Beyond Balance

“In your life, there are going to be constant demands for your time and attention. How are you going to decide which of those demands gets resources? The trap many people fall into is to allocate their time to whoever screams loudest, and their talent to whatever offers them the fastest reward.” 

These are the words of the late, great Clayton Christensen. Clayton developed the theory of "disruptive innovation", often referred to as one of the most influential business ideas of the early 21st century. For me though, I’m most inspired by his book called ‘How Will You Measure Your Life?’ and what it means for leaders and the ever elusive concept of ‘balance’. 

This is the first in a multi-part series of blogs where I am going to share with you my perspective on great leadership--that is also tied to wellness. Each part will focus on a key component that drives high performing leaders. I thought I would start with one of the hardest to define and, in some ways, the most controversial component in leadership—‘balance’.

So, let’s get this out of the away—I am not a big fan of the term ‘balance’ as it’s often defined. Its common usage implies a relatively static state, a nirvana that once we arrive there, our lives magically slip into some sort of effortless cruise control. If only life was that simple.

Another flaw with the concept of balance is that there’s a tendency to think it is universal. It is not. It is very personal. My definition of balance will, undoubtedly, be different from yours. If someone has prioritized their life so that they spend a large proportion of their time working and, most importantly, this time and energy allocation aligns with their motivations and values, who is in a position to say that their life is ‘out of balance’?  Granted, there is a fair amount of evidence that if happiness is your goal, a life focused on relationships over work will get you farther-but that is a topic for another day.

Your definition of ‘balance’ also changes over time. What was considered ‘balanced’ at the start of our careers when we were single may not be balanced when we have a family to care for. So, at best, ‘balance’ is dynamic in nature and never static. It sounds like a destination, when in fact, it is a living, ever-unfolding process. 

We know that the underlying concept behind ‘balance’ is a desirable one—that state where we, as leaders, are effectively juggling work and non-work priorities, activity and reflection, focusing on ourselves vs. others, and so on. 

Given all this, what is the best way to maintain your own definition of ‘balance’ then? Both from a leadership and a personal well-being perspective? 

Well, in my humble opinion, it is all about values. 

Let’s talk more about what this means for leaders.

After being a leader, as well as working with and for all kinds of leaders for nearly a quarter of a century, I firmly believe that all great leaders perform at that level not because they are born that way or because they acquire the ‘hard’ and ‘soft’ skills in some sort of box-ticking exercise to achieve well-rounded greatness. They are great because they do the ‘hard yards’ of looking inward. Some leaders may not start from this perspective and have to take a step back to arrive there, but all great leaders, at some point, put in the effort around the inner work needed to clarify her or his values. 

Why? Because from self-awareness comes the ability to identify and name your values.

Your values bring clarity. From your values flow your motivations. Motivations help shape priorities. Your priorities determine where you allocate your resources—your time, your energy, your passion. Boundaries keep those priorities in place on a daily basis and, ultimately, contribute to maintaining a sense of balance.

If these things are not aligned, you will always, and I repeat, always feel ‘out of balance’.  This will ultimately impact not only your work, but also your health and your relationships.  

This was something I experienced in 2019 BC—or ‘2019 Before Covid’—when I realized that some of the decisions I had made around priorities and boundaries over the years had adversely impacted my personal health and the health of some of my closest relationships. I made a conscious decision to step back and take stock. The first thing I did was to list out my values, which can be tricky as they tend to be jumbled up with motivations and things you like to do. Both provide pathways back to your values, so use them as guideposts. I then traced key decisions in my life that I had made around my career, in particular, and realized that while I had started out with the best of intentions as a management consultant in the mid-90’s, I had also made small, incremental shifts along the way. These incremental shifts took me away from my core values.

What do I mean by ‘incremental shifts’? Well, we all make decisions along our career (and life) journey that seem like small compromises at the time. However, if you make enough of these compromises, sometime in the future, you will look back and realize those decisions have added up—you are now on a different path than the one you set out for yourself. Oftentimes, this comes as a surprise, since the changes were so subtle and spread over such a long period of time. And we are good at justifying these incremental shifts by saying ‘Not my first choice, but this is what I need to do to get ahead/fit in/survive’—feel free to insert your own verb here. But these add up over time. I came to realize that I had diverged from some of my core values, and my career and personal life paid the price.

So, what can anchor you through the countless decisions you will make around career and your life and how your allocate your resources? It all comes back to values, which drive your motivations and how you allocate your resources. 

What does that mean to leaders on a daily, weekly or monthly basis? Well, if you say that your family is your number 1 priority, and you do a time audit and find that, after sleeping, 75% of your awake time is allocated to work, 10% to your friends, 10% to your hobbies, and 5% to your family—assuming, of course, you are not texting while you are in their company and they have your full attention—then how can you say you are living a life of ‘balance’? How does being this way align with your values? 

With that, I turn now to Wayne Dyer, an internationally renowned author and speaker in the field of self-development:

‘Getting in balance is not so much about adopting new strategies to change your behaviors, as it is about realigning yourself in all of your thoughts so as to create a balance between what you desire and how you conduct your life on a daily basis.’

That wraps up our Lead Well with Zenshin blog today. I hope you enjoyed it and took something of meaning away from it. 

I would love to hear your perspective on ‘balance’. Is ‘balance’ attainable or a false ideal? How have you dealt with the current pandemic-related challenges in a way that has changed how you look at maintaining ‘balance’? Where does your sense of ‘balance’ come from?

Till next time, may you lead well…and be well as you lead.