The Ultimate Rockefeller Habit

In 2004, biographer Ron Chernow (author of Hamilton, upon which the award-winning musical is based, Washington, and Grant) published the nearly one-thousand-page tome, Titan, The Life of John D. Rockefeller. As I read this book, I tripped over Rockefeller’s steadfast commitment to exercise. Chernow writes, “Extremely finicky about diet, rest, and exercise, he reduced everything to a routine and repeated the same daily schedule, forcing other people to fall in step with his timetable.”

Without context, one might think this quote describes a millennial entrepreneur leader in Silicon Valley with too much venture capital (and who is perhaps a little too into work-life balance and his Tesla). It’s not. This is John D. Rockefeller, in the late 1800s, running the largest organization the world had ever seen. Rockefeller was determined to build Standard Oil around his workouts.

Indeed, over the last three decades, an increasing body of literature suggests that our exercise fuels our performance in the workplace. On his podcast in 2020, Tim Ferris states, “If I think back on the hundreds of interviews on this podcast, whether it’s Bob Iger in the world of business heading Disney, or an athlete or otherwise; If you look at the people who have really performed at a high level for decades, weight training seems to be one of the constants.”  Writing in Harvard Business Review, Dr. Ron Friedman states, “Studies indicate that our mental firepower is directly linked to our physical regimen. And nowhere are the implications more relevant than our performance at work.”

Take home message: Channel your inner Rockefeller and commit to building your career, your business, or your craft around your workout. Doing so may just create a powerful win-win.