The first step to time management: Know how you want to use your time. Once you decide what’s important to you in your own life, it will make it easier to know when to say yes and when to say no to requests for your time and energy. You can decide how you want to spend your time. There are endless ways that we can spend our time and we have to be selective. Selective means that sometimes you just have to say, “no.”
Here are 10 ways to say no and save face:
1) No. I’ve heard that no is a complete sentence! Although this is a bit too blunt for most of us. Try these softer approaches…
2) Thank you, but I already have too much on my plate right now.
3) Thank you, but this isn’t a good fit for me right now.
4) Thank you, but I already have another commitment.
5) Thank you for thinking of me but this isn’t something I can do right now.
6) I appreciate that you have confidence in me for this project, but I am focusing on something else right now.
7) I would love to take that on after I drop something else from my schedule.
8) This isn’t something I can do right now, but I’d be happy to help you find someone else for this role.
9) I don’t have the skill set for this particular project to help you succeed.
10) I don’t have the energy and enthusiasm that this project deserves.
Sometimes you just have know when and how to say no to balance your time which will help you balance your life!
