Sunday, September 10, 2017

False Urgency


What should I do with a client or boss who insists that a certain task is urgent, but it turns out to be likely a false alarm?

In your mind, subtract 10% from this persons trust account, then watch for the second occurrence. It might be a one-time mistake or it might be a person who thinks every little thing is "urgent."

If it happens again, tell him or her that you charge double (or triple) for urgent tasks. If he or she isn’t willing to pay, then find another client.

If you're an employee and this is your boss, you obviously can't charge them with money, so you have to find another way to make them pay. My favorite way was simply to ignore them and proceed at my normal pace, in priority order. I never got fired for doing that, particularly when it became evident to everyone that the urgency was false.


This is just one of the ways you have to train your clients and your managers if you want to be a successful employee, contractor, or consultant.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

If your boss is saying that everything is "urgent", then the simple answer is the question "Which of these urgent things is the priority?" "All of them" is not an acceptable reply.