Pick and choose what you will say “yes” or “no” to wisely – and do it early and guilt-free – if you want to maintain your sanity.
We ALL know how busy we are. We have a million things to do and cannot get all of them done. I almost dread when people ask me how I am doing or what I’m doing, or worse, that they want to have a meeting on something. I either have to get into a too-long explanation of everything so I seem credible or tell them nothing. It’s easier nine times out of 10 to just say, “I’m super busy,” or, “It’s crazy right now.”
For example, I have three board meetings/company events all colliding at the same time this September combined with teaching that week. I will not get out of my teaching obligation unless I can’t get out of bed from illness. I cannot do all of these meetings, each in a different place in the country. Something will have to give.
When we are this busy, we have got to be extremely careful in terms of the things we say we can do or the commitments we will make. It’s all about priorities. What is the most important use of our time? And who can we let down by not being there? How understanding will they be? Sure, we are all adults. But will they get their feelings hurt or be mad at us? And keep in mind, I’m not talking about balancing work and family stuff here. It’s all work and only work I am talking about.
I think many of us who are owners and leaders in our businesses find ourselves in this situation too often. Many times we exacerbate it by not confronting the problem straight away. We delay making a decision on what we can and can’t do and that just increases the odds someone will be upset with us and makes the stress of it all worse. So one piece of advice is don’t mislead anyone and if you know you can go, state that right away.
Another piece of advice is you have to ask yourself if you really are essential to this proposed gathering or not. Maybe you don’t want to feel left out but really don’t need to be there? Or maybe your ego says you want to feel wanted but really don’t need to be there? Or maybe the people you think will be upset if you say you can’t do it are really only asking you because they don’t want you to feel left out but would be just as happy if you didn’t come? You have to be honest with those asking as well as yourself here.
In any case, human cloning isn’t happening yet (to our knowledge, at least), so you can only be in one place at a time. Pick and choose what you will say “yes” or “no” to wisely – and do it early and guilt-free – if you want to maintain your sanity!
Mark Zweig is Zweig Group’s chairman and founder. Contact him at mzweig@zweiggroup.com.