82 brilliant stress management
Say NO
Part of controlling stress is not exposing yourself to unnecessary
stressors, so a vital part of your time management toolkit is your
ability to say ‘no’. Once you have
your goals and you know what is
important, then you should be able
to weed out the unimportant calls on
your time and decline them.
Noble Objections
Saying ‘no’ is difcult for most of us, because it feels like we are
letting others down. ‘No’ is a negative word, and who likes to be
seen as negative? However, it is perfectly reasonable for you to
decide how you use your time, and therefore perfectly reason-
able for you to say ‘no’ to unwanted demands.
So ‘no’ can be positive, when you say it for the right reasons.
Then it becomes noble: a Noble Objection to a proposal. Saying
‘yes’ to everything might be a great way to advance in the early
stages of a career, but it will rapidly bring diminishing returns.
No longer will people respect you more for saying ‘yes’: they will
respect you less. Too much ‘yes’ and you become a ‘yes-man’ or
‘yes-woman’ – treated like a doormat by anyone who wants a
mug to do something for them.
On the other hand, when you get a reputation for saying yes
selectively, to important things; and that reputation is backed up
9 Promise
Make someone a promise that you will get it done. Or two people, or
three. The bigger the promise, the more you’ll want to get on with it.
10 Bring it on
If all else fails, get macho. Think about I’m a Celebrity . . . and the task of
eating a live spider. Psych yourself up, open your mouth, and bring it on.
a vital part of your time
management toolkit is
your ability to say ‘no’
Control your time 83
by a 100 per cent record of delivering on your commitments to
the highest standards, then people will really respect and value
you. So don’t just say ‘no’ to unimportant tasks; make a Noble
Objection: say ‘NO’.
Delegation
Once you can gracefully decline responsibilities and work from
other people, the next skill to learn is how to delegate some of
your work to others. This can be good for you and also good for
them, but only when you delegate carefully. Here is how to do
so, in ve easy stages.
Matching
Carefully match the task to the person. Choose someone who
can learn from the task, or gain condence or recognition from
doing it. There must be something in it for me, if I am to take on
a task for you willingly. If, on the other hand, you simply dump
the jobs you don’t fancy, or set people up to fail, they will soon
come to resent you.
Brieng
If you are delegating to me, then brief me well. Let me know
the background, so I can understand the context of the task,
and what you expect of me. You may want to set me objectives
in terms of what you want, the standards I must meet, any
deadlines or timescales, and the budget or resources that I have
available. Be really clear about the level of authority that you are
delegating to me. For example, are you leaving every decision to
me, to do the whole job and report back when it’s done, or do
you need to be involved in key decisions? How do you want me
to report back to you during and after my work? Finally, think
carefully about how much advice you give me on how to do the
job. Find a good balance between giving me too much guidance
and thus stiing my creativity and robbing me of the learning
experience of guring it out for myself; and giving me too little
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