Do you have a strategy for saying NO?

Do you like making choices?

Saying yes to one thing often means saying no to something else. And most people don’t like to limit their options, especially when the stakes are high. 
I was working with an executive team on their strategy. They had trouble narrowing their target market. They didn’t want to eliminate any potential customers. Therein lies the problem. When you’re trying to please everyone, you dilute your focus.

Strategy is about making choices. Be they work choices or life choices. It requires saying no to some things, so you can say yes, in a big way, to things that will pay off.

If you want to be excellent at the most important priorities, you have to say no to things that could potentially be good.

One of my mentors, Regena Thomashaur (known as Mama Gena who runs amazing programs for women) says, “I’m only responsible to 3 things at a time (my book, my kid, my biz) and everything else goes by the wayside. Right now is not a good time for me to start French lessons. Or add on another course. Or throw a dinner party.”

Think about your own work and life, are you trying to be good at everything? Are you trying to please all your customers? Or do you know where you should laser-focus?

In the case of my banking client, I asked them, “If you and two of your best people had one week to do nothing but focus on a single group of customers, who would they be and why?

Their answers revealed which types of customers were most valuable.

Strategy is about where you place your bets. A good strategy is not a plan describing how you’re going to do everything. It’s about choosing where you want to invest the most time and resources.

When you have a clear strategy – for work or life – it makes it easier to say no to choices that don’t align with your goals. It also gives you the fortitude to push through when something really matters.

Thomashaur describes a recent experience, “I was in the middle of the height of teaching season. Ten days after teaching an intensive in New York, I was headed to Paris to greet my advanced students for their final intensive there.

In between those huge events might not have seemed like the best time to fly to Los Angeles and take my daughter to look at colleges. But, she is my number one. And (I am so proud!) she got accepted in her top two choices of universities that happen to be on opposite coasts. So, no there was no decision there. We jumped on a plane and headed to Cali.

Thomashaur, who has written several books and runs the school of Womanly Arts to help women take more pleasure in life says, “Was I exhausted? Yup. Overcommitted? Absolutely. Yet, I found my joy in pushing through because there is so much pleasure in showing up to mama my kid, and getting her set up for this huge next chapter of her life.”

It takes courage to say yes, and it takes courage to say no.

A good strategy is one that forces you to make choices about where you want to focus. It gives you power. When you try to choose everything, you only wind up draining yourself, and you never get a foothold into the markets (or goals) that matter most to you.