Monday, May 11, 2009

The Importance of Stepping Away from Your Desk

At my Leadership Montgomery class last week we listened to a talk by Dr. Alan S. Gregerman, President and Chief Innovation Officer, Venture Works. His talk was titled "Surrounded by Geniuses: Unlocking Brilliance in Yourself, Your Colleagues and Your Organization."

Dr. Gregerman had a lot of good pearls of wisdom. I'll write about them during the next few weeks.

The first one I want to tackle is the importance of stepping away from your desk. (And I'm HORRIBLE about following this advice.)

More days than not, I eat at my desk and find the only time I get up is to go to the bathroom. Besides the obvious health detriments of my inactivity, Dr. Gregerman would argue that I'm stifling my potential brilliance by staying put on my bum. He believes it's necessary to "get up out of your chair and wander around the world, engaging with people" if you want to be brilliant, creative, innovative, etc. And he gave plenty of examples to back up his point.

I'm going to remind myself of this important piece of advice the next time I want to go to lunch with a friend or colleague... or go to a networking or educational event... and think I have too much work to do so. (And maybe you should remember it the next time you want to come to one of our lunches but think you're too busy... yeah, that was a shameless plug... sorry!)

So I'm going to challenge every one of you to get up off your bum and go wander around the world at least once this week. And then come back here and tell me how it went.

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