Protect Your Wellbeing with the Strategic "No"

Hello all,

Do you have trouble saying no? If you're anything like me...and I know I am...the answer is yes.

I've written about this before—but it keeps coming up as an issue for people in IT and IT related fields. The pressure to deliver is intense. The work never ends, the urgent gets conflated with the important, and the pace of change keeps increasing. Despite all our advances in programming and productivity and automation, we can't always keep up.

And what do we often sacrifice in our attempts to keep up? Our own wellbeing. And our long-term success depends on our long-term wellbeing. There are so many reasons for us to protect our time and energy for the tasks and people we value most, and yet we often find ourselves agreeing to things we'd rather not do.

So, we have to be the strategic project managers of our own lives. Being strategic in what we say yes to (assuming we have a choice!) also means being strategic in what we say no to!

There are some resources for us to review as we work to be more strategic in loading up our plates:

The No Club: "Putting a Stop to Women’s Dead-End Work. A practical, timely guide for bringing gender equity to the workplace: unburden women’s careers from work that goes unrewarded."

And here's a bonus Leadership 480 Podcast, where professor of organizational behavior, Laurie Weingart, author of "The No Club: Putting a Stop to Women's Dead-End Work," joins DDI to discuss why saying no at work is such a crucial skill for leaders, especially woman leaders.

Empowering women in tech to say “no”: "Women in tech today still face unique challenges, including the pressure to do more and the need to prove themselves. Simply put, there’s a ‘yes’ problem. Many women feel the need to say “yes” and often the assumption is that we will."

The Gentle Art of Saying “No” At Work: This resource from Cornell University can be one to printout and post in your workplace for regular reference!
"It can be difficult to say “no,” but it’s a critical skill if you are to protect your own priorities, time, and even your mental wellbeing. Saying “no” does not mean you’re rejecting the other person; it means that you’re turning down a specific request that the person is making of your time and energy."

Whatever strategies you use, I wish you all the best,

Holly