If You Want to Say ‘No’ Say ‘NO’

When I was studying in SEED InfoTech one of our faculty named Amit Khedkar has taught us XML (If my seed friends are having problem in remembering him).  He was really a nice gentleman with lot of knowledge about the subject. On that day at the end if his session he told us about the few books which he would recommend us to read.
On that day he said something which I forgot in between time but I found it written in my notebook few days back. That sentence was “If you want to say ‘No’ say ‘NO’”.

Seriously it is that much difficult to say NO. If you ask me yes it is really difficult. The problem is that we are always trying to be nice to others at the expense of ourselves. By saying no we thought that we have hurt someone.
For example, whenever I get requests for help from someone, I would attend to them even though I had important work to do. Sometimes the requests would take more time. At the end of the day, I would have to work extra, spend more time to catch up on my work. This problem of not knowing how to say “no” also extended to my clients, colleagues, friends & family. The above mentioned example is not applicable for professional life, but applicable for my personal life also.

After sometime, I realised that all these times of not saying “no” (when I should) were not helping me at all. I was spending a lot of time and energy for other people and not spending nearly as much time for myself I slowly realised if I wanted personal time, I needed to learn to say “no”.

Why We Find it Hard to Say “No”

We have to first understand what is resisting us about saying “No”. Following are common reasons why people find it hard to say no:

1. You Want to Help: You are really nice person. You are a kind soul at heart. You don’t want to turn the person away and you want to help where possible, even if it will consume your precious time.
2. Afraid of Being Rude: Most of us brought up under the notion that saying “No”, especially to people who are more senior, is rude. May be this will affect my reputation or overall performance or the senior guy may feel disrespected.
3. Saying Yes in Crowd: You don’t want to be eliminated yourself from the group because you are not in agreement with their decision. So you confirm to other’s requests.
4. Fear of Conflict: You are afraid the person might be angry if you reject him/her. This might lead to an ugly situation. There may be future misunderstanding.  
5. Fear of Lost Opportunities: Perhaps you are worried saying no means closing doors. There is fear of saying no to seniors may affect your appraisal or growth in the organization.
6. Not Burning Bridges: Some people take “no” as a sign of rejection. It might lead to relationships severed or misunderstanding.

If you nodded to any of the above reasons, then you should started thinking on this front. If you will not started thinking on this side then it is going to be very difficult for you to balance between your personal and professional life. Saying “No” doesn’t mean you are being rude; neither does it mean you are being disagreeable. Saying “No” doesn’t mean there will be conflict nor that you will lose opportunities in the future. And saying no most definitely doesn’t mean you are burning bridges. These are all false beliefs in our mind.

At the end of the day, it’s about how you say “no”, rather than the fact you are saying no, that affects the outcome. After all, you have your own priorities and needs, just like everyone has his/her own needs. Saying no is about respecting and valuing your time and space. Say no is our right or its exclusive privilege.

When last time I wrote my article one of my friend suggested to me that instead of discussing problem give solutions. So here I am providing some of the solutions. They are not purely my thoughts. The solutions inspired from the books I read, discussions with my friends and personal experiences.

Simple Ways to Say “No”

Rather than avoid it altogether, it’s all about learning the right way to say no. Saying no to others is really not as bad as we thought. The fears of saying no are just in our mind.

Following are may be the few ways to say “NO”. If you have your own views or solutions then you can add/share your solutions or views.

1.  “I can’t commit to this as I have other priorities at the moment.”If you are too busy to engage in the request/offer, this will be applicable. This lets the person know that your full of work at the moment, so he/she should hold off on this as well as future requests. If it works, you can also share what you’re working on so the person can understand it better.

2.  “Now’s not a good time as I’m in the middle of something. How about we reconnect at X time?”It’s common to get sudden requests for help when you are in the middle of something. Sometimes I get phone calls from friends or associates when I’m in a meeting or doing important work. This method is a great way to (temporarily) hold off the request. First, you let the person know it’s not a good time as you are doing something. Secondly, you make known your desire to help by suggesting another time (at your convenience).

3.  “I’d love to do this, but …”Use this in a gentle way while saying no to the other party. It’s encouraging as it lets the person know you like the idea (of course, only say this if you do like it) and there’s nothing wrong about it, but I can’t take part in this due to some other reasons.

4.  “Let me think about it first and I’ll get back to you.”This is more like a “Maybe” than a straight out “No”. If you are interested but you don’t want to say ‘yes’ just yet, use this. This will help you in managing your work and also to manage your future work.

5.  “I’m not the best person to help on this. Why don’t you try X?”If you are being asked for help in something which you (i) can’t contribute much to (ii) don’t have resources to help. Let it be known they are looking at the wrong person. If possible, refer them to a lead they can follow-up on – whether it’s someone you know who can help them with their Problem. This things works in two ways. Without helping that person that person would appreciate your help.

6.  “No, I can’t.”The simplest and most direct way to say no. We build up too many barriers in our mind to saying no. Most of these barriers are self-created. Don’t think so much about saying no and just say it outright.

Learn to say no to requests that don’t meet your needs, and once you do that you’ll find how easy it actually is. You’ll get more time for yourself, your work and things that are most important to you. By saying only two letters is you are getting these much benefits then why we should start practicing it.