Tea at Trianon: How Wellbeing Improves Performance

John Wilson Croker on Marie-Antoinette

"We have followed the history of Marie Antoinette with the greatest diligence and scrupulosity. We have lived in those times. We have talked with some of her friends and some of her enemies; we have read, certainly not all, but hundreds of the libels written against her; and we have, in short, examined her life with– if we may be allowed to say so of ourselves– something of the accuracy of contemporaries, the diligence of inquirers, and the impartiality of historians, all combined; and we feel it our duty to declare, in as a solemn a manner as literature admits of, our well-matured opinion that every reproach against the morals of the queen was a gross calumny– that she was, as we have said, one of the purest of human beings."

~from History of the Guillotine by John Wilson Croker, 1844

Edmund Burke on Marie-Antoinette

"It is now sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the queen of France, then dauphiness, at Versailles; and surely there never lighted on this orb, which she hardly seemed to touch, a more delightful vision. I saw her just above the horizon, decorating and cheering the elevated sphere she had just begun to move in, glittering like a morning star full of life and splendor and joy. Oh, what a revolution....Little did I dream that I should have lived to see such disasters fall upon her, in a nation of gallant men, in a nation of men of honor and of cavaliers! I thought ten thousand swords must have leaped from their scabbards, to avenge even a look which threatened her with insult. But the age of chivalry is gone; that of sophisters, economists, and calculators has succeeded...."

~Edmund Burke, October 1790

Saturday, March 20, 2021

How Wellbeing Improves Performance

From McKinsey.com:

Let’s look at sleep. We had a CEO, just to give you one anecdote, who was sleeping six hours a night. He thought this was enough. He was performing quite well, leading a large organization, and he thought everything was quote, unquote “fine.” My father challenged him to try and sleep for eight hours a night to see the impact.
The executive was shocked. His comment after two weeks was, “Oh my God, I’m seeing colors. For the first time I am actually seeing colors.” By changing that one little thing he realized significant benefits. He was more aware of everything going around him, more in tune with his own emotions, more able to recognize emotions in others. Sleep deprivation affects everything: our emotional intelligence, our creativity, our ability to solve complex problems. And the challenge with sleep deprivation is that we get used to it. That’s what happened to this CEO. He had gotten used to performing suboptimally. The key for him was to have the realization, “Wait, maybe there’s more.”

We’re starting to be able to quantify the impact of things like sleep deprivation, physical exercise, and nutrition on cognitive performance. Not just on our physical performance and health, but on our ability to think on our feet, to be creative, to collaborate—and to collaborate online, which is actually harder than collaborating in person. (Read more.)