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Why Everyone Wants a Piece of You
One of the curses of being a physician is that everybody wants you. Everyone, all the time.
You're a smart, high-energy person who asks good questions and figures out problems lickety split.
You've got roles and responsibilities piled chin high. You don't remember saying yes to them, but you also don't remember saying no.
- So at work, everyone wants you to be on their committee or to come to their meeting.
- And in your home life, the PTA wants you, the board of the library wants you, everybody in the community wants you to ... and pretty soon you're overextended.
Let's get you back in balance
In this episode, I'm going to show you the number one life balance skill of all physicians and physician leaders
How to say NO with elegance and grace.
I'm going to show you exactly how and when to say a kind, respectful, empathetic NO - with a word-for-word script. By the end of today's lesson, you're going to be an expert in that two-letter life balance Power Word: N - O .... NO.
In this post, you'll discover a proven method to say NO with elegance and grace.
I'm also going to show you the secret agent decoder ring that will tell you WHEN to say NO and when to say YES. This is one of our ninja skills, a high-level life balance power tool for physician leaders.
To help us teach this skill and to help you learn and practice it, we've given it a shorthand name:
Quick No, Slow Yes.
When you say no, you say no quick. When you say yes, you say yes super slow. I'll show you exactly what I mean, and it's most effectively wielded once you know what your ideal job description is.
The Secret Decoder Ring to Saying No (or Yes) With Confidence
I shared the Ideal Job Description Process two posts back. If you haven't had a chance to do it, go back HERE after this and get started on your Ideal Job Description.
But don’t stop now. You can go back and get clear on your ideal job description in a second. Let's practice saying NO here and now.
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Please understand that your clarity on your Ideal Job Description is the secret agent decoder ring that can tell you whether to say YES or NO to any inbound request for your time and energy - both at work and at home.If you do not have a written Ideal Job Description at this time please go back to this blog post - after you are done with this NO lesson - and begin the process of creating one. It's the key to taking back your job, your practice, your career, and your life.
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Anytime anyone asks you to take on any role responsibility or time commitment:
Compare their request to your Ideal Job and Life Description.ASK YOURSELF:
If I say yes to their request, would that commitment be consistent with my ideal job description?
~ If NO - let me show you how to say a QUICK NO.
Right there on the spot. No hemming, no hawing, no maybe. A clean quick respectful NO and you're done.~ If MAYBE or YES - Never Say YES In the Moment.
You need to sleep on it and check it out with your family before you can commit. Let me show you how to deploy the SLOW YES protocol. So that every YES you say gets you closer to your ideal job, practice, career and life.
The Power of a Quick No
Once you have your ideal job, life, and career description, you can now use that as a sifting and sorting tool when people ask you to make new commitments.
We talked previously about decommitting when you're overextended, and hopefully, you've been able to do that and benefit from it.
But what about the continued requests that people make of you? Because you're smart, bright, hardworking, a helper, and a healer, people know it’s hard for you to say no.
So here’s how Quick No works. Let’s say someone asks:
“Hey, Dike, you want to be on the tumor board? We’d really love to have you, and man, you’d be awesome.” (with a big thumbs up)
- I know the tumor board is not in my ideal practice description.
- So I am going to deliver a QUICK NO
“Hey John, I’m really honored by the invitation. That really means a lot to me that you would ask me. I want you to know, I'm very careful about how I manage my time and my priorities. I set my priorities every quarter, and the Tumor Board isn't on my list.
Because it's not a priority I won't be able to play my role on the board at 100%. , so I'm clearly not the best person for this position.
My answer is NO. (do NOT apologize)
Good luck in finding someone to take that position. Again, I’m honored that you asked.”
I acknowledge saying NO can feel quite uncomfortable at first. Let me assure you, your family and your spirit will be much happier when you learn this skill
Practice. Practice. Practice. Because practice makes ......... BETTER.
Stand up and read it out loud right now. Rehearse with your significant other or a colleague until it feels comfortable. Go ahead, it is actually easier than learning to ride a bike.
Make sure that when you know it’s a NO, you say NO quickly so they can go find someone else and you can get on with your life.
The Discipline of a Slow Yes
What if someone asks you to participate in something that does sound interesting? That’s where Slow YES comes in.
Let’s say someone asks:
“Dike, I want you to be on the archaeological dig committee of the downtown church. That church has been there since 1598, and we need someone to make sure we don’t lose any ancient artifacts.”
That sounds cool. I might be interested. But I never jump in immediately. Now that I have my ideal job description, I give them a slow yes:
“Wow, Fred, that sounds really interesting, and I think I might be interested. However, what I do when people ask me to do something that might be interesting is I sleep on it, check it out with my family, and compare it to my other priorities.
hat way my family and I can understand whether the Dig Committee is a good fit with our priorities and I can give you the time and energy this project deserves.
So I’ll go back and talk to my family and look at my priorities. I’ll get back to you in… (wait for it)… two weeks.”
And never use less than two weeks. Give yourself time. Go back, look at what's on your ideal life list, speak to your family, and make sure this is a commitment they would support.
Why? Because if you don’t, you’ll wake up at 5 AM on a Tuesday to go to the tumor board, and your spouse will say, “What? You never told me about the tumor board! What am I, chopped liver?”
Make sure you take it home, run it by the important people in your life, and then you can give a clean, confident YES.
The Key to Boundaries: Rehearse, Rehearse, Rehearse
Quick NO, Slow YES.
And the only way you can do this effectively is by knowing what your Ideal Job, Practice, Career, Life Description looks like. That’s your bullseye to aim yourself at and the compass needle that shows you your true north.
Please notice that this process give you gives you your personal description of an ideal life. It's uniquely tailored to meet your needs. It is NOT someone else's cookie cutter idea of what you SHOULD be doing.
If this feels new or uncomfortable, reead it again it until it makes sense.
The key is rehearse, rehearse, rehearse because as a smart, hardworking person, you will always get inbound requests. Everyone wants you on their committee, in their meeting, on their project.
But you don’t have to say yes to everything.
Master Quick No, Slow Yes and take control of your time and energy.
If you haven’t already created your ideal job description, go back to this blog post and get started.
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PLEASE LEAVE A COMMENT
How did your first NO ... go?