”How can I help my Boss?” This was a simple yet fascinating question asked by a recently hired senior operations executive regarding his boss, the President. The President, who I also coach, had hired me to provide Accelerated Leadership Transition Coaching services to assure the success of this new acquisition to the executive team. Her organization had invested considerable time, money and effort in finding and bringing this unique individual on board and she was determined to protect that investment and accelerate his successful transition. In coaching him toward formulating answers to his question, the following piece was shared with him and was intended to bein service of deepening his intention, providing alternate perspective(s) and putting him in choice as to how he might truly be there for the organization and the President. The end result was his being in amazing clarity around next steps. The author is unknown, but it has always intrigued and been received very positively by all my executive clients when introduced. It is called ‘The Fixer’.

• A fixer has the illusion of being causal. A server knows s/he is being used in the service of something greater, essentially unknown.
• We fix something specific. We serve always something: wholeness and the mystery of life.
• Fixing and helping are the work of the ego. Serving is the work of the soul.
• When you help, you see life as weak. When you fix you see life as broken. When you serve you see life as whole.
• Fixing and helping may cure. Service heals.
• When I help, I feel satisfaction. When I serve, I feel gratitude.
• Fixing is a form of judgment. Serving is a form of connection.

What does this mean for you? What is the blinding glimpse of the obvious? What small or large change in perspective does this create? What are in the possibilities for you?

“So how stressful is it for an executive who’s responsible for the development and implementation of an organization’s strategic plan?” This was a provocative question that clearly showed this student was thinking bigger than the subject I was teaching at hand. In response I recalled some work that I had been leading as the Vice President of Human Resources and Strategic Management with a large tertiary care hospital earlier in my career. It involved partnering with Dr. Dave Hitchin, a former professor[1] of mine, a faculty member with the School of Business and a member of the Master of Science in Organization Development Program, at Pepperdine University at the time.

In one of our many discussions while at the professor’s home in Sun Valley, Idaho, he mentioned that in doing this work over the years he had observed a number of the senior executives he had the good fortune to work with who had passed away unexpectedly. Of course I was curious about this interesting observation and I was particularly curious about the issue of executives providing strategic leadership within their organizations and the enormous stress that is a part of that journey.

Dave then shared that he was working on a concept with his wife Jill at the time that he felt would be of value to his executive clients. Not only did it speak to the related issue of stress as executives engaged in developing and leading strategic change within their organizations, but also provided a model for them to consider in the thinking and behavior necessary to better achieve and sustain healthier balance in their work and personal lives. He referred to it as ‘Middlaning’.

In this model work was viewed as a three lane highway. He referred to the inside lane as the ‘fast lane’. This was where you put the pedal-to-the-medal so to speak. Of course, it can be absolutely essential at times, but it should be engaged in by exception only, not as a general way of operating. Typical types of behavior involves going in extremely early every day, pushing it hard throughout the day, rarely ever taking meaningful breaks, staying into the very late evening hours to get that all important report out, financials analyzed, proposal prepared, presentation drafted, negotiations completed, etc. I’m sure many of you reading this can think of a long list of other urgent concerns that always need addressing. Unfortunately, this is typical of executives, managers and professionals who live to work, versus the rest of people who normally work to live. Now if you stayed in the fast lane on an ongoing basis, it wasn’t if you were going to crash and burn, it was when you would hit the wall. Further, this could very well lead up to eventual burn out, and yes, possibly death. When I thought about this, and I still do, I can recall a significant number of associates that I’ve worked with in the ‘C-Suite’ over the years who are no longer with us because of just these circumstances.

Guess what lane most organizations want their leaders, and often their employees in general, to work in. Yes, the fastlane! They don’t intentionally have the foregoing consequences in mind and, at times, even express in their own way that the that the fast lane is not a healthy place to stay.  But watch what actually happens if the executive tries to work toward more balance in his/her work and life. Out come the organizational antibodies that try to get rid of any behavior that actually involves work/life balance or seeks to minimize it.

Next is the middle-lane. This lane is a healthy and productive one to travel in.  As opposed to the peddle-to-the-metal approach of the fast lane, here you keep a good healthy speed and a solid, productive momentum. Give or take a few clicks either way, in this lane you will successfully achieve planned intentions, on time, within the resources allocated, fully meeting and even exeeding standards of performance, producing high employee and customer satisfaction (the Top Line), and often beating revenue and cost targets (Top Line). The Middle-Lane should never be confused with the Slow Lane which has a totally different purpose.

Oh, the Slow Lane. Perhaps a bit of a misnomer, but essentially it means going to work at a reasonably appropriate time and taking healthy breaks or time outs throughout the day so that you remain maximally productive. It includes taking time for lunch, either by oneself or as an opportunity to engage in relationship building with key others. It means leaving at a reasonable time at the end of the day or going home to be with your loved ones. Not taking work with you (unless you happen to be temporarily in the fast lane). It means taking the weekends off for you to be with your family and friends. It means taking your scheduled vacations, even stat holidays. The whole purpose here is for you to live the life that you’re working to create and enjoy. These are critical opportunities for you to regenerate you batteries. Otherwise, if you don’t do these things you will eventually end up being no good to yourself, your family and or to the organization over the intermediate to long term. But many of us learn the hard way, and often too late.

Is Middlaning easy? I would love to hear your experience, thoughts and wisdom on the subject. What does better look like for you? What are the consequences of not addressing and facing up to this? What’s in the payoff of dealing with it? What prevents you from addressing the matter? Have fun with this and I look forward to hearing from you!