
self-disclosure by following five steps:

1
Build a foundation of self-
knowledge. You can leam
about yourself in many ways,
but the best approach is to so-
licit honest feedbackideally

a 360-degree reviewfrom coworkers and
follow it up with coaching. In Why Should
Anyone Be Led by You? (Harvard Busi-
ness School Press, 2006), Rob Goffee and
Gareth Jones suggest exploring biography.
You might consider your upbringing, your
work experiences, and new situations,
such as volunteer opportunities, that test
your comfort zone and force you to reflect
on your values. You might also consider
your personal management philosophy
and the events and people who shaped it.
We start our executive coaching engage-
ments with a detailed interview that
essentially walks clients through their
personal and professional histories, their
successes and failures, and the lessons
they’ve drawn as a result. These exercises
can help you choose which stories are
most appropriate to share with others.

2
Consider relevance to the
task. Skillful self-disclosers
choose the substance, process,
and timing of revelations to
further the task at hand, not

to promote themselves or create purely
personal relationships. In fact, we found
in our earlier work that team develop-
ment efforts often fail because they try
too hard to foster intimacy rather than
focusing on task-relevant disclosure and
social cohesion. Be clear that your gocd in

October 2013 Harvard Business Review 137

EXPERIENCE

Whenand When Notto Share
This checklist can help you decide when
self-disclosure is advisable.

revealing yourself at work is to buud trust
and engender better collaboration and
teamwork, not to make friendsthough
that may happen. So before you share per-
sonal information, ask yourself whether
it will help you do your job. Is it germane
to the situation? Will your staff get a bet-
ter understanding of your thinking and
rationale? If not, you might want to save
the story for a coffee date with friends.
If your goal is simply to develop rapport
with employees, you can find safer ways
to accomplish thatsuch as bonding over
a beloved sports team, a new movie, or a
favorite restaurant.

3
Keep revelations genuine.
This should be a no-brainer,
but we’re amazed at how often
we hear about managers who
fabricate tales. Take Allan, who

recently stepped down from his position
as the associate director of marketing and
communications for a regional hotel chain.
In both presentations and small group
discussions, he would cite examples of
how he had successfully used social media,
video on demand, and search engine opti-
mization in his prior position at a premier
boutique hotel. The problem was that he
held that job in the early 1980s, before
those technologies were widespread. Allan
did have extensive social media marketing
experience, but it had come through his
volunteer church work; he fudged the de-
tails in an effort to bond with his younger
colleagues. Eventually they found out,
and Allan lost credibility, which ultimately
led to his departure from the company.
Making up stories or exaggerating parts of
a narrative to fit the situation may seem
like a good idea, but it is easily discovered
and can do a lot of harm. Instead try to
find real if less-than-perfect disclosures
that still capture the emotions of the situ-
ation and convey empathy. If, for example,
Mitch had never been part of an exchange
program, he might have told his potential
partner that he was a father and therefore
recognized the importance of assuaging
young people’s fears in new situations.

HBR.ORG
For an interactive
version of this
tool, with tailored
advice, go to
hbr.org/
web/2013/09/
assessment/
when-and-when-
not-to-share.

How much self-reection
have you done?
A I don’t engage in self-reflection.

B I’ve taken many self-assessment tests but rarely get feed-
back from others.

C I’ve completed numerous self-assessments, and my scores
are usually similar to those my colleagues give me in
360-degree reviews.

What is your goal in
self-disclosure?
A I want to demonstrate knowledge, competence, or empathy.

B I want to connect with my colleagues in order to improve the
atmosphere at work.

C I want to gain the trust of my colleagues in order to make
our performance more effective.

What kinds of information
do you disclose?
A I fabricate a story to fit the situation.

B I tell a true story that may or may not fit the situation.

C I tell a true story that fits the emotion of the situation
and conveys empathy.

What personal information do
your colleagues share with you?
A No one shares personal information in my workplace.

B I know a lot about the personal lives of a few friends at work
but not much about my other colleagues.

C My colleagues share personal information, especially when it
is pertinent to the task.

How long have you known
your colleagues?
A We just met.

B We’ve had one or two formal meetings.

C We’ve had at least a week of formal and informal discussions
and have completed one significant task.

If your answers were mostly As, you might want to be quiet.

If they were mostly Bs, you should proceed cautiously.

If they were mostly Cs, speak up.

October 2013 Harvard Business Review 138

HBR.ORG

4
Understand the organiza-
tional and cultural con-
text. Considerable research
has shown that people from
individualistic societies, such

as the United States and India, are more
likely to disclose information about them-
selves and expect others to do the same
than people from coUectivist societies,
such as China and Japan. Thus Roger’s
Asian teammates might have been put off
by his readiness to share a personal story.

care agency. Exhausted after a sleep-
less night with her sick baby, she shared
that experience in her introduction, to
the discomfort of her audience. “They
wanted to know about my education and
industry background, and instead I spoke
graphically about baby throw-up,” she re-
calls. “It took me a few months after that
to reestablish credibility.” This doesn’t
mean you have to wait years before telling
colleagues anything about your personal
life. You just need to have spent enough

Skillful self-disclosers choose the
substance, process, and timing of
revelations to further the task at
hand, not to promote themselves.

regardless of its content. Make an effort
to investigate national and orgjinizational
norms about sharing so that you’ll know
when it’s best to keep quiet. In any con-
text, but especially one new to you that
involves teammates from other countries,
companies, or functions, you should talk
to respected insiders about how people
operate and what level of candor is ex-
pected. HR personnel and group leaders
may be able to provide this information,
but you can also test the waters with task-
relevant self-disclosure to see how people
respond. And you can look for cues such
as eye contact and others’ attempts to
share or solicit stories.

5
Delay or avoid very personal
disclosures. Intimate stories
strengthen relationships; they
don’t establish them. Sharing
too much personal information

too quickly breaks all sociocultural norms
of behavior, making one appear awk-
ward, needy, or even unstable. That was
Helen’s mistake when she was asked to
introduce herself at the cross-site launch
of a training program at her home health

time with them to develop a foundation
of trust and to learn organizational norms.
First develop common objectives, delin-
eate goals and roles, and demonstrate
credibility and trustworthiness through
your work. Take careful note of how open
others are before offering significant dis-
closures of your own. In some workplaces
you will eventually find it safe and helpful
to share; in others you’ll realize it’s ex-
tremely unwise to do so.

These five steps should help you
avoid some of the pitfalls we’ve outlined
and become a more effective leader.
Remember to think carefully about your
motives and likelihood of success. (See
the exhibit “Whenand When Notto
Share.”) Self-disclosure is a valuable
mcinagerial tool, but it must be used
judiciously. What stories do you have to
tell, and who needs to hear them? 0

HBR Reprint R1310J

Lisa Rosh is an assistant professor of
management at the Sy Syms School of

Business at Yeshiva University. Lynn Offermann
is a professor of organizational sciences and
communication at the George Washington
University.

JjjHKUST
H J j BUSINESS SCHOOL
^’v 9 m m m ^ “^

INSPIRING

YOUR
FOR CONTINUED

SUCCESS

HKUST’s open-enrollment and

custom programs w\\ advance

your global business knowledge

and help you become a promising

business leader in Asia

for the world

www.bm.ust.hk/execed

executive
E D U C A T I O N
t a M

Copyright 2013 Harvard Business Publishing. All Rights Reserved. Additional restrictions
may apply including the use of this content as assigned course material. Please consult your
institution’s librarian about any restrictions that might apply under the license with your
institution. For more information and teaching resources from Harvard Business Publishing
including Harvard Business School Cases, eLearning products, and business simulations
please visit hbsp.harvard.edu. hbr.org | October 2007 | Harvard Business Review 63

STEVE WANNER IS a highly respected 37-year-old partner

at Ernst & Young, married with four young children.

When I met him a year ago, he was working 12- to 14-hour

days, felt perpetually exhausted, and found it diffi cult

to fully engage with his family in the evenings, which left him

feeling guilty and dissatisfi ed. He slept poorly, made no time to

exercise, and seldom ate healthy meals, instead grabbing a bite

to eat on the run or while working at his desk.

Wanners experience is not uncommon. Most of us respond

to rising demands in the workplace by putting in longer hours,

which inevitably take a toll on us physically, mentally, and emo-

tionally. That leads to declining levels of engagement, increas-

ing levels of distraction, high turnover rates, and soaring medi-

cal costs among employees. My colleagues and I at the Energy

MANAGING YOURSELF

Manage Your Energy, Not Your Time
The science of stamina has advanced to the point where individuals, teams, and whole
organizations can, with some straightforward interventions, signifi cantly increase their
capacity to get things done.

by Tony Schwartz

G
re

g
M

ab
ly

1580 Schwartz.indd 631580 Schwartz.indd 63 9/5/07 9:04:55 PM9/5/07 9:04:55 PM

MANAGING YOURSELF | Manage Your Energy, Not Your Time

64 Harvard Business Review | October 2007 | hbr.org

Project have worked with thousands of

leaders and managers in the course

of doing consulting and coaching at

large organizations during the past fi ve

years. With remarkable consistency,

these executives tell us theyre pushing

themselves harder than ever to keep

up and increasingly feel they are at a

breaking point.

The core problem with working lon-

ger hours is that time is a fi nite resource.

Energy is a different story. Defi ned in

physics as the capacity to work, energy

comes from four main wellsprings in

human beings: the body, emotions,

mind, and spirit. In each, energy can be

systematically expanded and regularly

renewed by establishing specifi c ritu-

als behaviors that are intentionally

practiced and precisely sched-

uled, with the goal of making

them unconscious and auto-

matic as quickly as possible.

To effectively reenergize

their workforces, organiza-

tions need to shift their em-

phasis from getting more out

of people to investing more

in them, so they are motivated and

able to bring more of themselves to

work every day. To recharge themselves,

individuals need to recognize the costs

of energy-depleting behaviors and then

take responsibility for changing them,

regardless of the circumstances theyre

facing.

The rituals and behaviors Wanner es-

tablished to better manage his energy

transformed his life. He set an earlier

bedtime and gave up drinking, which

had disrupted his sleep. As a conse-

quence, when he woke up he felt more

rested and more motivated to exercise,

which he now does almost every morn-

ing. In less than two months he lost

15 pounds. After working out he now

sits down with his family for breakfast.

Wanner still puts in long hours on the

job, but he renews himself regularly

along the way. He leaves his desk for

lunch and usually takes a morning and

an afternoon walk outside. When he ar-

rives at home in the evening, hes more

relaxed and better able to connect with

his wife and children.

Establishing simple rituals like these

can lead to striking results across orga-

nizations. At Wachovia Bank, we took

a group of employees through a pilot

energy management program and then

measured their performance against

that of a control group. The partici-

pants outperformed the controls on a

series of fi nancial metrics, such as the

value of loans they generated. They also

reported substantial improvements in

their customer relationships, their en-

gagement with work, and their personal

satisfaction. In this article, Ill describe

the Wachovia study in a little more de-

tail. Then Ill explain what executives

and managers can do to increase and

regularly renew work capacity the

approach used by the Energy Project,

which builds on, deepens, and extends

several core concepts developed by my

former partner Jim Loehr in his semi-

nal work with athletes.

Linking Capacity and
Performance at Wachovia
Most large organizations invest in devel-

oping employees skills, knowledge, and

competence. Very few help build and

sustain their capacity their energy

which is typically taken for granted.

In fact, greater capacity makes it pos-

sible to get more done in less time at a

higher level of engagement and with

more sustainability. Our experience at

Wachovia bore this out.

In early 2006 we took 106 employ-

ees at 12 regional banks in southern

New Jersey through a curriculum of

four modules, each of which focused

on specifi c strategies for strengthen-

ing one of the four main dimensions of

energy. We delivered it at one-month

intervals to groups of approximately 20

to 25, ranging from senior leaders to

lower-level managers. We also assigned

each attendee a fellow employee as a

source of support between sessions. Us-

ing Wachovias own key performance

metrics, we evaluated how the partici-

pant group performed compared with

a group of employees at similar levels

at a nearby set of Wachovia banks who

did not go through the training.

To create a credible basis for

comparison, we looked at year-

over-year percentage changes

in performance across several

metrics.

On a measure called the

Big 3 revenues from three

kinds of loans the participants

showed a year-over-year increase that

was 13 percentage points greater than

the control groups in the fi rst three

months of our study. On revenues from

deposits, the participants exceeded the

control groups year-over-year gain by

20 percentage points during that same

period. The precise gains varied month

by month, but with only a handful of

exceptions, the participants continued

to signifi cantly outperform the control

group for a full year after completing

the program. Although other variables

undoubtedly infl uenced these outcomes,

the participants superior performance

was notable in its consistency. (See the

exhibit How Energy Renewal Programs

Boosted Productivity at Wachovia.)

We also asked participants how

the program infl uenced them person-

ally. Sixty-eight percent reported that

it had a positive impact on their rela-

tionships with clients and customers.

Seventy-one percent said that it had a

noticeable or substantial positive im-

Tony Schwartz ([emailprotected]) is the president and founder of the Energy

Project in New York City, and a coauthor of The Power of Full Engagement: Managing

Energy, Not Time, Is the Key to High Performance and Personal Renewal (Free Press, 2003).

The core problem with working longer
hours is that time is a fi nite resource.
Energy is a different story.

1580 Schwartz.indd 641580 Schwartz.indd 64 9/5/07 9:05:12 PM9/5/07 9:05:12 PM

hbr.org | October 2007 | Harvard Business Review 65

pact on their productivity and perfor-

mance. These fi ndings corroborated a

raft of anecdotal evidence weve gath-

ered about the effectiveness of this ap-

proach among leaders at other large

companies such as Ernst & Young, Sony,

Deutsche Bank, Nokia, ING Direct,

Ford, and MasterCard.

The Body: Physical Energy
Our program begins by focusing on

physical energy. It is scarcely news that

inadequate nutrition, exercise, sleep,

and rest diminish peoples basic energy

levels, as well as their ability to man-

age their emotions and focus their at-

tention. Nonetheless, many executives

dont fi nd ways to practice consistently

healthy behaviors, given all the other

demands in their lives.

Before participants in our program

begin to explore ways to increase their

physical energy, they take an energy

audit, which includes four questions

in each energy dimension body, emo-

tions, mind, and spirit. (See the exhibit

Are You Headed for an Energy Crisis?)

On average, participants get eight to ten

of those 16 questions wrong, meaning

theyre doing things such as skipping

breakfast, failing to express apprecia-

tion to others, struggling to focus on

one thing at a time, or spending too

little time on activities that give them

a sense of purpose. While most partici-

pants arent surprised to learn these be-

haviors are counterproductive, having

them all listed in one place is often un-

comfortable, sobering, and galvanizing.

The audit highlights employees great-

est energy defi cits. Participants also

fi ll out charts designed to raise their

awareness about how their exercise,

diet, and sleep practices infl uence their

energy levels.

The next step is to identify rituals for

building and renewing physical energy.

When Gary Faro, a vice president at Wa-

chovia, began the program, he was sig-

nifi cantly overweight, ate poorly, lacked

a regular exercise routine, worked long

hours, and typically slept no more than

fi ve or six hours a night. That is not an

unusual profi le among the leaders and

managers we see. Over the course of the

program, Faro began regular cardiovas-

cular and strength training. He started

going to bed at a designated time and

sleeping longer. He changed his eat-

ing habits from two big meals a day

(Where I usually gorged myself, he

says) to smaller meals and light snacks

every three hours. The aim was to help

him stabilize his glucose levels over

the course of the day, avoiding peaks

and valleys. He lost 50 pounds in the

process, and his energy levels soared.

I used to schedule tough projects for

the morning, when I knew that I would

be more focused, Faro says. I dont

have to do that anymore because I fi nd

that Im just as focused now at 5 pm as

I am at 8 am.

Another key ritual Faro adopted

was to take brief but regular breaks

at specifi c intervals throughout the

workday always leaving his desk. The

value of such breaks is grounded in our

physiology. Ultradian rhythms re-

fer to 90- to 120-minute cycles during

which our bodies slowly move from a

high-energy state into a physiological

trough. Toward the end of each cycle,

the body begins to crave a period of

recovery. The signals include physical

restlessness, yawning, hunger, and dif-

fi culty concentrating, but many of us

ignore them and keep working. The

consequence is that our energy reser-

voir our remaining capacity burns

down as the day wears on.

Intermittent breaks for renewal, we

have found, result in higher and more

sustainable performance. The length

of renewal is less important than the

quality. It is possible to get a great deal

of recovery in a short time as little as

several minutes if it involves a ritual

that allows you to disengage from work

and truly change channels. That could

range from getting up to talk to a col-

league about something other than

work, to listening to music on an iPod,

to walking up and down stairs in an

offi ce building. While breaks are coun-

tercultural in most organizations and

counterintuitive for many high achiev-

ers, their value is multifaceted.

Matthew Lang is a managing director

for Sony in South Africa. He adopted

some of the same rituals that Faro did,

including a 20-minute walk in the af-

ternoons. Langs walk not only gives

him a mental and emotional breather

and some exercise but also has become

the time when he gets his best creative

ideas. Thats because when he walks he

is not actively thinking, which allows the

dominant left hemisphere of his brain

to give way to the right hemisphere with

its greater capacity to see the big picture

and make imaginative leaps.

The Emotions: Quality of Energy
When people are able to take more con-

trol of their emotions, they can improve

the quality of their energy, regardless

of the external pressures theyre fac-

ing. To do this, they fi rst must become

more aware of ho