Work-life balance — Jeff Bezos — Transcript

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1. 0:03[Applause]
2. 0:09how do you go about establishing that
3. 0:12work-life balance that everybody you
4. 0:14know talks about and thinks about you've
5. 0:16got I mean you live a big life right and
6. 0:18how do you how do you I get down in a
7. 0:21lot I get it I teach senior executive
8. 0:24kind of leadership classes at Amazon for
9. 0:27our most senior execs and I also teach
10. 0:31or not teach but I also speak to interns
11. 0:34so kind of all across the spectrum and I
12. 0:37get this question about work-life
13. 0:40balance all the time from from both ends
14. 0:43of the spectrum and the my view is I
15. 0:47don't even like the phrase work-life
16. 0:49balance I think it's misleading I like
17. 0:52the phrase work life harmony because I
18. 0:55know that if I am energized at work
19. 0:59happy at work
20. 1:01feeling like I'm adding value part of a
21. 1:05team
22. 1:06whatever energizes you that makes me
23. 1:09better at home it makes me a better
24. 1:12husband a better father and likewise if
25. 1:16I'm happy at home it makes me a better
26. 1:20employee a better boss all the things
27. 1:23it's not about it's not primarily about
28. 1:25there may be crunch periods where it's
29. 1:27about the number of hours in the week
30. 1:29but that that's not the that's not the
31. 1:32real thing usually it's about do you
32. 1:34have energy and is this is your work
33. 1:37depriving you of energy or is your work
34. 1:40generating energy for you and you know
35. 1:42there are people everybody in this room
36. 1:44notice people you fall into these two
37. 1:47camps you're in a meeting and the person
38. 1:49comes in the room some people come into
39. 1:51the meeting and they add energy to the
40. 1:53meeting other people come into the
41. 1:55meeting and the whole meeting just
42. 1:56deflates and those people just they
43. 2:00drain energy from the meeting and you
44. 2:02have to decide which was host of people
45. 2:04you're gonna be are you gonna add energy
46. 2:07and the same thing at home and the same
47. 2:09thing at home and it's so it's a wheel
48. 2:11it's a cycle it's a flywheel
49. 2:13it's not a balance because of balance
50. 2:16that's why that metaphor is so dangerous
51. 2:18because it implies there's a strict
52. 2:19trade-off and you could be out of work
53. 2:23have all the time for your family in the
54. 2:25world but really depressed and
55. 2:28demoralized about your work situation
56. 2:29and your family wouldn't want to be
57. 2:31anywhere near you they would wish you
58. 2:33would take a vacation from them and so
59. 2:35it's not about the number of hours not
60. 2:38primarily I suppose if you went crazy
61. 2:41with you know 100 hours a week or
62. 2:43something yeah that maybe maybe there
63. 2:45are limits and they probably but I've
64. 2:47never had a problem and I think it's
65. 2:50because both sides of my life give me
66. 2:52energy and that's what I would recommend
67. 2:54that's what I do recommend to interns
68. 2:56and xxxx
69. 3:04you