HUFFINGTON
08.04.13
CORPORATE ZEN
fulness is an antidote to stress.
Stress harms human health,
resulting in higher medical bills
borne by employers. Stress interferes with sleep, yielding employees whose judgment may be
impaired, making them prone
to costly mistakes. Stress shuts
down the sort of creative thinking
that can generate profitable ideas.
Workplace stress respects no
boundaries, following workers
home and reconstituting itself as
family stress that then finds its way
back to the cubicle in a feedback
loop of tension. Unchecked, this
sort of stress can fill an office with
burnt-out people consumed with
managing dread, anger and anxiety
instead of the company’s business.
“When people go home and they
have had a stressful day, that influences the family,” says Bill Linton,
Promega’s founder and chief executive officer. “The dog gets kicked.
It has an effect in the community.
That’s not a good outcome.”
WELL-BEING AS A SKILL
Mark Bertolini, chief executive
officer of Aetna, the medical insurance giant, frequently tells the
story of the broken neck he suffered in a skiing accident nearly
a decade ago. The resulting pain
WHEN PEOPLE
GO HOME AND
THEY HAVE HAD
A STRESSFUL
DAY THAT
INFLUENCES THE
FAMILY. THE DOG
GETS KICKED.
was excruciating. So excruciating that it set him on a desperate search for any therapy that
might provide relief. This is how
he stumbled into yoga and meditation. This is how he eventually
came to have his company make
meditation and yoga classes available to employees.
“Some people think I’m weird,”
Bertolini says. “They say I’m only
doing it because of my own experiences. And I say, ‘I may be
weird, but I’m also in charge of
the company.’”
But to those who may claim the
boss is being frivolous, Bertolini
emphasizes that the program was
provoked by concern for the sorts
of corporate interest that get captured in a spreadsheet: Aetna determined that workers in its most
stress-prone positions were racking up medical bills that exceeded