Why Leaders Should Be Quitters

Strategies, questions and courage

Photo by Sigmund on Unsplash

Very few people want to be quitters. In fact growing up, it’s likely you were taught not to quit. Quitting is bad. “You won’t get far in life if you quit at every turn” was the narrative.

The ethos sticks.

Life, and business, is full of words and expressions geared towards keeping going and getting better at it. “Work smarter, not harder” and “continuous improvement”, are just two, and both based on the sentiment of doing things differently or better. But definitely not quitting.

The countless Board Meetings during my career have been stacked to the rim with new project proposals, plans to develop strategic programmes or launch new products.

But I struggle to recall ever listening to a proposal simply and only to ‘stop’ an activity. Nothing more.

Even at an individual level it is normal to focus on what you want to start, rather than what you want to stop.

But many of the things that are tolerated, both in life and in business, come from not having the insight, motivation and ability to quit it.

Quitting intentionally arguably takes more courage than starting something.

There are many reasons for not quitting. And as with many things there’s a spectrum. Quitting a job, career, relationship, or circumstance may take a lot of preparation and effort and more so than a small day to day change.

And the conditions must be right. You need to know what to quit, have the right circumstances in place to quit as well as the necessary motivation.

The desire for perfection that I encounter in many leaders can lead to stalling, quitting by default or stubborn refusal to give up. The key is to be intentional about knowing when to quit and when to persist.

There are good reasons to quit something and bad reasons to quit doing something.

Developing insight into when quitting is the best choice for you will help you identify when it’s right to quit and when you need to push on through the discomfort and keep going. Quitting for the wrong reasons, right before the good stuff starts to happen, is not the route to success.

If you need help identifying how to quit intelligently and intentionally, here are six things to help you.

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Wise words: From Harvard’s Michael Porter (of Porters Five Forces fame).

To what degree do you and your leadership team focus on what needs to start versus what needs to stop?

Perspectives: Most of us are raised to believe that quitting is failure. But what if failure to quit is actually the failure?

These are two different perspectives on failure.

• What deep rooted beliefs do you hold about quitting?

• What’s your collective leadership perspective on it and how does that tally with your day to day actions?

• What proportion of new projects have you started versus those that you have stopped?

Think: How you make decisions about what to quit and what to persist with will be dependent on a multitude of factors, both internal and external.

• What tells you when it’s time to quit?

• What criteria do you use to be intentional about your choices?

• What are the signs that tell you a cold turkey approach is better than a transition plan?

Coach: One of my favourite coaching questions comes from Michael Bungay Stanier’s The Coaching Habit.

If you’re saying yes to this, what are you saying no to?’

Ask yourself:

• What were the hidden implications of what you said yes to this week?

• What did you automatically say no to, by refusing to quit the status quo?

• Expand the scale. What else in life are you automatically saying no?

Read: Seth Godin wrote a whole (short) book based on his belief that to be successful leaders need to get good at quitting. In fact he goes so far as to say that you fail when you get distracted by tasks you don’t have the guts to quit. Winners are indeed the best quitters.

Reflect: What’s one thing that would make your life or work better if you were to take it out of the equation?

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You can find more thought provoking leadership thinking here and connect with me on Linkedin and Twitter.

And if you’d like some help getting perspective, send a quick note to me at rebecca@rebeccajjackson.com and I’ll help you figure it out.

With thanks

Rebecca

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