No matter what company, job, industry, time of year, state of the economy, one’s age, or position in life – the words are always the same “I’m too busy”. Of course the words themselves vary from person to person, but the meaning is the same: I’m simply too freekin’ swamped and that’s why I can’t do it, or didn’t get to it, or whatever excuse of why I didn’t do something I said I was going to do. Bullshit.
No one is ever too busy. They simply don’t prioritize you or whatever it is your asking high enough. That’s not in and of itself a bad thing. But how about a little honesty? Just simply say something like: “sorry, but I’ve got other things right now that are commanding my attention”. Sometime their priorities are outside work and that’s ok, but I hate it when they fein like work is so demanding and then I see them tweet out that they just finished a 50 mile ride at lunch on a Tuesday.
Second point: never lead someone along, particularly an entrepreneur. Time is your enemy when building anything. You only have so many hours in the day. Those get consumed by market research, customer/client interactions, employee development, communicating with investors, honing a marketing message, etc., it never (ever) ends. Not to mention the importance of spending quality time with your family or significant other. If you race bikes like I do, then you need to figure out how to squeeze in a workout here or there too. The worst thing anyone can do to me is string me along. Punt; and tell me why. I’ll get over it. In fact, I’ll appreciate the honesty.
A word about email. I see and read every one of them and like you, I get a lot of them. I don’t respond to all of them. If I’m cc’d then likely I won’t respond. I also hate bcc’s its transparent in a bad way. If I don’t respond to an email its because I don’t prioritze my interaction on that particular thread very high. Its not personal. Sometimes I don’t know an answer I’m asked and I need more time to formulate a response or the issue being articulated is complicated and requires more thought. In those cases I may take a couple of days to respond – but I do respond.
I hate when people tell me they’re too busy. They’re just simply too busy for me.
>No one is ever too busy. They simply don’t
>prioritize you or whatever it is your asking
>high enough.
Agree, this is a great way to think about it. If you are on the receiving end of this type of action, ask yourself: can i ask this in another way? can i add more data to make it clear this actually is urgent? can i present this from an angle which impacts something that is of strategic importance? And if the answer is “no”, then you’ve probably filtered it out of your priority list as well. drop it. a good thing.
Good point.