Stressful at the top? Not really, study finds

[bemildred]

Management consultants say 60% of senior executives experience high stress and anxiety on a regular basis, and a thriving industry of motivational speakers teaches business leaders how to manage their corrosive burden of stress. But just how uneasy lies the head that wears the crown?

Not so uneasy, it turns out.

A new study reveals that those who sit atop the nation's political, military, business and nonprofit organizations are actually pretty chill. Compared with people of similar age, gender and ethnicity who haven't made it to the top, leaders pronounced themselves less stressed and anxious. And their levels of cortisol, a hormone that circulates at high levels in the chronically stressed, told the same story.

The source of the leaders' relative serenity was pretty simple: control.

http://www.latimes.com/news/science/la-sci-leadership-stress-20120925,0,524384.story

[DavidDvorkin]

1. Control plus big paychecks.

[Blue_Tires]

5. and the ability to make sure there is a subordinate 'fall guy'

to blame/fire in case of scandal...

[RC]

2. Plus having psychopathic tendencies helps.

[bemildred]

3. Indeed, no troubling nuances to disturb your rest. nt

[ChazInAz]

4. Ontrol, indeed.

How sweet it is no longer having someone above you, pounding you down like a nail when you poke your head up. Even sweeter to be the hammer, and keep everyone under you beaten down to the same, unthreatening level.