don's report archive

by Donald B. Ardell, Ph. D.

Wellness in the Headlines
(Don's Report to the World)

William Fisher, in an April 2006 online article entitled "Grading Our MBA President", identifies ten indispensable characteristics for an effective chief executive. He claims a consensus among CEOs and business school professors for the ten foundation elements. The list was drawn in part from studies of highly successful organizations. CEO's who embody the qualities described include Jack Welch of General Electric, Bill Gates of Microsoft, Andy Grove of Intel, Sam Walton of Wal-Mart and Meg Whitman of Ebay. (No, George Bush, Harvard MBA, was not credited with a single one of the desired qualities based on his performance as chief executive of America, Inc. But, the failed pres is not the subject of this essay, so enough about that! For now.)

It might be interesting to compare your qualities with those of effective CEOs. Assess how well you are doing as a person in charge of shaping and sustaining a high quality lifestyle. Both you and the CEOs require the same characteristics, or descriptors of leaders for super-effective organizations. These ten essential tenets of effectiveness are:

1. A coherent vision of the future.
   
   
2. A tendency to seek out (and hire) smart people, and include them in crafting strategies and action plans to implement a collectively determined vision.
   
   
3. A willingness to listen to a lot of people, including those who may not agree with your vision.
   
   
4. An understanding of who your stakeholders are, while paying attention to their views, and letting them know how they're doing.
   
   
5. A recognition of the competition and the environments in which you and they operate.
   
   
6. A desire to give your strategists lots of latitude to do their planning, while subjecting them to frequent reality checks.
   
   
7. An ability to establish benchmarks to measure progress.
   
   
8. A capacity to develop alternative scenarios that are realistic. Always have a Plan B, C, or D, because every major policy initiative is likely to have "unintended consequences."
   
   
9. A willingness to admit and correct errors, even if this means altering the vision.
   
   
10. A commitment to maintain the integrity of the organization and its goals through sound internal accounting and ethical guidelines.

All sounds pretty good. However, I confess to modest skepticism about the first quality, namely, a coherent vision of the future. Nobody knows much about the future, even near-term, and those who prattle on about having a "coherent vision" of such a thing are either demented, fruitcake weirdos like Nostradamus or Pat Roberson, or CEOs who are full of themselves. However, a limited amount of this, perhaps a sense for trends and other evidence-based data that enables good guesses labeled as such, is surely a substantial asset.

Maybe it's simply intended to relate to goals or mission. In that sense, a CEO does need a coherent vision of what it is he/she is trying to achieve, subject to modifications, of course.

The rest are unarguable. Sure it pays to have good folks involved as part of your support group, and as coaches, friends and so on. Likewise, it's beneficial to seek feedback on your ideas and plans for wellness from other than consensual validators (in other words, "yes" men and women, toadies, uncritical fan club members, etc.) The fourth quality, staying connected with those closest to and most concerned about how your life quality measures up, is clearly important personally as it is in a workplace setting for a CEO focused on the health of an organization. Likewise, individuals who succeed more or less in living wellness lifestyles do so with regard for their environments and with threats or challenges of all kinds  (in other words, "competitors"). Furthermore, they are in touch with reality (versus wishful thinking), they track their progress and are always willing to entertain alternative directions as conditions change, which of course, is always happening. (Always expect "unintended consequences," for better or worse.)

Finally, humility and sincerity are solid personal qualities, even if you have to fake both. (Kidding.) In terms of lifestyle adjustments, unlike CEO decisions that can cost an organization millions, decisions that affect the direction and quality of your life are choices. Some choices are better than others, in retrospect but most are well made at the time, given the info at hand. Thus, the individual shaping his or her lifestyle need not blame himself for errors when fine-tuning the vision. Rather, consider such false starts as learning opportunities and invaluable lessons learned.

So, mull and ponder these CEO traits but get on with being the best leader you can be of YOU, Inc., shaping a quality existence physically, mentally and emotionally as well as you can. In doing so, consider the ten tips from business, modify and tailor them all to your unique circumstances and always look on the bright side of life.

Be well.

(Note: This essay will be filed in the archives in the PHYSICAL DOMAIN under the skill area of lifestyle habits. Additional articles related to this theme may be found there.)

(Ed. Note: Views expressed in this and other columns are those of the author and not necessarily those of the SeekWellness Editorial Board.)

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