If You Can’t Say “No”, You Can’t Lead And Won’t Grow

I was in a session last week with a team of young executives who were talking about and sharing key strategies for being successful not only as a young executive but also as one in a young and growing company. Some critical themes emerged from the conversation:

1. Managing yourself, your stress, your emotions, and your energy
2. Managing your time, attention, and priorities
3. Investing in relationships at all levels of the company
4. Focusing on strategy to guide the company and maximize value creation

These are hard to argue with, but in my experience, they are even harder to consistently invest in in the face of the tyranny of the urgent in a young company.

The Urgency Flywheel

As I listened to the conversation, I could sense many in the room were thinking the same. They were nodding in agreement with the importance of these themes, but I suspected some already felt consumed by their roles. Some were already feeling what I call an urgency flywheel (a.k.a. putting out fires all day) that makes these intentional investments harder and harder to make as the flywheel picks up speed. The things that are often most valuable and require the most intentionality lose priority in the face of the perceived urgent.

In the short term, this can be reality. But, over the medium term, this is bad for the business and bad for their career growth.

If you are on this flywheel today and you can’t get off, you’ll likely still be on it in 12 months. The company will have grown and evolved around you, but you’ll still just be firefighting.

I knew it was important for the group to feel validated that there was a lot they can’t control in their current roles. Fires are part of young companies and often for young executives to handle. But, I also wanted to push them not to allow that to become an excuse for throwing out everything they just agreed was most important. In fact, the reality that they can’t control so much of their current role is exactly why they must control what they can.

Control What You Can Control

So, I quickly drafted 6 questions in the moment to push them to this level of boundary urgency – pushing them to control what they can control in the face of all of the noise and competing priorities around them.

1. How can you manage yourself when all you do all day is react to others?
2. How can you manage your time if everyone else owns it?
3. How can you cultivate relationships when you are in survival mode?
4. How can you think strategy when you are consumed by the tactical?
5. How can you maximize value for the company if this is what your work looks like?
6. How can you feel valuable, fulfilled and grow if this is what your work looks like?

Career Advice, Career Growth, leadership development, Leadership Skills, Leadership Tips