Leap Academy with Ilana Golan - Former Siemens CEO on Building an $80B Business While Avoiding Burnout | Klaus Kleinfeld | E123

Episode Date: September 2, 2025

Klaus Kleinfeld’s journey from a difficult childhood in Germany to leading two Fortune 500 companies, Siemens and Alcoa, was anything but easy. He experienced  the true cost of leadership: the loneliness of making impossible decisions and the grit to push forward when every alternative seems bleak. In this episode, Klaus joins Ilana to share how resilience and freedom shaped his leadership philosophy. They dive into his shift from time management to energy management, exploring lessons from sports, breathing techniques, and mindset practices that helped him lead various multi-billion dollar businesses without burnout.  Dr. Klaus Kleinfeld is a German entrepreneur, investor, and former CEO of Siemens AG, Alcoa Inc., and ARconic. He is also the founder and CEO of the investment firm K2Elevation and was named director of Saudi Arabia's Neom initiative, later becoming an advisor to the Crown Prince. In this episode, Ilana and Klaus will discuss: (00:00) Introduction (02:01) Early Life and Family Tragedy (07:31) East vs. West Germany and Freedom (12:01) His Love for Problem-Solving (18:01) Creating a Strong Feedback Culture (23:31) Becoming the CEO of Siemens (30:01) The Loneliness of Leadership (35:31) Letting People Go with Respect (40:01) Facing Fear and Regret (45:31) Energy Over Time Management (50:01) Building a Passionate and High-Performance Team Dr. Klaus Kleinfeld is a German entrepreneur, investor, and former CEO of Siemens AG, Alcoa Inc., and ARconic. He is also the founder and CEO of the investment firm K2Elevation and was named director of Saudi Arabia's Neom initiative, later becoming an advisor to the Crown Prince. As the author of Leading to Thrive, Klaus offers a framework for blending personal well-being with strategic leadership.  Connect with Klaus: Klaus’s LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/klauskleinfeld Resources Mentioned: Klaus’s Book, Leading to Thrive: Mastering Strategies for Sustainable Success in Business and Life: https://www.amazon.com/Leading-Thrive-Mastering-Strategies-Sustainable/dp/1544546718 The Power of Regret: How Looking Backward Moves Us Forward by Daniel Pink: https://www.amazon.com/Power-Regret-Looking-Backward-Forward/dp/0735210659 Open: An Autobiography by Andre Agassi: https://www.amazon.com/Open-Autobiography-Andre-Agassi/dp/0307388409 Leap Academy: Ready to make the LEAP in your career? There is a NEW WAY for professionals to fast-track their careers and leap to bigger opportunities.Reserve your 24-HOUR PASS today at https://webinar.leapacademy.com/24hr-pass1

Wow, this show is going to be incredible. So buckle up, and I'm sure you're going to enjoy it. But before we get started, I want to ask you for a favor. See, it's really, really important for me to help millions of people elevate their career, fast-track to leadership, land dream rules, jump to entrepreneurship, or create portfolio careers. And this podcast is all about enabling this for millions of people to see a map of what it actually takes for big leaders to reach success. So subscribe and download.

ever missed it. Plus, it really, really helps me continue to bring amazing guests. Okay, so let's dive in. Emotions are inside of you. So it's not like, oh my God, I'm angry. I'm angry because this happened. No, you decide to become angry and allow this trigger to make you angry. Klaus Kleinfeld, previously CEO of Siemens, where he led transformation inside one of the most historic industrial giants in the world if you're feeling burned out. This is a lot. a conversation you need to hear today. You have the absolute option to sit there and say, this does not affect me. I will not allow this emotion to affect me. Was there a certain situation where it kind of woke you up to the whole idea of mindset and energy? I was for a good part

of my life of the belief that it's all about time management. One evening, one of my colleagues comes to my office and he said, Claus, you've been all wrong. And I said, all wrong on what? On your metaphor of life. And that got us into a really, good late night discussion battle and that made me then look at okay what is this really and it's all about energy so then the question is how do i get energy Claus Kleinfeld, previously CEO of Siemens, where he led transformation inside one of the most historic industrial giants in the world. He then went to lead Arcoa and Arconic and other companies and ventures. So if you're feeling burned out, overwhelmed, simply tired.

this is a conversation you need to hear today because we'll talk about how to manage energy versus time and the latest book, Leading to Thrive, which is mastering strategies for sustainable success in business and life. Klaus, it's so great to have you here. Well, Ilana, a pleasure to be here. I want to take you back in time to Germany and maybe talk a little bit about Klaus. Can I take you to before age 10? Like, who was Klaus? Claus before age 10 is the only child of two refugees from East Germany living in the north of Germany, Bremen, Hansa Town, you know, so trading town right on the ocean there. Growing up, you know, while his father is getting a good education and it's just been making it into being one of the founding members of what then turned out to be the

out-of-space team that Germany put together after the Second World War, and he died. So, and then life changed quite dramatically at age 10. Take me there to age 10. You lose a prominent figure in your life. Can you take us there for a second? I mean, that's devastating. You know, the sad thing is I sat on his deathbed without knowing that he was dying. You know, I was, I came home from school, and my father was at home on a normal day,

which was not common. At that days, they used to work also on Saturdays, and he also continued his education at night. So I didn't see much of him, and my mother said, oh, he just shut eye, and I sat next to him and was hoping that he'll wake up.

He died from an aneurysm, you know. Only hindsight that I noticed while I was trying to wake him up, his responses, you know, to me trying to tickle him, we're getting less and less and less, you know. So, but at that time, I mean, Later on, at Siemens, I actually ran the unit, angiography, an X-ray unit that helped to change this environment. And many people can get saved today by minimally invasive treatment, you know.

But at that time, it was not known. How did that change your childhood or your mom or your, like, how did that change everything? I mean, changes everything, I'm sure. Yeah, it changes everything. I mean, we had just bought, my parents had just bought a bigger apartment. The apartment was very small that we had. But obviously we didn't have any money. So she had to sell that again and try to recoup as much as possible.

But we hadn't even moved in, you know. So yeah, and then she went back to work. So that changed my life also grammatically. And I think it just accelerates how you grow up. One other thing that my mother did then, all of our relatives lived in East Germany. So she decided during the time of vacation that I should go see my relatives. So I spend a lot of time in East Germany. And I mean, all of these things, hindsight, I mean, the old, the old,

saying is what doesn't kill you makes you stronger and I think they they have been extremely formative for me you get thrown into you have to become a bit self self-reliant you know you I grew up basically partially in two different systems as saw the importance of freedom and what freedom really meant which has never left me you know that's the reason why I also moved to the US you know because that's a really very very great thing that defines you as in my view you know very attracted so um yeah you're mentioning how the moon landing of all things substantially inspired you you're going back to places that are very emotional you know so the moon landing i saw

while i was visiting my aunt and my uncle in east germany and and you were not allowed in the east to watch western tv and obviously the the russians had a heads up at least the u.s thought they had a heads up with Sputnik and the first man, Gagarin, I think it was, you know, flying out of space, you know. So the moon landing, we wanted to watch it because it was such an important thing, but we could only watch it on German TV. And again, that wasn't allowed. And so we set the clock. It was late at night, you know, we got up, we got up and closed the curtains, you know, and then huddled around the black and white TV. And the black and white TV had an antenna.

So you had to twist the antenna to get a better signal. But it literally was just like this snow, you know, snow forming. And suddenly out of the forming snow, you know, you see something that looks like an image. And then comes this live transmission from the man basically getting out on the moon. And what it symbolized for us huddling around this, you know, and kind of secrecy, is that, well, maybe one day the world will come together again, you know, so in a free world. And do you feel like that motivated you or how did that inspire Klaus later on? Like, what impact did that create for you? It inspired me in many ways, you know, because I also was for eight years,

the head of the American-Russian society, you know. And I have a lot of friends over on Russia, really good friends, you know. And I've worked most of my business life. I've worked internationally. I have become fascinated through this by. humans and what humans do for different motivations. I have seen people being enormously courageous, knowing that the environment would punish them for this, even at a young age. One of my best female friends actually was not allowed to go to university because she decided

to wear her Christian cross, you know, while she was going to school, and she was the best in class. And the committee decided that she's not ready to go to university. So the recommendation was that she should work in forestry, you know, for a few years, you know, to redeem herself. But it was not easy for her to find a job. She eventually ended up working in the church as an assistant, you know, as a secretary, basically. But she was actually, when the wall came down, she was together with her husband, one of the first, you know, that left and built her life again, you know. So, but seeing that and seeing that, she made that decision when she was 17, you know, so, and to new farewell, what consequences that would have for her. Unbelievable.

And again, it's hard for us, I think, a lot of times, unless some of the listeners are from these regions. But it's hard for us to even imagine a place without some freedom, right? I think it's really, really hard. So you did do some, you know, some other roles in your career before Simmons. But what was your career like? Like, where did that take you? I was always interested in math. I mean, I loved programming.

Even at the time, it was originally unimaginable that one could own a computer. So I wanted to get my hands around a computer. And there were only two places to do that. One was in the physics department. And the other one was in the econometrics department. So I chose the econometrics guy. I just like this more practical problems there. And I like to crack some more complicated things, you know.

So that made me work in consulting, which at that time was just barely invented, you know, and I enjoyed it tremendously seeing a number of different industries cracking complicated problems. If you would have asked me, Clowns, do you ever want to become a CEO? I would have said, no, I have no desire. But what happened then is when I then move from consulting to bigger companies, you know, And I realized that a lot of the times the people I worked for directly, I felt that they made the wrong decisions. And I thought, well, I think I can do this better and I can influence the people who work for them in a much more positive way. So it motivated me.

And in the end, you know, I ended up running Siemens and was the youngest CEO that Simmons had ever selected, you know. Take me there for a second. So you joined Siemens. What were some of the initial roles? And how did you position yourself to? keep climbing the ladder. I mean, Siemens was a client of mine in the consulting firm. And I then decided I wanted to leave consulting and go into an operative role. So I interviewed, but I didn't even interview with Siemens because I felt I knew them quite well and I wanted something else. So

I went into the pharmaceutical industry, left, go to Switzerland and worked for what now is Novartis in the pharma division. And they were crazy enough to allow me a role in the central nervous system drugs part, which was insanely interesting, one of the most interesting jobs I've literally ever done. I would not have left it, you know, but the Siemens folks knew that my wife was working as a civil servant in Munich and would not have that easily been able to transfer to Switzerland. So they offered me a very attractive position. And so I joined Siemens. Amazing. So you joined Siemens. And again, some people are right now kind of mids, career, maybe in some kind of a senior manager role or director role, and they're trying to

figure out, how can I prove myself? How can I climb up the ladder? Like, what are some of the things that you think that you did to position yourself more ready to eventually take on such an incredible role? I tell you, I don't know how many times I've had with colleagues in my age at that time that had their own spreadsheets of who is at what age and what is the best position and God knows what. I always thought that that's a waste of time, a complete waste. of time. I also thought it's a waste of time to listen to the HR folks who tell you this is the career path, you know. So I always thought in the end, you have to be your own entrepreneur. And one of my models was I love it, change it or leave it, right? And I've always

lived by that, right? So even when I didn't have money. But the other principle was I want to create value for the people who I work for. And the value very often was of a nature that that they didn't necessarily ask me to do that. So I used my own brain and I used what I saw as the potential solution of moving forward and then got on to it, right, and made suggestions some of the stuff I did in my free time. But I didn't do it out of the motivation that I wanted to shine or something. I just did it because I thought this will be good for the business, it will be the right thing, exactly. And in a way, I was betting on, in the end, people will also give you better opportunities, you know.

That didn't always work, by the way, you know, in large organizations, this is sometimes very bureaucratic. I had one boss who told me, hey, because I was there and I felt for a year, and I felt I didn't really learn much. And I was rather in the role of, even though I was the youngest in the department to teach. So I had a conversation with my boss, and the boss basically said to me, hey, You have to first adopt the smell of the stall, the stable or whatever you want to translate that. And I thought, what on earth is that? You know, so if we are here in an environment where seniority accounts, I mean, talent, it hates seniority. I always thought it has to be about performance.

And if performance doesn't get gratified, then I'm out. Simple as that. Incredible. I love that. And again, that is the hunger that kept you going. Talk to me a little bit about the day. whatever that was, like, that you actually realized that you got the CEO role. What was it like?

And was it exciting? Was it scary? Was it worrying? Like, where? How did that take you? No, it was rather, I mean, first of all, it doesn't happen like this. It's not, I mean, in large companies, it's a longer process. But you realize at a certain point in time, you may have a shot.

And I liked it, to be honest, you know. But then came the time when Siemens announced the then-C-O- announced that he is considering to retire and some people obviously on purpose also sneaked out a couple of names who were contestants you know so that is the worst the worst that you can do I mean some people think that that's helpful because you test the people I think that's awful to be honest you know so because you drive away your best people and and it was like I mean I was wearing a little red dot on my on my forehead internally people were shooting trying to shoot me from back and center, you know, so that was not pleasant, you know.

And then when I took the position formally, I felt very, very well prepared because I had worked in a lot of different industries, a lot of different businesses. I thought I knew the company very well. I had had many, many conversations in tons of data points on what I thought, what should be made differently. And unfortunately, also, we had quite a dramatic situation on our hand, because at that time about a third of Siemens was in a very bad situation, was all the IT and the telecom business that was sliding very, very fast, and we had to fix that. So that immediately started

with a pretty dramatic turnaround, which was not pleasant. So talk to me a little bit about it, because again, I think CEO at the end of the day, it doesn't matter like how much, how many people you have around you is a pretty lonely place. And it's a lot of decisions. It's a lot of challenges, there's a lot of conviction that you need to build within yourself, that this is the right idea. How did you take it or how did you build yourself to it? How did you cope with things? It's good to have a number of mentors. And fortunately, I had a lot. And many of those, I mean, I would not call formal mentor relationships, just people who I admire this, the wrong word, whose judgment I liked, you know, appreciated it, like. And it's a lot. And it's

It's not that I would immediately take their advice, but I would listen to it because they have more experience, have I forgotten certain perspectives. And I always had that. Partially, you know, because when you grow up without a father, you always, I think, implicitly look for father figures, you know. So that was natural to me. That was one thing. But in the end, this is a lonely job and the most important decisions you have to make on

your own. And the tragedy really is that with which people only realize when they are. in such a situation, you know, very often you make a decision, and you know the alternatives. You've thought about the alternatives, probably more in depth and studied there's more in depth than anybody on this planet. So you make a decision, there's no good alternative. All alternatives are having crap on there. And you make a decision and you think this is the best alternative of all the crap that you have.

The next day you read in the paper or you see on TV and how you're getting dragged in the mud because some idiot journalist, you know, writes up all the things that are the negatives. they don't know and you can't tell them what the alternatives are because you don't want to make the situation even worse. And there is sometimes this moment when you think, ah, you know, if only I could, but you can't. And then you have to suck it up and basically say, okay, fine. That comes for the job. To think that this is a pleasant experience would not be the right description, you know. If you're feeling stuck, underpaid or unappreciated, or you're simply ready to take your career, in life to the next level. I have the perfect solution for you. We have a program that helps you

fast track and leap your reputation and career. Become the best version of yourself. Get the dream role you deserve, move up to leadership, jump to entrepreneurship, or even build a portfolio career. This program helps hundreds a year and it will help you gain the income, influence, and impact that will transform the second part of your life. Watch our free training today at leap academy.com slash free hyphen training. The link is in the show notes. Now back to the show. Is there a specific episode that you remember a challenge that you're allowed to talk about that kind of shaped you? Because again, it could be incredibly hard. I don't know if you sleep at night, but you know, some of these things come up at three in the morning. I think also because I started

having a really paid job when I was 12, you know, and from then on I've never stopped working. So I've seen a lot, and I've seen it from the bottom, the bottom of the bottom of the bottom, you know, until I made it to the top, you know, so that helps. That helps. So you actually never forget the perspective. You have different perspectives. What is the bottom? The bottom was filling in racks at the supermarket around the corner in the morning, you know.

And the most hated place was the milk rack, you know, because in summertime, the milk rack, if that didn't work out well, I tell you, that was not the most pleasant way to get into the day before school. Definitely not. But it also was fun. I mean, come on, it was a lot, a lot of funny things also. So otherwise I wouldn't have done it, you know, and it paid. It gave me real money. So that was the important thing. Take me to a challenging moment as a CEO that you had to force. On the challenging moment side, I think I saw very often that people were not making decisions. They did it probably out of the good heart that they didn't want to hurt the person who was

in some type of a leadership position. But what they didn't see is what is really happening with all the people who are reporting to this individual, you know? And that's one thing. The other thing that I realize is that I always believed I have to, whatever I do, you know, there's a good thing in everyone, you know, and I want to treat everybody with respect, even if I have a difficult message to convey, you know, so I've let a lot of people go. But I think, I hope in most, if not all cases, I've done it with showing them that it doesn't mean that I have no respect for the individual. However, the role the individual is in needs some other capabilities that I have not seen in this person. I've seen very often that when you have this conversation, two things happen.

One is that the person basically is surprised about the feedback because the individual has not had that feedback before. That particularly happens when I came into a new environment, you know, and looked at the leadership and I realized that there had not been a good feedback culture before. That's painful, but the other thing that I also realized that most people actually realized how true it was and they suffered from it implicitly because they were knowing that they didn't live up and it was burning into them and they didn't enjoy the job. And in a way, it was almost like a burden falling off them, you know. And I still remember, that's not always the case, but I still remember somebody who I very much admired, you know. It was in my early days, you know, and I told him, look, I mean, this is not the place for you. And you have many, many talents, but this is not the place. This will kill you.

Literally burn you out, you know. So he was so mad with me. I happened to meet him again, and we had a longer conversation two years ago at a friend's 60's birthday party, you know. And he walked up to me and he said, hey, Claus, I really want to thank you for that moment, you know, because he's happily married. He has a super, has had a super life and did something that was so fitting to what his skills are, you know, and has achieved things in life that he never thought were possible. But he said, if I had stayed in that, I would have continued to be unhappy, you know. And that's, I mean, that's wonderful. That's really wonderful.

I love that, Claus, because I think, you know, I talked to Sahil Bloom, I think it was. that talked to me about how having a good job that is not yours is actually worse than a bad job, right? Because a bad job, you constantly know or a bad situation. You're like, I need to fix it. I need to fix it. But a good thing that isn't yours is not the right fit is really hard because it's basically like, you know, if you feel like your handcuff into this thing, it's comfortable. And you're not going to take the action until somebody hopes you out, right?

So, I mean, it's kind of that. I think it's also the problem that many people shy away from making a decision because they have this enormous fear, you know, and I think fear is a really bad decision maker. I always call fear as an acronym false expectation appearing real. And I think this is very true because it's this ambiguous thing. Very often we don't even want to think about it because there's shatters, you know, leaving the job. Oh, my God. Yes, it's terrible. Oh, my God.

Tomorrow my boss is going to treat me badly, you know, and dress me down in front of everybody. know, but I'm losing the job. But in reality, then, if you think about when people make these decisions and courageous decisions where they had fear before and analyze them and also look hindsight, how has it worked out, I think in most cases you'd see that many of these things that you were thinking would happen, what did not happen. And what would have happened if you had stayed in this. I mean, you see it also in relationships.

If you had stayed in the relationships, you would have ended up having a very, very unhappy life. And Ilana, I mean, I think you've read the book. You know, I have a chapter in there on what can we learn from the dying, you know. And there is this one study about what do people say on their deathbed. And I think to me, it's one of the most chilling chapters I have in the book, you know, what do they say on their deathbed? And I mean, and they say, I wish I had allowed myself to be more myself, listen to myself and not listen to others.

and the worst one is I wish I had allowed myself to be happier. You know, that's, that is profound and it's profound because that's the realization there that happiness is inside of them. They can choose. And that's the other thing on the emotional energy side. You know, people have to understand the emotion is in you. You can choose, right? And yes, the environment sometimes triggers a lot, but then you can also choose to leave the

environment. And I think that's brilliant. And I mean, this is a chilling realization, I think, because I think regret is a really hard feeling because you can't fix a lot, right? I mean, and I think this is where there's like a lot of sorrow, like a lot of sadness about remiss life. And I think Daniel Pink had a book all about regret, which it's amazing how similar ideas these are, right? And most people regret things they did not take action on, not the thing that they took auction. that did not work well, which is kind of interesting. Was there like a certain situation where it kind of woke you up to the whole idea of mindset and energy?

I was for a good part of my life, of the belief that it's all about time management. I mean, having grown up in Germany, discipline, time efficiency, that's the thing. And also I was completely in that, you know, until one evening at that time I was working in New York, one of my colleagues, who was also a good friend, you know, comes to my office, and he knew how to poke me. And he said, Claus, you've been all wrong. And I said, all wrong on what? And he says, on your metaphor of life. A metaphor of life was life is like an ultramarathon, you know, and I was running marathons at the time. And I said, okay, tell me what. You know, and he said, no, life is not about ultramaraths. It's a sprint and then a rest, you know, and it's all not about managing time. It's about managing energy. And that got us into a really good late night discussion battle, you know, which he won, I have to admit.

And that made me then look at, okay, what is this really? And I had noticed before, so it was not an entirely new thought. I love to play tennis. And I had noticed before that something was going on in the tennis world. We saw this phase where people were shooting up and then burning down. But then all of a sudden, you know, you had people staying in top for longer and playing for longer and they got older and older and older and stayed at the top so i wasn't quite sure what exactly happened there but i thought there's something going on there that one should probably

learn from and in reality i mean these guys who are in high-performance sports or or special units they had figured it out it's all about energy you know and what does it mean energy it's about physically being strong you know treating your body mind and soul well and also mind plays a major role and soul too you know so and so that got me on to that to that So that's amazing because, again, I didn't believe mindset exists. I didn't, I believe that you can just persevere through anything. And, you know, if something gets in the way, you just work harder, right? Right, like, let's go.

So that's where I was for many, many years. And in fact, I think one of my shame areas is that it's not that nobody said anything, is that I wasn't receptive to listening. Like, I think that every time I heard the word mindset or they heard the friends, Raise energy. I was just like, oh, this is a bunch of crap. Let's go. It's for, it's for losers. This is for losers. I'm going to be like, so tell me, how did you morph? But also, how did you take others with you? How do you do it when you need to work really, really hard, especially when you have very demanding roles? I think everybody has that. You know, we don't want to talk about that in business. You know, we are strong. You know, we can do anything. There's no, we don't admit any. And even if we have a bad day, we have a really great day today, don't we? Exactly.

You're going to get out, man. Fake it. Fake it. I always approached it from the perspective of performance. I mean, I would not have bought into it if I would not have always looked at. How is that working for performance? So my optimization criterion was always performance, right? What really cracked the code was looking at sports.

Because if you look at top sports, and for me it was tennis, you know, but in the end it was, tennis, I think, was one of the first that discovered it because it's a really brutal single person on the court. You lose most of the time. You know, you're not number one is number one. That's the person who walks the way with money. The rest is crap, you know, out of 300, you know. So you lose a lot, a lot, a lot. You know, so that's why I thought this is interesting what's happening there. And so I started reading some of the books and saw what they were doing. and that convinced me. And then I also saw that in the special unit side, I mean, this thing of mental training, how that works, you know, and that this is real and that you can get your performance up. So I tried stuff out. I tried neurolinguistic programming I thought was cool, super, super cool. It was very interesting that even though already at university,

I tried to meditate, I thought this is such for douchebacks. I can never do that. That's a waste of complete waste of time. I learned, however, a thing called autogenous training, which is a self-hypnosis technology developed in the 18s, you know, by a guy called Schultz, which worked magically well, super, super well, you know. So, okay, there was something there, but I realized also that it's all about breathing. But frankly, until I realized breathing is so, so cool, you know, and for instance, when you are in a stressful situation to just get yourself into a more. peaceful environment, you know, and have much more focus, much more capability to process by just simply controlling your breath, simply controlling your breath, you know.

And then simple things like, which I saw actually in almost all really great leaders, this aspect of compartmentalization, you know, of basically not, we're having capabilities to switch from one thing to another, you know, or managing your emotions and mindset perspective from what you see. I mean, how many times have I seen that everybody sees something negative? I see that there's an opportunity, you know? Those things I saw were real and one could use the playbook and use that playbook to also increase the performance for oneself as well as for a whole team.

This is incredible, Klaus. I needed to learn this the hard way, but it was actually interesting. And you shared a little bit of a sport. At some point, I decided to do what is called an iron distance triathlon or Ironman And it's a long day, right? It's like, I don't remember, like, 24.4 miles swim and 180 kilometers bike ride and a marathon at the end or whatever. You know, when I was training, the heart piece is the training, right?

And I remember coming to work and I had a good friend that was looking at me and he was like, Ilana, you look like crap, right? And for me, at that point, like, you know, I was training, training, training. And I was actually getting slower instead of faster. And I was like, how is it possible? So instead of slowing down, I would, like, slam even more training and more training and more training until that day when he was like, you look like you're going to collapse. And it was true, right? And the solution was to take two weeks break.

And I'm like, I can't take a break. Like, the iron is right around the corner. Like, I can't take break. I'm becoming slower instead of faster. How can I take a break? And actually, it's the break that actually saves me. But I don't think that I realize it to the world of work. Like, were you already like?

like CEO of the different companies when you already realized that, did you start operating in a different way? That is true. Yes. At that time, I wasn't already in a pretty senior leadership position when my mantra changed. As I said, I always saw it under the perspective of how can I become a better performer. I never believed in this. Here's my private life. Here's my business life. I always believed it's one life. I have to integrate that. I want to be a good father. I want to be there for a family. I want to have a good friendship group. At the same time, I also want to be a great leader. And also, I always saw this as one thing, you know, so I thought, this is great. I can expand my tool set, you know, I can even get more stuff done, probably be a little more happy. That's how I saw it. And that's also, I mean, those who work together with me know that's exactly how I positioned

it, you know, and how, because it was what I still today think. That was one of the reasons why I've written the book, because I want to make sure, I want to make sure that people get this kind of framework. Because I've seen interestingly that also in the young generation, I mean, particularly founders, people who started in the startup world, I saw that people already in their 20s have their burnout. One person who I've worked very closely with almost died after a fundraising round, you know, because he had just a little code and the code was jumping and ignored. It was jumping to his heart and flamed his heart. And that boom was it almost. And I thought, wow, I mean, this is not right.

People, there is a different way and there's a better way, and this better way will get you, not less performance, but more performance, more energy, because in the end, it's all about how much energy you have, where you then want to apply it. That's completely up to you, you know. So then the question is, how do I get energy? You know, how can I conserve energy? You know, and then this other thing that was important to me, what's the aspect of purpose? What role does purpose play? And purpose does to energy, what a laser does to light. It takes this diffuse thing of energy, focuses it around one thing, and boom, you know, makes this extremely powerful.

I mean, my simple indicator for whether you have found, it's typically not one purpose, most people have more than one purpose, you know. But if you have found some things, you know, how do you feel when you get up in the morning, when the alarm clock rings, you know, you think, like, oh, another day where I have to schlep my. myself, it's only 20 more years until I retire. There are people like this. I met people like this. I do. I met people who could tell me exactly by the day, how many days I left until retirement. Or do you say, bam, I have a great day.

I have a great day today. I have this meeting, this meeting. It will get me much closer to what I want to do in life. You know, and this meeting doesn't necessarily just mean meetings in business. also means, hey, I will spend some time with my kids tonight, you know, I have a special moment. I took them, take them to dinner or take them to whatever, you know, to a game or so. That doesn't have to be big, you know, just have a sit down, you know, over whatever, you know. So that is the framework that I wanted to provide.

And I love that. And I want to talk a little bit about it because I think burnout is real. Yeah, anxiety is real. And you're very vocal also about ways to recharge yourself, which I love, because it's not necessarily. with margaritas on the beach all day. Like, not everybody wants that. But what does it look like, right? I mean, they still need to get the paycheck or they need to find the job or they need to find

the funding. Like, how do they find a way to balance and not burn themselves out to death? Well, I think the first thing is to understand what sources of energy are there and to keep it very simple. It's body, mind, and soul. And then when it comes to body, body is probably the best understood today. But even there, you know, most people understand you have to move your body. You have to stay reasonably fit.

You have to eat recently well. Don't overdo it with alcohol. Alcohol is a neurotoxin and other substances. I also would like to mention that. But there are some things like sleep that's very little known for years. I thought sleep is for weak people, you know. But now that we all have these wonderful devices that can measure what's really happening to you, it's really fascinating to see how sleep alters your capabilities, you know.

So that's good. breathing is the power drug. I mean, the ultimate power drug. Super. Everybody breathers. It's easy to learn. You do it anyway, you know, until the last day. So why don't you use it more effectively and to get oxygen into your body and to calm your nerves? It does multiple things, you know. And then on the emotional side, I think the fundamental thing is to understand emotions are inside of you. So it's not like, oh my God, I'm angry. I'm angry because this happened. No, you, you, you, you decide to become angry and allow this because you allow this trigger to make you angry, right? You have the absolute option to sit there and say, this does not affect me. I mean, it affects me mildly. I will not allow this to happen. I will not allow this emotion to affect me.

And also that's important. And then there are obviously very strong emotions that we also don't talk about and almost overlooked that. Isn't that sad to say love? You know, love is the most powerful in positive as well as negative ways, emotion. And also the interesting thing is there are ways, you know, how you can exert it and also how you can gratify yourself by gratitude. If you do something for others, whether they know or not, I think you usually feel good about it and it gives you positive energy, you know. So those are things, you could call them little tricks, you know, but little tricks that go and you don't need any money for it, you can do all kinds of things, hold the door

open, say a nice word to somebody, random acts of kindness, I call this, you know. So I enjoy it. I'm a big fan of random acts of kindness, you know. And then on the mindset side, I mean, I always tell the story, which I, because I feel it's so clear, it's of the old shoemaker, who has two sons, he wants to pass on his business, but he doesn't know which of the son has it. So he sends them to Africa, one to the west goes, one to the east goes, one to the east goes. The first one who goes to the East Coast writes him a note and it says, Father, I have very bad news. There's no market here. They are all barefoot. The other one sends a note bag and says, Father, send me as many shoes as you can find. This market is

endless. Everybody is barefoot. I do believe that one of the traits of really good leaders is in the mindset part. I mean, as in others also, but very strongly in the mindset part. I know that some of the top folks have trained themselves to always look to the contrarian side. Whether you then adopt it or not, it's a different thing, you know, but to force yourself to say, okay, this is common wisdom, but is there another way to look at it, you know? I look at leaders, not by them explaining to me what went wrong in the past, why they couldn't make their numbers, but explaining to me what is going to happen. I say, I want my leaders to look around the corner.

that is the skill of re-leadership usually you know your business so well that you see things much earlier than others that others don't see you when when it's common wisdom you know what even children can see it but because it's in every paper you know but you see it i mean jeff bezos i mean he named his company he named his company amazon after the largest river on this planet because his idea from day one on he wanted to create an e-commerce company that is the largest river of goods you know, on this planet and throughout his life, this was the vision. Boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, you know. So that's on the mindset side and then the spiritual side. It's another one of those things that never gets talked about. I mean, to have a belief in a higher being is giving you strength. So, I mean, it's your decision whether you want that or not, you know, but I can tell you from my own experience having been challenged often and early, it was a very good decision that I have that belief. We tend to bring not the data, but the drama. Instead of like this is the fact that happened.

I got the rejection. I got the whatever. Like that is the fact. But now you're creating this whole story and drama around I'm never going to be hired. I'm too old. I'm not relevant. Like you create this entire world of drama. I think you said it so beautifully.

It's not the challenges that stop us. It's the beliefs around these challenges. It's that fact that now is this belief, now we're not taking action because we're thinking, again, about the drama instead of like, okay, is there an actually put? potential, right? Like, what is going on here? You had a post on LinkedIn that basically said, hey, gone fishing. You know, like, I'm basically, you know, a salute, right, for a while. But then I said also that I don't shut off, you know. Exactly. Exactly. Because again, you will find your own ways to recharge and what fuels you. But I think there's some shame. And I want

you to help me cut to the shame, Klaus, because you've done all the things. You've been a CEO. been investor, chairman, da-da-da-da-da, author now, like you've done all the things and still there's no shame in saying, I'm going to recharge. Bye. Asteroigo, right? How should a person that is trying to create more of themselves and be relevant and work harder and how did they do that? Yeah, I put bygone fishing in there, but to explain exactly that the thing that is not commonly admitted. You know, today people say, oh, you know, you have to completely do to the digital detox. I can do it. I mean, because I remember at times, you know, when I couldn't that easy to get hold of my office. And then I came back after one or two weeks somewhere. And

all this stuff had happened. And I thought, my God, I wish I had never been away from my desk. You know, in my view, this is more liberating, you know, if done right. You know, so obviously, I have an office and the office knows, knows how to prioritize and that they just reduce the workload on me. So, so I will not, I mean, for a time there, I will not work with the same workload, but I will not completely disconnect. That's what completely stressed me out, completely stress me out. Frankly, also, if you are in a normal business to completely disconnect, you know, very difficult, very difficult. If the higher you rise, I think, I think it's almost impossible, really almost impossible, right?

So I think that's more natural, and you have to find a way how you still recharge, you know, and my routines, those times I can do more things that recharge me, but I also, in my normal life, will have times of recharge. You know, it's not like, hey, here is business, here's life, and only then will I do that. So it's rather a normal process. One of the best advice I ever got from a friend when I became CEO, by the way, who said, Klaus, you now have to, every beginning of the year, lock in vacation times, you know, and into your calendar.

And I said, why? He said, do it, because otherwise you will never be able to go anywhere, do anything. And I did that. And he was right. I never took all the times that I put in there, you know, but at least you have some periods where you can say, hey, let's go for a long weekend, let's do this, you know. Let's spend a night in the opera, you know, let's go with the kids someplace, you know. If I wouldn't have blocked that, you know, all the stuff that's happening overrides it and you suddenly, your life has been eaten up, eaten up and you allow others to run your life instead of yourself.

And I love that because I think there's a reason why on planes they tell us to put our own oxygen mask on, right? If we don't have our own oxygen mask on, we can't take care of not the teams, not people around us, not right? Like, it's just impossible. I love this conversation. I think it is very, very, very. missing from the world of wah-wah-wah, let's do it. So you do have the too extreme, like

the huah-ha, let's do it and the complete detox, but you don't have, let's just prioritize, you know, like our own things are important for us and just make them work because you can have it all just not at the same time. So let's just kind of prioritize in a way that keeps our sanity.

Yeah, exactly. But I think both sides, I mean, I think that rah-rah, let's go, let's go, and we're going to fight it and we're going to win. The sprint is even strong. Even stronger, if you go at it, relax. You've had your time. It's also interesting that people should not think about it. If I do a sprint, let's say, for two days, that I need two days of rest.

That's not the way it works. You sometimes have routines. I mean, in tennis, they have this routine that every top tennis player has rehearsed until the end, you know, that during the surf, 20 seconds, maximum time allowed. They have this routine where they literally have a movie going on through their mind that reframes them. reframes them, entirely reframes them, you know, and the moment the new serve comes, they are literally a different person, you know, so you can screw with your mind in a very positive way. And you should, you should learn these things. A friend of mine, you know, who works in Hong Kong, you know, in a high rise, he gives his cell phone to his assistant,

drives down with the elevator, walks around the block a couple of times, you know, enjoys a lovely noise and chaos in Hong Kong then moves up again, you know. And if somebody called the assistance there, yeah, he will come back in a few minutes. I call you back, blah, blah, blah. Then he gets on it. And that's reset. Others, I know, close the door and say, let me just close my eyes. I do a breathing exercise for 10 minutes.

And I guarantee you, 10 minutes, you'll be recharged, you know. So there's different things that happen. Some people just listen to a piece of music. You know, I'm a big music thing. For me, music, a big big thing. And I listen to one, three and a half minutes. the song, you know, and boom, I'm a changed person instead of plowing through, you know. So there's very, very different things that you should learn how to recharge and also learn

how to not exert energy when it's unnecessary. You don't have to respond aggressively, jump out of your chair. The Japanese do some of this very well. They just close their eyes. The higher up they are, you know, you see them sitting in the meetings like this. You never know, are they asleep or what, you know. Some are sleepy. That's true. But many just recharge listen you know with your eyes closed you can actually listen better you know and become a super human performer oh this is so powerful close what would be one thing that you wish somebody told you way earlier in your career that would have shaped you taking me there like what do you think with something that would be really really hopeful for you well the the energy side i wish i had known

that earlier would have actually allowed me more you know to to do that and to do more or do it more relaxed probably. Other than that, I mean, the thing also, when you get into a CEO position, the biggest surprise for me was the amount of things that land on your desk. Because in reality, in most companies, I mean, all the crap that the people below you can't solve, they all land on your desk. And if you don't have a way to compartmentalize and stay sane, you get the impression as though this is a disaster zone that you're in, you know, sometimes it is, by the way, but that's

another story. Another story for another day, for sure. Sometimes I'm in the disaster zone. And that suddenly you don't have a boss, but you have a group as a boss, the board as a boss, you know, and that you suddenly go from talking to somebody who you know, you know what pressure points are there, you know what not to do and what to do. But with a board, you have group dynamics. And in group dynamics, I have only two stable states, and I've seen that many times. Either they love you or they want you gone. And the false belief that in these environments, it's all about performance and performance trumps everything, very false belief. Tell me more.

Well, in group dynamics, there are a lot of variables that people consider important for a decision, right? So, and many of those might be very personal and might have very little to do with, with the true performance, you know. So I work a lot with CEOs of companies these days. And I know that that is one of the things that many have gotten surprised by. And somehow fortunately realized that early enough and some have been struggling with it. But almost everybody is wondering what on earth is going on. And again, it sounds like the way you change your mindset, your belief, the way you recharge, all of this is what keeps you sane with all the things that you're involved today. Klaus, anything else that people, listeners should learn, should hear from you?

I think this point of purpose that we haven't talked about is one other thing. We have a little talked a little bit about it. And I actually used the book because I wanted to clarify for me, what is this magic thing with purpose? And because I always thought, have I gotten this right? And I hear so many people wonder, oh, I don't know what my purpose is, blah, blah, blah. I have a long chapter on this, you know, because purpose is the one. thing that humankind has struggled with since beginning, you know, and there are many, many intelligent people who have thought about it. I do believe it's worthwhile to reflect on it, to think about what gets you moving, what do you want to do. I mean, do a couple of reflections

on it. So I think that's important because purpose is this magic thing that brings everything together. And the other thing, you touched upon it a little bit before, it's this self-talk, you know, and I think most people, and that also comes with the reflection on purpose. To figure out what purposes you want to follow, you have to figure out who you are. And that sounds like simple, but in truth, you have to establish some observer in your mind who is able to distinguish between all these things that come up in your mind and which are your own thoughts and which are thoughts that have been coming from outside or somebody gave you and that you have adopted without even knowing it,

and they are not really yours and they have not benefited. They have not benefited you. So to go through is kind of a systematic filtering process on saying, well, is that really me? You know, it doesn't matter if it came from somebody else and it's good, yeah, and you like it, go for it, you know. But if it came from somebody else who sneaked it in, you know, and it is a limiting belief that has been following you all of your life, you know,

then you rather throw it out the door quickly and give it a kick and never see it again. This is important. I see this again and again, when you hear the self-talk, and you very often, when you talk to people, you hear it in the words that they choose, you know, and how they frame themselves, which often is limiting that they say, well, I believe I can only do this. I'm good at this, you know, and very often you say, why do you think you cannot be good at that? Well, I never tried it out or I've been told, you know, in my youth, blah, blah, blah, and so, well. is it really true yeah exactly is it really true you know that is super important and the other thing which is goes more into what i call the auto game is the question of how do you multiply yourself because frankly there's one thing that you can achieve but it's even better if you can build a high performance team and work with a team i am an addict of high performance teams and i've experienced fortunately many many times in my life that i've been able to work in a team or even build up a high performance team and achieve things that I would have never in my life achieved

on my own, right? And how do you, how do you build this? Because there is a relatively simple mechanism to do that. How do you build that? And I would highly recommend the higher you rise, you know, make sure that you look at your team, not just as I lead my team and I'm the smartest man in the room, but I really want to create a high performance team that goes through thick and thin, you know, and where people basically have trust, have a commitment. and are lined around what winning looks like. That's another interesting thing. Many times people don't understand.

What is it really that we want? I mean, their KPIs are 500 KPIs. You can't figure it out. But what is it? What is one thing that winning looks like? And also that's the cool thing about sports and sports. Everybody knows there's the goal. You have to shoot through there.

That's when we win. But in business, when you ask, I have had many times that people say, oh, my team is not really behind me. when I talk to the team and say, well, what do you think winning looks like? I get 500 different views, you know, because the leader has not expressed very clear. Yes, you have to do your part in it, but this is ultimately what we want to do. And in every special forces mission, you know, this is the goal. You have this task, you have that task, but the goal is this, right?

And that's important to build a team and be aligned around the goal. All these things are so, so critical. And I think it boils down. down, first of all, as a leader, is what to say no to. And I think that is so hard, right? Like, all the shiny objects sound really cool. Can we all go all of them? Right? And I think as a leader, like, the better you are at honing that and just saying, no, let's focus here. The more your team can actually go after that. But I think you said another thing that I want to talk about purpose. So, and again, in Leap Academy, we have a lot. Basically, that's what we do. We help people reinvent themselves,

figure out what is the zone of genus, what are the must-haves, right? And I think one of the interesting thing is, first of all, that many, many times it's scary or it's uncool to admit what their new passion is or what their new purposes, right? Because it's not aligned with what their parents expected or what, you know, people expected from them or whatever it is. Like, it's the uncool thing to say. The other thing is there's this myth about this is going to be your passion. The problem is that when you're experimenting with something new,

you don't know if it's your passion yet. You didn't stack enough evidence to say that this is your passion. You think that it could be interesting. You think it's worth exploring and maybe experimenting. But when you're expected to fall in love with this, I didn't fall in love with the idea of Leap Academy until it became one of the fastest-going companies in America. You know what I'm saying?

Like, you don't fall in love until you have, like, stacking the evidence. But I think this is also where this is an era of every, you know, successful person will probably have multiple streams of ventures, incomes, things that they care about. And sometimes it's for something that you're passionate about. Sometimes it's something that creates income. Sometimes it's something that creates status, volunteering, whatever. I think we're looking at a whole different level of future of careers and education and the way we're looking at life. What are your thoughts around? This is very good that you bring this up because I think that that is a misunderstanding, particularly of young people.

And I've heard this, unfortunately, as career advice way too often. And I think it's wrong. You know, look for your passion is a very difficult, a very difficult one. Because if I look at my life, my passion was not to refill supermarket tracks. No way. No way. My passion also was not to turn around companies. I had no passion for this, you know.

However, my indicator was always, where can I create a lot of value? And do I think that I can do this and let me try this out? And then I realized I was very good at it. And the moment you are good at it, you suddenly get this, you know, reinforcement. It's fun. Maybe it is my passion. It's really fun. It's really fun.

I like it. You know, and why do I like it? Because I have results. but go into something where you say, hey, this creates good value for society, you know, or for my company or for business, you know, and can I do something in this field where I think I probably have some skills? Try it out. I mean, there's this old rule of Malcolm Gladwell came out with, you know, and I think it's proven that I think a million times or so your repetitions of a million times under guidance, you know, which is true. I mean, I'm just listening to the Agassi autobiography and when you You see, I mean, how his father drove him, drove him through the tennis court from early childhood on and had the idea of this will be number one. There was no passion. Well, he had hate. He admits it was a hate, you know.

But he became very good and he then enjoyed it. You know, he also admits he enjoyed it. He hated it, but he enjoyed it. Passion is a different, different ballgame there, you know. And I think they allowed him to lead a very fulfilled life, you know. I'm not saying that as a father. You should drive your kid like this. That's not what I was saying, you know.

just to clarify. Well, my daughter will kick me out the door if I'll try. So, you know, I mean. Yeah, but there are some cultures where this is still quite acceptable. That's true. They do have their own, their own spirit, though. Klaus, this was so, so, so fun. I can probably talk to you for five more hours.

Seriously, this was so, so, so great. And so many nuggets. And folks, if you hear something that you love, write us like it makes our day. Klaus, thank you for being on the show. Well, Ilana, it was a pleasure, really, and you made it fun as a host. I enjoyed the conversation, really very, very much. And I hope that the listeners will also do so. I hope you enjoyed this as much as I did.

If you did, please share it with friends. Now, also, if you're feeling stuck or simply want more from your own career, watch this 30-minute free training at leapacademy.com slash training. That's leapacademy.com slash training. See you in the next episode of the Leap Academy with Ilan and Golan Show.