Co-author to Trump emphasizes workplace sanity

When Riverdale resident Tony Schwartz needs to replenish his energy, he ballroom dances. That gives him more than just an opportunity to pass the time. It creates a feeling of renewal, something Mr. Schwartz considers an invaluable key to success.

“Human beings are designed to move between spending and renewing energy. There is a point at which you push people so hard that instead of their becoming more productive, they actually become less productive,” he said.

Mr. Schwartz’s company, The Energy Project, specializes in teaching businesses and employees how to allow for renewal throughout the workday in order to optimize efficiency and productivity. He has called on his expertise  to write a number of books, including one with mogul and Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump.

During conversations, though, Mr. Schwartz tends to shy away from discussing that collaboration.

“The core principle is that you have an inner life and then an outer life. You do stuff and then stuff happens inside you. We put all our attention on the outer life and very little attention on the inner life. We put a lot of attention on the what and very little attention on the how,” Mr. Schwartz explained.

“We are in the business of systematically helping people spend more time feeling their best and less time feeling their worst,” he continued. “We’re trying to take the science of performance and apply it in a practical way to changing how people feel.”

Since launching in 2003 in two duplexes off Johnson Avenue and West 238th Street, The Energy Project has worked with some of the country’s biggest companies to create environments that emphasize quality over quantity.

He cited an occasion when The Energy Project trained several hundred employees from the financial firm Ernst & Young to reconsider the way they worked during the day. Renewal came in forms varying from visits to the gym in the afternoon to phone calls with the family back home. Within the first few months of the collaboration, Mr. Schwartz said the turnover rate for the workers at Ernst & Young fell to zero.