“When you become bored, bad things happen.” This is a piece of advice I often give to my clients. Smart, results oriented leaders perform best when they are operating at the edge – growing the business, responding to unprecedented business problems, or strategizing how to pull ahead of the competition. While today’s business environment presents many challenges, I am still called in to advise executives who have simply lost their passion.

Of course, one option is to seek out a new role or a new organization. This is not always in the best interest of the executive or the company, particularly during a period of transition or economic challenges. In most cases, we create a plan to reinvigorate the leader/my client.

Whether my clients are suffering from burnout following sustained stress or have lost their passion on the job, these strategies, as part of an overall advisory engagement, have been successful:

• Reconnect with your spouse, family and/or friends. Book a fishing trip, a long weekend at the lake or in the mountains, or a date night with your spouse to relax and spend some quality time together.
• Exercise. It can be hard to get moving when you feel physically and mentally worn down. That being said, we now know that aerobic exercise is the single greatest contributor to brain and heart health as well as mental and emotional health.
• Travel. This is my tonic; experiencing different cultures, language, and lifestyles through travel. When walking through 6000-year-old ruins in Turkey, I see my “pressing” business challenges with a whole new perspective. My sense of urgency recedes and I re-commit to a longer-term view.
• Identify what has changed. When you were engaged, what was different? What aspects, if any, can you recreate?

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