Etiquette matters in the business world. In spite of the frequent media portrayals of business executives as aggressive boors, in the real world most successful senior leaders are meticulously polite and even formal.  For example, I have received numerous hand-written notes from business leaders, even though this practice is fairly rare in my non-business social circle.  My business colleagues typically shake hands at the beginning and end of a meeting and are careful to introduce people who don’t know each other.

As I was working my way through my Ph.D. program, I didn’t know that the skills I learned from waitressing would prove their own education. For several years I waited tables at La Trattoria in Bloomington, Indiana, a fairly high-end restaurant where most of the employees were university students. It was a great job at the time. It paid better than most office or retail jobs, it had flexible hours, and I was on my feet so much that I didn’t have to watch my weight. Nonetheless, I wasn’t sad when I graduated and moved on to professional work.

You may have heard the Texas slang, “big hat, no cattle” — referring to a person who makes him or herself look important, without the substance to back it up.

We’ve all met business leaders who always want to be seen as “the smartest person in the room.” Sometimes they really are highly intelligent. Other times they are empty suits. But it’s always wildly irritating to watch them swagger about. They are terrible listeners, they don’t contribute well to team goals, and often their communication is dripping with condescension.

Everywhere you look, people are feeling stressed, overworked, and inadequate. In our hyper-stimulating environment, we’re trying to do it all and we end up feeling exhausted and empty. We talk about finding work/life balance, but nobody is balanced and the concept just makes us feel worse. As I work with my executive coaching clients to help them be the best leaders they can be, this issue of how to manage yourself for peak productivity is very often on the agenda.