Why Your Company’s Health Depends On Your Personal Health

As a business leader, it can be easy to get caught up in the company’s day-to-day operations. You may find yourself sacrificing your personal health for the company’s sake, thinking it’s necessary to succeed. Good luck with that.

Neglecting your personal health can have a negative impact on your business.

In this article, we’ll explore why your company’s health depends on your personal health and provide tips on maintaining both.

The Link Between Personal Health and The Company’s Health

Your personal health and your business health are deeply interconnected. Here’s why:

1. Energy and Productivity

When you’re not taking care of your personal health, you’re more likely to feel tired and sluggish. This can make staying focused and productive throughout the day challenging, ultimately impacting the company’s bottom line. In today’s current climate of hustle culture, it’s a badge of honor to stay up late, wake up early, and grind throughout all hours of the day. Sadly, this disobeys our current understanding of the brain and the importance of sleep.

Moderate sleep deprivation can induce cognitive impairments equivalent to alcohol intoxication levels of 0.10%, affecting judgement, memory, and visual perceptions. This could be the difference between you landing that massive deal or missing your punch line to deliver the final closing statements of your pitch.

When you prioritize your personal health and make time for proper sleep, physical exercise, and healthy eating, you’re more likely to have the energy and cognitive bandwidth you need to tackle your work and get things done.

2. Creativity and Innovation

To run a successful business, you must be creative and innovative, especially in today’s changing climate of AI, ML, and automated software. So when you’re feeling burnt out and exhausted, it can be challenging to tap into your creativity. Once again, the brain is the limiting factor in this equation.

When we’re tired and run down, our brain’s circuitry responsible for high-level thinking and executive function shuts down. We become overwhelmed by simple tasks and jobs, causing us to become impulsive and emotionally unstable. And this isn’t a supportive mindset for optimizing creativity and facilitating innovative thinking.

By taking care of your personal health and giving yourself time to recharge, you’ll be better equipped to develop new ideas and strategies to help your business grow.

3. Leadership

When you’re in the C-suite, you’re the leader of your company. You are responsible for setting the tone for your employees and customers.

You’re more likely to be a positive and inspiring leader when you’re healthy and vibrant. And when you’re not taking care of yourself, you may be more prone to becoming irritable and short-tempered, which can negatively impact your team.

Much like parenting, actions will always speak louder than words. Your employees will respond to your actions, regardless of the words you use, which can significantly impact the company’s health. One doesn’t need to look any further than the gradual decline of Dov Charney with American Apparel to see how a leader’s personal health can impact the company’s health.

4. Reputation

As The Oracle from Omaha, Warren Buffet states, “It takes 20 years to build a reputation and 5 minutes to ruin it.”

As a business leader, your reputation is everything. Constantly cancelling meetings or showing up to work looking disheveled and exhausted will impact how your employees and customers perceive you. Sadly, presentation matters in this context. And if you feel good, you’ll most likely look good.

Taking care of your health and presenting yourself as a confident and competent leader will positively impact your company’s reputation. It can also create a ripple effect throughout your organization that will empower your employees and colleagues.

Tips for Maintaining Your Personal Health and Company’s Health

Now that you understand the link between your personal health and your company’s health let’s explore some tips for maintaining both:

1. Make Time for Exercise

As Anat Baniel states, “movement is the language of the brain.” Exercise is a crucial component of personal health. It helps you to maintain a healthy weight, improves your mood, and increases your energy levels. Exercise can also help optimize sleep, enhance cognitive processing, and reduce stress, which can be especially important for business leaders. Make it a priority to exercise for at least 30 minutes each day, whether that means going for a run or taking a yoga class. Even taking simple walks around the office or doing a walking meeting can yield vastly beneficial outcomes for you structurally, neurologically, and emotionally.

2. Prioritize Sleep

Getting enough sleep is essential for both your personal health and company’s health. It’s genuinely impossible to “make up” for lost sleep during the week by sleeping more on the weekends. According to neuroscientist Matthew Walker, since sleep is one of the most effective things we can do for our mental and physical health, it must be prioritized.

When you’re well-rested, you’re more productive and better able to make sound decisions. Your brain can better manage stress, improve your critical thinking skills, and possess the mental bandwidth to make high-level judgements.

Ideally, you should sleep between 7-9 hours each night. No exceptions.

Be intentional about creating a sleep-friendly environment by keeping your bedroom cool and dark and limiting your light exposure 60-90 minutes before bed. Keep your fluid intake to a minimum later in the night to avoid getting up to use the bathroom. And most of all, get into the routine of getting to bed at a regular time to sync your circadian rhythm.

3. Practice Mindfulness

Mindfulness is a powerful tool for reducing stress and improving overall well-being. And while it may sound like a soft science, a plethora of phenomenal research supports its use in changing circuits in the brain.

Whether you prefer meditation, deep breathing exercises, or simply taking a few moments to focus on your breath, practicing mindfulness can help you to stay centered and focused throughout the day. It can also enhance your ability to manage stress, which is rampant in the business world.

Practicing mindfulness is like a muscle; The more often you use it, the easier it becomes and the greater the benefit you receive. By managing your stress levels, you can also vastly improve your chances of living a long and healthy life, as stress can shorten lifespan and longevity.

4. Eat a Healthy Diet

As weird as it may sound, eating a healthy diet is essential for your and your company’s health. When you’re fueling your body with nutrient-rich foods, you’ll have the energy you need to tackle your work and stay focused throughout the day. A healthy diet can also help to reduce your risk of chronic diseases like heart disease, cancer, and obesity.

A diet full of diverse and fibrous vegetables and fruits, high-quality healthy fats, and organically sourced protein can make a massive difference in how you feel, look, and function. There’s even evidence to support that skipping a meal or two via intermittent fasting can provide even more significant benefits for longevity and quality of life.

Your nutrition is the keystone for your health, which can significantly impact your company’s overall health. Don’t underestimate this simple task. You are the only person who controls what you put into your body multiple times a day via the food choices you make.

Your Company’s Health Is In Your Hands

It’s easy to see how your personal health impacts your company’s overall health and growth.

A business leader’s responsibility is to guide and inspire others toward a common goal. And a leader’s effectiveness is directly linked to their ability to communicate, build trust, and lead by example. When it comes to your personal health, it’s no different.

Your ability to take care of yourself and prioritize your health sets an example to others and can inspire them to do the same.

Successful leaders understand the importance of personal health and well-being. They know that taking care of themselves enables them to lead more effectively. When you’re healthy, you will have more energy, focus, and resilience to deal with the challenges that come with leadership.

Leadership, personal health, and success are all interconnected. As a leader, your ability to maintain good health and care for yourself directly affects your success. Prioritizing sleep, exercise, nutrition, stress management, and your support networks can help you maintain good health as a leader and lead by example for others to do the same.

Remember, taking care of yourself is essential for your health and well-being and the success of your organization and the people you lead.

Written by Dr. Erik Reis

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