I also like to spend quality time with those close to me. I de-stress by spending memorable moments with my family. I love to visit places of worship and attend spiritual discourses. I also read motivational and spiritual books. I try not to bring the office home. This helps me effectuate a well-balanced work-life approach.
Professionally, I deal with stress as way of life. After all, it comes with the terrain. I like to spend quality time and efforts in leading, driving and managing objectives and goals. These lead to high degree of performance through effective teamwork. As a team, we also learn continually in order to imbibe best practices to achieve excellence in terms of performance. This approach helps manage expectations and deliverables - in addition of having effective communication and collaboration. At office, I practice what I call Management by Walking Around (MBWA). I do this to meet and interact with my team and internal users so that I can render service to all. For me, this is also one form of exercise that helps to de-stress.
I try to work with my team on maximizing our strengths to over come our limitations in order to create a winning situation. I believe in leading by example so I do not display any stress or signs of burn out to my team. I also groom them on leadership principles, and help them learn the art of de-stressing by being organized, focused and structured - besides giving them spiritual insights.
Finally, be what you are. Don't try to be what you are not. If you try to be what you are not, you will never be successful. You will always feel incomplete and unfulfilled. If you simply try to be what you are, you will have an incredible reawakening experience, a mystical transformation of consciousness. You will attain true and lasting peace and happiness. You will become one of a small elite group who realizes their full potential.
Remember: three grand essentials to happiness in this life are something to do, something to love and something to hope for.
-As told to Gunjan Trivedi
Living By the Gun
He lived by it. It took over his life. Work constantly demanded attention and was never satisfied -- until it burnt him out.
All that David Briskman, VP and CIO of Ranbaxy, wanted to do when he joined two start ups in Silicon Valley was to 'get things done.' There was just too much to do and he was constantly on his toes. "I burnt out. I realized I had to take stock of my life and redirect myself in a more balanced way," he recalls.
And he got back on that horse. The experience made him stronger and from then on he began to respect work pressure. "Today, I thrive on pressure and usually can do my best work under the gun. Pressure does not always lead to too much stress. Without it, I think we can get too relaxed," says Briskman.
Briskman says that the secret of being an inspirational leader is finding happiness in life and leading by example. "It is good to understand the capabilities and limits of people. When you make people responsible for too much, it can create a bad situation or help them can rise to the occasion," he says.
Briskman credits stress with being the best motivator for teams. "Sometimes your team should be stressed. When there is too much time at hand, there is an equal amount of distraction. You can achieve an incredible amount in a shorter period of time. It forces people to be focused and productive."
A firm-believer in work-life balance, for Briskman family comes first and it is important to make every effort to 'be there' for his family. A top priority in his long 'to-do' list, is that simple - yet easily forgotten - word: fun.
"Have fun, never get personal. Remember that this is work, definitely not your life. Hunker down and get things done. Prioritize the important and delegate the urgent," he says.
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