Setting Priorities: Saying Yes to
Something is Saying No
to Something Else

By Vicki Wrona, PMP

Whether I am working with new or seasoned employees or managers, I often see a misunderstanding of the consequences of saying “yes”. As Stever Robbins said in one of his Quick and Dirty Tips, “Saying no has real consequences. Saying yes does, too. We’re often way too scared of the consequences of no and not nearly scared enough of the consequences of yes.”

I learned pretty early in my career and as a business owner that saying yes to something might keep me from being able to say yes to other, more desirable things later on. It doesn’t always stop me from saying yes to things I maybe shouldn’t have, but I try. I keep this in mind on both personal and work decisions, especially when selecting or running projects and balancing the desire to do as good a job as I can do with the ability to deliver to all the promises within the constraints of time, money, people, etc.

This is a key life skill to develop. On projects, this is a crucial skill. Without it, we as Project Managers will not be able to consistently and successfully meet stakeholder expectations and deliver project success, since the wish list is always larger than time and money can allow. As Kathy Martucci writes in Goldplating: A Dilemma for the Over-Achiever, goldplating is appealing, and avoiding it by learning to say no is “a bitter pill for us baby-boomer over-achievers to swallow”.

In this Projects At Work interview, the mindset of IT departments and their ability to deliver is explored. Unfortunately, IT is seen as a service provider in many organizations, limiting the ability of IT (or at least their perceived ability) to say no to some requests, blocking better prioritization of resources and effort. According to the interview, “It is not a literal ‘no’ but involves being selective in when to say ‘yes.’  IT needs to create a more collaborative and ‘two-way’ relationship with the business.”

A quote by Stephen Covey states this well. He says, “You have to decide what your highest priorities are and have the courage – pleasantly, smiling, non-apologetically – to say ‘no’ to other things. And the way to do that is by having a bigger ‘yes’ burning inside.”

Creating a “Not To Do” list may help you free up time and energy. Dave Crenshaw offers some tips on how to do this in this video. Tim Ferriss, author of The Four-Hour Work Week writes, “Not to do lists are often more effective than to-do lists for upgrading performance. The reason is simple: what you don’t do determines what you can do.”

On projects, it is just as necessary to define what will not be done as what will be done within the definition of the project. We use a tool called the Is/Is Not table to accomplish this. For ideas on items to include on a personal Not To Do list, go to Silvia Mordini’s article Not To Do List: 15 Habits to Stop Now.

One way to learn the consequences of saying yes and the real impact of saying no (vs. the imagined impact) is found in this LinkedIn article by Beth Kanter – Productivity Hacks: Keep a “No Thanks” Journal.

According to Dr. Oz, saying no is one of the five things that happy people do. That’s an incentive to learn this crucial life skill!

For tips on how to deliver the presumably bad news of a no answer, check out, How to Deliver Bad News: 3 Techniques.

I have given you a number of resources to explore this topic. What have you done to learn how to say no effectively? How have you made it part of your natural decision-making process?