Evergreen Leadership Blog

It’s that time of the year. Perhaps not the “most wonderful time of the year”, but the time of the year that businesses and nonprofits alike go through the process of strategic planning and goal alignment. The notion is this: direction gets set at the top, then is cascaded down the organization through a goal alignment and setting process.

Today, I’m not going to quibble with the process. I’m going to attempt to demystify the language, as I observe much head scratching (and some of it’s my own) when asked to participate in the process. What is an objective? How does it differ from a goal? Should I have a mission? A vision? And when someone tells me I should be more strategic, what do they mean?

Common wisdom advises us to “ask a busy person” when you have something that needs done. I’m not sure if this is because busy people have a way to get organized and just get things done or if it is because really busy people have not mastered the art of saying no.

Either way, as a busy person, I find myself asked to take on a variety of roles, tasks, and causes. More often than not, I say yes.

At times the yes serves me well. I do good work, enjoy the work I do, and meet amazing people. And at other times, the yes undermines my focus, well-being, and energy.

So, when the need arose to teach a group how to “say no gracefully” – I said YES! Because like usual, I knew that by teaching, I might learn. And indeed, that is the case.

Let me share some of the highlights of the retreat workshop and a few of the techniques, for I suspect I am not the only one who says yes too often.