The Performance Tax | Ep #113

Zoran breaks down why back-to-back meetings are destroying your performance. Using data from Microsoft’s 2021 Human Factors Lab study, this episode explains why a 10-minute break is a non-negotiable requirement for high-level decision-making and how recovery is a fundamental part of the performance system.

 🎙️ Built for Pressure is a short-form podcast for high performers, leaders, and decision-makers who thrive under pressure. Hosted and produced by Zoran Stojković.

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Transcript

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Welcome to the Build for Pressure podcast episode 113. I'm Zoran Stojkovic. Today, we talk about the one mistake executives make that an NFL pro would never dream of. In the world of high-stakes business, I see a recurring systemic error, skipping breaks in the name of productivity. Like, what is going on here? Founders and executives often believe that they're optimizing their output by stacking meetings back to back to back to back to back. But the biological reality is that they're actually destroying their performance. And so athletes understand something that corporate culture often resists. It's this recovery is a fundamental part of the performance system, not a reward you earn after you've burned yourself out. Absolutely not. We have the hard data to prove this too. In 2021, Microsoft's Human Factors Lab conducted a study using brainwave monitoring during... Consecutive virtual meetings. And so the results were definitive. Without breaks, stress, specifically beta wave activity, accumulates across meetings. Your brain literally gets worse at focusing and engaging with each passing hour. The transition period hits the hardest. Moving from one high stakes conversation to the next without a moment of recovery causes sharp stress spikes that compound over time. Your cognitive load becomes a cognitive task that you pay in the form of poor decision-making and emotional reactivity. So the study showed that with just a 10-minute break, stress resets between meetings. Participants who took those short windows to take a break stayed mentally fresh across four consecutive calls. So this is why for every executive client I work with or every head coach I work with, we implement a non-negotiable 10 minute break between sessions. You have to get up, walk around or do some squats, whatever. You don't need anything that pulls your eyes away from the screen and allows your, you don't need anything that essentially pulls your eyes away from the screen and allows your nervous system to downshift. Many of my clients push back saying, I don't have time for breaks. And my response is always the same. You cannot afford not to take them. The irony is that these breaks don't just prevent burnout, they actually improve your ability to perform in the meetings themselves. When you reset your stress levels and your focus, you show up to the next conversation with your full hardware available. You aren't processing the leftovers of the last hour. You're fully present in the current one. Recovery isn't what happens after your performance. It's what happens Yes. Which makes performance possible. It is what makes performance possible as well. So today's invitation for you is, really my challenge for you is, look at your calendar for tomorrow. And if you have back-to-back blocks, create a 10-minute buffer zone or do what some leaders are doing. Schedule 50-minute meetings or 45-minute meetings to create that buffer zone and use it to move your body and reset your brain. Go for a walk around the building and respect the recovery as much as you respect the work. I'll see you next time.