Mastering The Art of Saying No

Embark on a journey to dissect the art of saying 'no' with intention and clarity. Let's uncover the subtle intricacies of communication that can make or break a leader's relationship with their team. We've all been there—struggling to convey what we mean without sending the wrong message. But what if you could navigate these waters with confidence? Our conversation takes a deep dive into the missteps and triumphs of executive speak, from the pitfalls a senior executive faced while aligning her team's understanding to the empowering effect a well-placed 'no' can have on both leadership and team growth.

In this episode, we discuss the following:
1. Being clear about expectations and learning to say no effectively.
2. Importance of active listening and thoughtful responses.
3. Different ways to say no effectively.

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CONNECT WITH SUSIE:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/susietomenchok/

CONNECT WITH JAMES:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/capps/

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:15

Welcome to the Quick Take podcast, the show where you get targeted advice and coaching for executives by executives. I'm Suzy Tominchuk.

Speaker 2: 0:24

And I'm James Capps. Give us 15 minutes and we'll give you three secrets to address the complex topic of issues that are challenging executives like you today.

Speaker 1: 0:35

Hey, welcome to Quick Take. I'm your host, Dizzy Tomlinson, along with my co-host, James Capps. How are you, James?

Speaker 2: 0:41

I'm super good, me too Super fine, super great.

Speaker 1: 0:45

All right. So one of my favorite topics to talk about because this goes over to negotiation too, so I love this topic is know and clarity about the ask, and it really occurred to me this week. I I work with a senior executive and she has some feedback she needs to give to the team about how they need to look at the business case. And she's like I keep telling them and they don't hear me. And so I went to her staff meeting Cause I was like I want to hear what she's saying, like why is there such this chasm of what I'm saying and what I'm hearing? And so I went to her staff meeting and I was waiting for her to articulate exactly what I thought she should say, and she didn't even come close.

Speaker 2: 1:31

And you knew what she was going to tell them and you still didn't hear it.

Speaker 1: 1:33

Yeah, that's crazy. It was so interesting and you knew what she was going to tell them and you still didn't hear it.

Speaker 2: 1:35

Yeah, that's crazy.

Speaker 1: 1:36

It was so interesting. So she and I understand it because I remember as an executive I remember having to give tough information to somebody or telling somebody you know what you better get you know better performance.

Speaker 2: 1:52

Thank you.

Speaker 1: 1:53

Thank you. Thank you. I was going to use a cuss word, and you know me and cuss words, we don't go along. But being really clear about what the expectations are, we believe we're saying one thing and we're not, sometimes because we have a relationship with these words, and no is one of them.

Speaker 2: 2:10

Yeah, I think it's a really fascinating word and I think that we have been certainly programmed as children to respond to no in a certain way. I think we are programmed as a receiver of that word differently than we are a transmitter of that word. I think we hear it in a different way, much differently than we say it. I think it's easier for us to hear, harder for us to say and I think that that's one of you know, there are very few words and maybe yes is a similar word, but it's strange that it doesn't. It's not as simple as it appears.

Speaker 1: 2:45

I think it's also really interesting to look at what we believe no is and what no is actually. And we think of no as somebody's going to go. No, you can't have this, no. And it's really it's always disguised by. I understand, but we don't have the budget for that right now.

Speaker 2: 3:07

And it's not this.

Speaker 1: 3:09

You expect that? Okay, I heard a no. Now I'm going to move through it on that side and the other side of it is we aren't that clear about exactly what we mean.

Speaker 2: 3:19

Yeah, and I suspect, if you speak to any executive, that they would say that they have an absolute ability to say no with clarity and crispness. Yeah, and I think you're absolutely right in person that that it is so rare that the answer is no without a tremendous amount of, of, of, uh, of caveat, and and uh fluff and data that goes along with it. And I think, as an executive, we should be able to say no in lots of different ways and use that as a muscle that we should be building and growing, and I think you know uh, I think that you know the. The three areas that I'll talk about are are just unique ways to say no and areas that you can say no. That gives you more of a license to be better at at saying it.

Speaker 1: 4:07

All right, well, tell us the first one.

Speaker 2: 4:09

Well, you know, I think the first one, um is really learning to say no about your time and identifying those time sucks, identifying those areas that you need to delegate. You know, I think, that there's so many great stories about, whether it's Elon Musk or even, you know, sheryl Sandberg was really well. She spoke clearly about it in her book about how she champions the ability to delegate so much work to her high-performing teams. Elon is known historically to delegate so much of the engineering stuff to his teams, and so Really learning to say no to stuff that you know you can do but shouldn't do, and I think that that's something that executives really need to embrace better.

Speaker 1: 4:58

Yeah, I need to double click here because I talk to people about delegation. All the time I talk about it as delegation to develop. So it's not just taking something off of our plate, it's thinking about how is that going to build trust with the other person, how is that going to give them experience? That's going to give them some muscles that they have to to to move through, and you also talked about. Sometimes it's easy for us to do and that fills our ego, because we feel this sense of accomplishment to get something done.

Speaker 1: 5:34

And so we have to be aware of that, because it's not about us when we're leaders. It's really about the team.

Speaker 2: 5:41

Right, I'm coaching a CEO right now who she is uh has struggled with her social media team and they're not uh, being creative, they're not being innovative, they're not being responsive. And I finally asked her how involved she was in it. She goes. She told me she was very involved. I said how many of the posts do you edit or write yourself? She goes, almost all of them. I said well then you're not, then you're not doing any. You're not saying no, you are the problem.

Speaker 2: 6:08

And so that was a very fascinating conversation because she felt, as we talked about, that she had said no, she's not doing the social media posts, yet she was and I think that that you know, identifying as a leader, identifying those areas that you can say no to and delegate, I think is absolutely critical.

Speaker 1: 6:25

So I want to just throw out a technique. I wonder if in our heads we need to say, should I be doing this, yes or no, and then take action, because I also think we don't take the time to identify. We just jump in and do it that feels comfortable to her. She never really thought about it.

Speaker 2: 6:45

Right, Right, yeah, and I think you know that's really my second piece of advice when it comes to these types of things is, as a concept I like to call the power pause. You know, um, there was a great guy that you and I worked with at at Comcast and, and his name was Kevin. I won't mention his last name, but he was one of the most intelligent engineers, um, uh, that I'd ever worked with very smart man, and he, I learned the power pause from him because he would start a sentence by saying almost every time, you know, and then he would pause. But I'll tell you what, when Kevin said you know, the room got quiet and that pause gave him not only the opportunity to think through the moment, but also gave him the, the, the command of the moment, but also gave him the command of the room. And I think that power pause that Kevin so well embraced is an opportunity or a moment that allows you to determine whether you should do something or not. This is the window where you can begin to think about saying no.

Speaker 2: 7:49

So many times we are thrown with decision-making and thrown with quick responses, but that power pause really gives you the moment to think through. You know. I think that actually Satya Nadella, the CEO of Microsoft, is known and I've read many articles about his thoughtful listening and slow responsiveness or not responsive slow response to the conversations, where he is known for active listening and giving significant thought to his responses and I think he uses that power pause to ensure that he is acknowledging or admitting or stepping into what he should be and saying no to what he shouldn't. A lot of our responses as leaders and as people who like to solve problems, a lot of those responses are based on our desire to solve and be the problem solver and I think having a power pause there gives you strength to say no, Having a power.

Speaker 1: 8:50

Pause there gives you strength to say no. So I have a great example. Last week I was moderating a panel of BRG leaders that were talking about advocating for yourself and finding a voice in these moments and having the courage to do it, and I love that topic so much and I've read a lot of research around it, but I decided not to be a voice in the conversation because it wasn't my place to be. It was for theirs, yeah, but it was hard.

Speaker 1: 9:16

I had to really practice the power of the pause to ask them a question and not jump in to reiterate what they said, just to acknowledge it and allow their voice to stand alone. I think, as leaders, we sometimes get that energy of wanting to show that we know and that. I love that power. Pause to even in the moment. Allow yourself not to be the center of attention.

Speaker 2: 9:43

Yeah, yeah, yeah, I think it's. It's just a. It's part of our, our nuance, of being both the leader and the, and the leader and the follower. You know the servant leadership approach, and I think that it's part of our growth as executives to not be the smartest person in the room, not to solve every problem.

Speaker 1: 10:04

Yeah, I love the power of the pause because it just creates that space to make that choice about what you're going to do. Yeah, so powerful.

Speaker 2: 10:13

Yeah, and I think that the final one is is really it's key for us to be and I think we started the conversation with this is crisp in the know. Right, you've got to say no, that is not the best use of my time, my capacity, my resources, and, and you've got to say the word no, yep, right, and, and I think that, um, you know, there, there is a nuance between saying no, I'm more important than that and no, um, that should be done by somebody else. Uh, you know, you, you, you want to make sure that you're communicating in a positive way, but ultimately, um, you've got to use the word no in the conversation for your time. And um, and things that are a little softer tend to be confusing, as you said at the top of the show.

Speaker 2: 11:00

You know, if you said I, for example, I don't know that I'll have time for that, I don't know that that's really something I can do right now. Uh, I'm a little underwater with his acquisition. I said I had. Those are three ways of saying no, and I never said that. I never said no, yeah, and that's not effective. If your team wants to understand that there are boundaries and you want your team to understand there are boundaries. You've got to be crisp in that word and you've got to practice it.

Speaker 1: 11:25

I think that's so difficult to do and in that pause and making that choice is this a yes or is this a no? So that you can say it. And the research shows that we have a hard time saying no. It's not easy for us to do so, practicing that even I think about my girls. It's really hard for me to say no.

Speaker 1: 11:48

I catch myself all the time trying to figure out how I can say yes and sometimes I need. They get mad at me sometimes. So saying the word more and being courageous around that, I think, is the practice here.

Speaker 2: 12:03

Yeah, a great method that I've seen. I work with another leader who starts off by saying something like you know, I want to say no to that, and that is almost uh, it's a great way of saying no and making you feel okay about it and making them feel a way about it. You're still saying no and it allows you to almost articulate or think that out loud in a way that may be more comfortable to you Right, rather than just knee jerk like your parents saying no, you do not get ice cream before dinner. It's like you know, I want to say no to that and let's work out why that is and then, when you end, land on it, as you know, that's just going to be a no. That was really. That's collaborative, that's they understand your thought process and that's just a much healthier way to handle it. And I love that that working on on that muscle of learning to say no in a way that works for you.

Speaker 1: 12:58

Yeah, I love that too, because you're signaling to the other person You're almost getting them ready for the no and yourself too because you're framing it that this is where I'm going, so that's I'm going to have to use that. I'm going to need some advice here, because I know it's not an easy thing for me.

Speaker 2: 13:14

That's a good one. I'm going to really think about that. That's a good one, all right so what are the three?

Speaker 2: 13:19

So, first and foremost, you know identify those areas like actively determine where you should be saying no. Delegate, you know, push off the work. You know walk the walk. Second one is work on this power pause, use that before you commit. Make sure you're not saying yes to things you shouldn't be, and start getting comfortable with saying no more often. And then you know, communicate that no much more clearly. Find ways to say that, to introduce it into the conversation, perhaps so you're more comfortable saying it. But if you aren't clearly saying no, then you're probably not being clear to your team.

Speaker 1: 13:55

Wow, such good advice. Thanks, james.

Speaker 2: 13:58

Thank you. Hey Susie, I've been wondering have you ever had an interaction with a client that was so memorable and so strange that you really had to work hard to keep a straight face during that particular meeting? So what happened and how did you handle that face during that particular meeting?

Speaker 1: 14:17

So what, what happened and how did you handle that? Oh gosh, funny enough I I can think of a few times. Uh, let's see, there was one time that this person was explaining a scenario with his his team and I could picture what it was like for the team, and it was not. He was serious about what he wanted them to express and and how he wanted to kind of get them out of their shell. And when he was explaining it to me, the way he did it was completely awkward, was very like a little bit unsettling, and I had heard from some of the team, like not in a bad way, but in a like this is weird.

Speaker 1: 15:03

What is he trying to do? It was almost like he came out of his shell trying to be this other person. That that was like he was reinventing himself and it didn't work it completely flopped.

Speaker 2: 15:13

Sounds like an episode of the Office.

Speaker 1: 15:14

Totally it was like that. It was like this awkward like and I could almost see, but when he was telling me the story because I had some contacts, I had gotten some other calls and stuff and so I could just like see what had happened and his reality of it and his, his perception of their reaction was different than what the true truth was.

Speaker 2: 15:36

Oh, that's so crazy. Yeah, that must have been really weird.

Speaker 1: 15:39

And part of it was I didn't know what to do with it all. I didn't know how to help him.

Speaker 2: 15:43

I can totally imagine. All I can do is listen at this moment, because I have to go back and think about how to deal with the fact that you are living on another planet Exactly. That is wild. So, does my advice go in sync with your reality or do I give my advice based on what the reality is? The bigger problem here is yeah, that's such a really interesting challenge. Exactly, wow, cool.

Speaker 1: 16:08

Thanks for listening to this week's episode of Quick Take, where we talk about the questions that are on the mind of executives everywhere. Connect with us and share what's on your mind.

Speaker 2: 16:18

You can find us on LinkedIn, youtube or whatever nerdy place on the internet. You find your podcasts. Our links to the show are in the show notes.

Speaker 1: 16:26

We appreciate you.