Finding the
How Suzy Welch’S 10-10-10 evolved from a survival
mecHanism for frantic moms into a national best-seller
Sometimes an “aha”
moment needs to
percolate a little while
before it’s ready to
serve. For journalist,
author and speaker Suzy
Welch, the core idea for
her book 10-10-10 was
bubbling away for more
than a decade before it
appeared in hardcover.
10-10-10
The 10-10-10 technique breaks decision
making into 10-minute, 10-month
and 10-year time frames, thereby
illuminating the consequences of an
action in the near-, middle- and long-term. As Welch relates in the book, the
idea was sparked during a disastrous
business trip to Hawaii during which
her two children escaped day camp and
appeared in hula skirts at the back of the
auditorium where she was presenting.
What would eventually become the 10-
10-10 concept began as a way to inject
big-picture perspective into a life filled
with in-the-moment chaos.
“In its earliest stages, 10-10-10
was just a survival mechanism,” she
says. “But it worked so well that I had
to share it. What do frantic working
mothers do? They talk to each other.
When I’d see a colleague at work
freaking out about something, I’d
mention it.” For several years, the inner
circle of 10-10-10ers was confined to
Welch’s sisters, friends and coworkers.
Indeed, the first time she really dug
into the mechanics of the technique was
in 2006, when she wrote about it for O,
The Oprah Winfrey Magazine. “I’d been
using it for nine years at that point,”
she says, “As a columnist writing for an
audience of millions of readers, I really
needed to deconstruct it.
The avalanche of positive responses
proved its efficacy in ways that Welch
had never dreamed—entrepreneurs,
educators, welfare mothers and lawyers wrote in to tell their stories. She
also heard questions that she needed
to address.
“People would say things like, ‘But I
don’t know what my life is going to be
like in 10 years,’” she says. “I needed to
be proactive about explaining that it’s
not what you think your life is going to
be like in 10 years as much as the life
you want to create in 10 years based on
your values.”
