Today, it takes effort to keep things this way, given the number of constituents exerting influence on the team and I. I try to keep my aggression under control with help of music and sometimes just walking alone. This helps me focus on the issue rather than people. On most days, I am able to shut shop by 7:00 pm. Over the weekends, I rarely spend more than a few hours working. There are exceptions and on such weekends I try to devote one day to the family. While I treat listening to music as a great stress-buster, I have developed nature photography as my passion. These two habits help me keep stress at bay.

Using my experience with stress management, I try to help my team with their stress. I also recommend leading by example. A word of caution though, stress cannot be an excuse for non-performance.

-As told to Gunjan Trivedi

Nip It in the Bud

CIOs aren't just made of people with great technology and man management skills. It's not just about beating project deadlines. It's also about accepting that some things can't be avoided. Certain things are inevitable - like stress. It's how you deal with it that differentiates you.

Eicher Motors', DGM & Head-IT Ajay Khanna, doesn't let stress build up. "The best way to handle stress is to take it head on, analyze the situation and the take necessary steps to deal with it immediately," he says.

Which is exactly what he did when a stressful situation screamed for attention. "We were observing strange network and application problems - stuff we had never anticipated or observed in the past. But, a positive attitude and a confident team helped in resolving the crisis and completing the activity - in time," says Khanna.

He believes in handling stress pragmatically. And for him taking frequent but short vacations is one way of approaching it. "At times it becomes difficult to spend time on a regular basis with my family, more so if I have been travelling or have been involved in critical projects. I prefer taking a break once in a quarter to spend some quality time with them and create work-life balance," he says.

When stress begins to take its toll, Khanna turns to Reiki. "I learnt Reiki on the behest of a friend. I started feeling better. While we attempt to combat stress by diverting our attention to other activities, our bodies silently absorb stress. This starts damaging our body over the long run. High blood pressure, headaches, arthritis, back pain and diabetes are some of the outcomes of stress. Reiki helps to remove this unknown accumulation of stress thereby cleansing the body and the mind," he says.

If that doesn't work, there's always Khanna's favorite hobby: cooking. "I enjoy making vegetable and chicken salads and garlic cheese breads. My favorite is making vegetable cheese omelettes which I learnt while observing a chef in Shanghai," he says.

-By Kanika Goswami

Take the Silent Monster Racing

Sleep wasn't peaceful anymore. For Animesh Singh, VP-IT Operations at Brickred, there was no mercy, work pressure kept mounting, he was getting crushed under it and there was no escape.

"I was becoming very temperamental, irritated and irrational - and I knew it. My mood swings were becoming common. I felt tired and low a lot of the time," he remembers.