Did you hear about the time that the CEO of Zoom got Zoomed out and had to take time off to heal his fried brain? No, not the beginning of a bad joke, but a true story. It happened during lockdown and is a stark illustration of why taking breaks matters.

What is your most valuable business asset, the one you can’t afford to break or damage? 

As a purpose inspired leader of your own business, the person that inspires all the activities and benefits that flow from your actions, yes, your most valuable business asset, that would be You.

Numerous studies have shown that working no more than 45-50 minutes before having a break is a solid and sustainable way to work. The results stand from whichever end of the telescope you look: whether tracking the habits of successful people; or looking at the human biology with data from brain scans and monitored heart rates.

When I first heard about it, I began working 50 minutes on and 10 minutes off, and found it really boosted my writing. But it didn't last. More than just the fading of the first flush of evangelical passion, after a couple of weeks I was tired, tired to the depths of my bones and my productivity dropped. 50:10 per hour, even with time off for lunch, was just too intense.

Now I have adjusted it to 45:15 per hour, creating 45 minute sections of work time, and I am in the Goldilocks zone of just right. I am getting important work done, well, and enjoying it.

As I work, I am generating a joyful sense of satisfaction.

More importantly, I am doing that without overstretching myself, so I now have more energy available for living after work. I am trying new things and meeting new people, in addition to creating (and delivering) my ways of making my difference through my work. Your ‘just right’ could be 5 minutes on either side, it doesn’t matter, the main thing is that you respect your most valuable business asset enough to find and do what works for you. This way you will be investing in this asset to keep it going, as if You are the goose that lays golden eggs.

There is a shift in thinking that needs to go with working in this way, because it really messes with the perception of a working day. I invite you to cast your mind back to a school setting, and the school timetable. Every day, school secondary pupils to get up and walk about between sessions, because classes are in different places. Classes do not go on for hours on end.

The next thing to think about is doing the work in 45 minute sections, because it is a novel approach to work.

It could be that you are writing, and getting up and moving about in silence aids the quality of your writing. You don’t lose the train of thought. While you are away from your desk, your brain makes sense of the task, making you even more effective when you return. The required shift here is being mentally prepared for the ‘interruption’ of the timer and embracing the negative space of the break to boost your creativity.

Or it could be that you are doing a series of 45 minute tasks, so the 15 minute breaks help you to transition between tasks, something which your brain needs. The shift here is sharpening the skill of accurately judging what you can achieve in 45 minutes, so that you are honouring your promises to yourself.

I believe in carrots, rather than sticks. So, one significant skill to sharpen is rewarding yourself. Making a physical movement of ‘Yes!’ or ‘Ha!’ or ‘winning!’ will embody your progress. Raising a mug of hot coffee to yourself in acknowledgement, or spending some of your 15 minute breaks outdoors and breathing in fresh air, these are all beautiful ways of micro rewarding yourself during the day. And so much more rewarding than having to wait for months for the grandiose gesture of a holiday.

Making conscious thoughts and actions in this way is making a conscious shift to recognising that you deserve these micro treats, so that the real link between goal - effort - attainment - reward makes a mental and physiological impression in your body. Overtime you will instinctively be trusting yourself and your judgement much more and inevitably, your confidence will build.

How do you want to be after a great day's work? Thinking about your personal Goldilocks zone of just rightness, how could ‘Your Working Life in 45 minute chunks’ work for you?