Next week marks the publication of my new paperback —
How To Relax Without Getting The Axe
. It’s a thorough rethinking and repositioning of my seminal work on executive life, Executricks, or How To Retire While You’re Still Working, published about six seconds before the recession hit over a year or so ago. The premise of that book was that he or she who perfects an executive lifestyle can emulate the existence of an affluent retiree. The basic concept of that book, and the suite of executive strategies contained therein, stands tall to this day, and those who acquired the work in hard cover have nothing to complain about. It was clear, however, when I contemplated the publication of the paperback this fall, that nobody at this juncture is thinking about retirement, affluent or otherwise. We’re all thinking about how to hang on to what we’ve got and protect our flanks from competitors, ambitious peers and colleagues and vicious McKinseyites now running down our hallways with silver hatchets.
So as much as I hate actual work, I sat down and rewrote the book for the somewhat despicable times in which we live. I believe it is very important that we all continue to live and work with distinction as true executives do, even if we are not executives, even if many executives now labor in somewhat reduced circumstances. The basic tools of executive life remain as solid and staunch as they were in better times. People still delegate. They continue to operate from remote and inaccessible locations. They use/abuse the perks of their jobs. They work on the things they choose, for intense, brief bursts. They define their jobs more than you or I can do. They have more fun. And as we see from today’s news from the world of banking, they continue to live without shame and suck up huge bonuses if they can get them.
There is no reason why people like you and I cannot study these executricks, modifying them for the world we now live in, and soldier through the muck and mire to, as much as possible, relax without getting the axe. Others are doing it. We can, too. With, of course, the right guide at hand. It’s now available on Amazon both in print and in a Kindle edition for you e-readers. I discuss the book at some length today on Reuters, if you are interested.
And by the way. If in the next month or so you go to an airport bookstore and they do not have my book, please let me know about it. I’m not in a perfectly sanguine mood these days and there are some butts I’d like to kick if I get the slightest provocation. That’s a well-known executive skill too, you know.
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