What Does It Really Take to Get Better at Saying No?

If I were to compile a list of the most requested topics my coaching clients wish to work on, being able to say no would be a strong contender for the crown.

If you care about others, enjoy being helpful and are known as the person who makes things happen, saying no may feel particularly difficult, because it can go against a lot of who you might believe yourself to be.

And although we often talk about it like one distinct skill, upon closer inspection there are a few elements involved touching on discernment, self-awareness, communication and emotional intelligence. Together, they shape how good we are at saying no, and examining it with this additional granularity can be the starting point of finally being able to crack that old chestnut.

A lot of the popular advice focuses on the moment of delivery: choose your words carefully, stay calm, or remember that “no is a complete sentence”, a piece of advice that always makes me roll my eyes a little. I understand the appeal, but a perfectly delivered no is not what makes someone good at it. The obstacle sits elsewhere - often in the wave of discomfort that arrives with a story about what our no says about us.

I was painfully reminded of this recently. Someone I care about asked me for help, and I knew I had to say no. 

I understand why saying no matters. I support my clients with this and have seen the cumulative impact of too many yeses on a life, a career, a nervous system. Yet doing it in the moment tested that knowledge in ways that understanding alone could not.

What struck me most was the gap between what I know about this topic and what it felt like to act on it.  That gap is what I want to explore today. 

Let me tell you what happened. We’ll look at the anatomy of a “no” through five distinct components. The first two I handled reasonably well and the third was harder, but the biggest learning came from the fifth.

Component 1: A clear and non-negotiable “yes” 

Every no exists because there is another yes that is more important. “I'm not able to join this meeting because my priority today is X.” “I'm not able to take this task on because my strategic focus is Y.”

That yes might be a project, but it might equally be your values, space, family time, not overexerting yourself when you’re heading towards burnout.

It needs to be clear to us before it can be clear to anyone else, and when it is, the no becomes much less negotiable.

The request for help came from someone I have a good professional relationship with, someone I care about. It wasn't urgent. It was important to them, but my help wasn’t essential. They could have found help elsewhere but, if I’m honest, they could have done it themselves and were taking a bit of a shortcut by asking me.

I was very clear in my mind that saying no was the right thing to do.

When I got that email, my yes was time reserved for my clients and preparing a leadership development programme. My personal yes is being an available parent to my teen. They are very clear and non-negotiable. 

Questions to consider:

How clear is my yes / my non-negotiable priorities? Am I able to articulate this?

Do my actual commitments (and calendar) reflect what I say my priorities are?

Component 2: Beliefs, assumptions and identity

Even when our priorities are clear, acting on them is another matter. This is often because there will be beliefs and assumptions operating in the background, often outside of conscious awareness, that make a yes feel necessary or safer. For example: “I should be able to fit it all in” or “If I don't do it, it won't get done well.” Identity can be wrapped up in it too. Many of us learnt early that doing a lot and helping others is how we earn praise and love.

Mine was a mixture of the above. As a former Big 4 consultant, I often had to make the impossible happen in absurdly little time, so part of me started working out how I could carve some time out of my calendar and help after all. I know this will resonate for many of my clients.

Questions to consider:

What does saying no seem to mean about me?

What am I assuming other people will think or feel if I say no?

Component 3: Can I put myself in the other person’s shoes without it changing my boundary?

Saying no well does not mean shutting out the other person's perspective or building a wall. We can value the relationship, see the situation from their point of view, and acknowledge their needs and feelings without changing our decision simply to relieve their discomfort. We can be empathetic without stepping in to rescue or solve the problem ourselves.

This one was harder for me at first. I wanted to put myself in their shoes, but I noticed I was feeling reactive, with a hint of resentment that they were looking for an easier route, when my way of doing things would have been different. But once I acknowledged that, I could also see things from their perspective and understand that they were trying to make their own discomfort go away. And I get that - it’s a human thing to do.

Questions to consider:

Can I genuinely see this from the other person's perspective?

How can I express empathy without implying that my decision is negotiable?

Component 4: Can I communicate my no in a clear, emotionally mature way?

Even when we know we need to say no, finding the right words in the moment can be difficult. A few ground rules help, and I describe them in more detail in [this article about boundaries]. It comes down to four things: speak from your own perspective using I-statements, be empathetic, be clear about what you can and cannot do without over-explaining, and where it is appropriate, offer a way forward within the boundary. For example: “I really understand how important it is for you to move forward with this. Focusing on project X is my absolute priority this week. I'm at capacity, so I can't take this on. What I can do is...“ covers all of them.

Questions to consider:

Am I clear in speaking from my own perspective / using I-statements rather than inadvertently slipping into blame / criticism?

How will I respond if the other person pushes back?

The wording, for me, was fine. The request came in writing so I had time to think. I paused, gathered my thoughts, wrote it as well as I could and hit send. And this is when things got interesting.

Component 5: Can I stay with the discomfort that follows a no, without letting it call the shots?

Once it was done, I felt so uncomfortable, almost regretting what I had done. I felt the urge to call this person and explain myself, to add qualifiers: hey, I'm not as bad as this might make me seem, really.

My nervous system clearly got activated. My stomach was tight. My pulse was faster. I started telling myself a story about what having said no meant about me: that the relationship would suffer because of it, and that the other person now thought I was selfish, not such a generous person as they had thought. It cut into a central part of my identity, my sense of myself as someone who is connected, who shows up, who supports. 

As a coach who works with parts, the IFS (Internal Family Systems) lens gives me a useful way of understanding what was happening. A protective part of me had become activated. It sensed a threat to connection, and perhaps to my identity as a caring and generous person, and immediately wanted to do something to make that threat go away: explain, soften the boundary, reassure, perhaps even reverse the decision.

The useful distinction is that the urge to do something was a response to the discomfort I was feeling. It was something to notice and understand, rather than evidence that I had made the wrong decision. I simply needed to give myself time to feel the ache of having disappointed someone, without deciding that it meant I had done something wrong. 

This, to me, is a core part of emotional intelligence: being able to notice what is happening, recognise the emotion, separate it from the story the mind immediately builds around it, and allow it to move through without letting the discomfort make the decision for us.

Questions to consider:

What happens in me when/after I say no?What does it feel like in my body?What story do I tell myself about what my no means about me, the other person or the relationship?What am I tempted to do to make the discomfort go away?

Wondering how my story ended?

You may well have guessed: the relationship did not suffer at all. They were understanding and quickly went on to solve the problem in a different way, without giving my no much thought. Everything else - from the tight stomach, the urge to undo my decision, the verdict on my character - all this played out in my head only. 

Bringing it together

I hope I've made a compelling case that saying no has many layers once we start to peel the onion. First, it is about understanding our why, our bigger yes, as in the first component. Then there is a skills-based part: how to communicate in a way that is both kind and effective.

There are also different flavours of emotional intelligence in the mix.

One is the capacity to take the other person’s perspective and see the world through their eyes, without jumping in to rescue or taking on more than we can or want to. Another is the capacity to acknowledge and stay with our own difficult emotions, rather than immediately doing something to make them go away.

And all of this sits very close to our beliefs and our identity. Because a no always happens in the context of a relationship, it can evoke a very real sense of threat: to connection, to approval, or to the person we believe ourselves to be. Being able to feel that threat without automatically organising our behaviour around making it disappear may be one of the less visible parts of becoming good at saying no.

Which of these components caught your attention as you read? Becoming better at saying no looks different for each person, so the one that stood out for you will be unique to you. 

Perhaps there is a no you know you have to say right now. If there is, which of these components would you most like to focus on?

Curious to explore what makes saying no difficult for you, even when you know it's the right thing to do, and what might help you approach it differently?

I’d love to hear from you.