Sunday Email - The Power of Saying No

Read time: ~5.30 minutes

Happy Sunday!

Every Sunday I offer strategies for the week ahead and a thought to fuel your action.

It was the early 1980’s.

Apple was on the verge of creating something extraordinary.

The problem? They didn’t quite know what that “special” product would be.

Pulled in three different directions, each project had merits and drawbacks.

One project was the current revenue generator for the business, but it may not be the future revenue generator.

Another project was the company's future vision in Steve Jobs's mind.

But the third project was consuming a great deal of resources and time within the company. The potential of the project was high. But the results had not been realized, yet.

Apple was strained, with no clear focus on a singular vision.

Steve Jobs had to make a decision.

Leander Kahney wrote in his book “Inside Steve’s Brain” that "One of Jobs's favorite mantras at Apple is: "Focus means saying no.””

Now, it was a point for Jobs to follow through in his own words.

He had to decide:

• Roll down today's revenue generator to focus on the future.

• Keep committing resources to the project with tremendous upside or accept sunk cost?

• Invest in an idea that is believed by the founder to be the future

Many people struggle to let go. More people struggle to say no to ideas.

In Apple’s situation, saying no meant giving up on a project or a potential company-changing idea.

They accepted the sunk costs and let a highly touted project die. Instead, they invested their time and resources into the founders’ idea of the future.

That project was the Macintosh, which launched in 1984 and became a revolutionary product that changed the course of personal computing.

Focus means saying no. Focus is necessary to create change. Focus is essential for creating impact.

Too often, we try many different tactics to help us become more focused.

Yet the simplest and most effective lies in the two simple letters… N O.

The research for this post was as much about providing a unique perspective to the readers as it was helpful for me.

I’ve always struggled with saying no. My thirst for curiosity and desire to explore and learn new things lead me to say yes more than no.

And the idea that the following conversation, connection, the new idea, or the meeting will ignite the next big thing keeps me saying yes more than no.

But I’ve reached a tipping point. It’s time to get better at saying no. The greatest products and most influential leaders found their footing by saying no more than yes.

An inability to say no means that we are mortgaging our time. We are paying a dear cost for lack of focus and are constantly leveraging our time for others rather than ourselves.

To regain control of our lives and create more profound and more impactful value, we must improve at no. This is extremely challenging in an industry built around serving others.

Setting boundaries is a key to helping us start saying “no” more often.

We have grown up in a world that seeks harmony and connectedness. To achieve this, we feel we must say yes and avoid conflict.

We’ve been trained to only say no to drugs.

Our human instincts yearn for acceptance, and we feel that saying no will damage relationships and reject us from people.

Selfishness bubbles up in our minds when we think of saying no. The professional concerns that saying no means we lack commitment or value to the organization keep people saying yes, even when they should say no.

The world is busier than ever. We all have many balls in the air, and we are juggling. When we see others constantly doing despite the balls they are juggling, we feel an innate obligation to say yes.

Assertiveness is the skill that allows for more “no.”

Assertiveness is this cultural perception of being aggressive, selfish, self-centered, or rude.

Research shows that assertiveness is a struggle for most Americans.

Assertiveness is a middle ground on the spectrum of passivity and aggressiveness.

But just like the economy has booms and busts and struggles to find long-term equilibrium, so do we as humans.

When we say no via assertiveness, we internally struggle with cognitive dissonance.

Cognitive dissonance occurs when a person experiences a conflict between two or more cognitive elements: beliefs, attitudes or behaviors.

So, if we feel internally that we are helpful and cooperative, then it is hard for us to say “no.” There is a dissonance between what we believe (we are helpful and cooperative) and our actions (saying “no” and not being helpful and collaborative).

In order to overcome this we can do one of three things:

• Change cognitions: this means we change our feelings about something. In the example above, this would mean changing our belief that we are not helpful or cooperative.

• Add new cognitions: This waters down the conflict by adding more beliefs on top of the statement. For example, we could say that we are not helpful or cooperative when it comes to XYZ tasks or areas.

• Trivalize the importance: We could downplay the significance of the conflicting cognition. In the above example we could have this dissonance but say that it doesn’t matter, it’s a minor issue.

Boundaries are meant to give us space to internalize the situation. They are not meant to alienate people but rather focus on our own behaviors. So, an example of a time boundary could be that I will wait 24 hours before committing to anything, whether that is a friend asking me for a night out or a work-related request.

That’s a healthy boundary. An unhealthy boundary would be expecting someone to respond to us within 2 hours. because that is not something we control but rather puts a burden on another.

Healthy boundaries must also benefit you as opposed to being set in an attempt to get something from someone else. And boundaries don’t require reciprocity. For instance, we don’t set boundaries that say, “I will only respond within 12 hours if they provide me with a rationale for why I should.” That is an unhealthy boundary.

Finally, healthy boundaries need to be realistic. They can’t be blind to hope. For instance, we can’t say we will only work three days a week when hired to work five days a week. The intention of this boundary may be for mental health or to get more time with the family, but the expectation that this boundary can be met is unrealistic if you want to keep working.

To help with setting boundaries, we must also set our priorities. For some, these may be the values they live by. For others, this may be their focus.

If being sure to be home for dinner with the family every night is your core focus, then this can help drive boundaries—one of which is no meetings after 4pm. Thus, we now have a framework to say no.

And saying no doesn’t have to be rude or selfish. Instead, there needs to be a clear intention behind it.

Thus, with the above boundary, we can easily say no in a kind way when someone requests a meeting at 4:30. The response can be polite, clear, and grateful, with a brief explanation and an alternative.

Here’s an example of the response: “It’s really great to hear from you. I very much appreciate our relationship, but I can’t meet at 4:30 next week as I work to get home to be with my family for dinner each night. How about meeting next Thursday at 3 pm or 3:30 pm?”

This may upset someone, but we have to remember whether we are mortgaging our time or owning our time. If we spend our entire lives constantly increasing our debt, we will eventually fold. Whether that is burnout, family issues, or a lack of quality in our work, we can only have so much leverage.

As I said, writing this week's post was cathartic and helpful because I struggle mightily with saying no.

However, through this research, I’ve created my own plan, boundaries, and tactics to make it easier to say no.

One tactic is creating templated messages for email responses to kindly say no to requests. Thus, I don’t have to think about what to say or how to say it. I just use a template and send it off. This limits the cognitive dissonance and helps me overcome the challenges I have with assertiveness.

In addition, I’m instilling a 24-hour rule where I won’t say yes or no for 24 hours. Thus, I can understand what the commitment means to my goals and values. It gives me space. Otherwise, I will say yes now and then have to backtrack or mortgage my time.

Yes, we are a services-based business. We need to be readily available to meet our client’s needs. However, a simple policy of responding within 24 hours isn’t the end of your business.

Your clients set boundaries for their lives, and we should as well. Otherwise, things may be worse for our clients because our focus may diminish, and they surely don’t want that.

“The difference between successful people and very successful people is that very successful people say 'no' to almost everything." -Warren Buffett

A Thought To Ponder This Week

Webvan flopped.

Instacart has had success.

Yet, both companies are essentially the same service.

One was early. The other benefitted from time and continued innovations.

An idea's success or an industry's evolution is not linear.

They are more stepped or “S” shaped.

Where many inputs may lead to minimal value output. Eventually, however, that one input may change the trajectory of a company forever.

Changes in our industry won’t happen linearly.

It will take time.

Just because a trend is muted for a period of time doesn’t mean that it will disappear forever.

Regulation, technology, and new opportunities can all reignite a formerly bad idea into a game-changing idea.

So, as we head into the week, find inspiration for innovation in your business by looking at something that didn’t work in the past but may have potential today. It could be the thing that accelerates your business.

The best is ahead!

-Matt