The Hidden Struggles of Leadership: A Conversation with Jan Gerber on CEO Mental Health and Ian King from Sky News
In a revealing discussion on Sky News, Ian King delves into the pressures faced by chief executives, particularly during financial reporting periods. Jan Gerber, CEO of Paracelsus Recovery, sheds light on the mental health challenges that leaders often encounter, especially around the deadline for first-quarter results. Paracelsus Recovery, renowned for treating business executives, observes a notable increase in referrals of CEOs during these times. Gerber discusses the typical conditions these leaders suffer from, including burnout and anxiety, and explains the tailored, pragmatic treatment approaches his organization employs to help them cope while maintaining their professional responsibilities. The conversation highlights the paradox of leadership roles: the isolation and intense pressure hidden behind a facade of success and capability.
And here is the full discussion:
Welcome back. Earlier on in the program, we discussed the incidents during the last year of profit warnings, always a stressful event for chief executives and chief financial officers. Another stressful event, however, is the deadline to file company results.
Paracelsus Recovery, which is based in Zurich and London and which specializes in the treatment of business people, says it sees a spike in referrals of CEOs at the end of April, which is usually the deadline for the filing of first quarter results. We’ll join me now is Jan Gerber. He’s chief executive of Paracelsus Recovery.
Jan, very good to see you this morning. What sort of conditions are CEOs commonly being referred to you with? Well, when they come under pressure, it’s normally sort of a burnout or an anxiety attack, but there are underlying issues. You know, what makes you more likely to land the top job in the first place actually makes you more vulnerable for your mental health.
I’m very startled, though, that it’s the Q1 results which seem to cause this spike in anxiety rather than the full year results. Well, it’s the, you know, a lot of the midsize companies will actually report the full year results more in March, April. And I think, you know, there’s still sizable companies with a lot of responsibilities on the shoulders of the chief executives.
So how does this stress and anxiety manifest itself? What sort of conditions typically are we talking about? Well, normally it’s just, you know, trying to cope until you can’t cope anymore, until the pressure’s off, which often with the filing of the results, the information’s out. Coping can be various ways. You know, often when you can’t sleep because of anxiety, you take prescription medication or you self-medicate with alcohol or other drugs.
You can act out in all sorts of ways or just sit out your anxiety attacks. So CEOs, though, by and large, are very, very successful, very able, very capable people. Are you saying that behind the scenes is that they’re all desperately worried about things? Well, behind the scenes, we’re all human at our core and chief executives and politicians and, you know, nobody is really different there.
The image that you have to portray, especially when you lead a large organisation, is not the human being that’s actually behind that facade. It’s funny, I often say this to people that being CEO, although they’re paid well, it’s quite a lonely job at times, isn’t it? It’s a very lonely job because you also have to be careful who you share your worries with because it might leak and then the market might react. And also, there’s not a lot of peers that really understand the pressure that’s on your shoulders.
Sometimes you have to close family, but then when you’re not home a lot, because you work a lot, which tends to come with the job, that also falls away as well. So yeah, you find yourself in a very lonely place. So how do you treat someone who comes to you and says, look, I’m just completely facing burnout here? Well, we’re very pragmatic in our treatment approach.
So we realise, you know, somebody who comes to us from a very stressful and high-profile job, they can’t just disappear for many weeks on end because, again, the markets will ask questions, will react and so on. So whatever works, you know, somebody can come in and out, we can send a therapist to work with them. Really, whatever works, you have to be very pragmatic rather than dogmatic when it comes to, if you want to be effective with mental health treatment.
And how do you judge success or failure with some of these patients? Is it when they return to their job and they’re back to the way they should be? Is that success? It’s something that’s really hard to put into quantifiable statistics. For me, success is anything that’s, you know, that somebody has a better quality of life than they had before. Even if there’s the ability to cope again, but still suffering, whereas they couldn’t cope anymore before without help, that’s already success in its own right.
You know, success, kind of being well and happy, dance for the rest of your life. I guess nobody will ever achieve that. Life brings its ups and downs.
Okay, Jan, we have to leave it there. Good to talk to you this morning. Thank you.
Thank you. That’s it from me for the time being. I’ll be back at 4.30 with our afternoon edition of Business Live, of course.
Hope to see you then. In the meantime, as you’ve been watching this morning…
