This one earned the eye-roll emoji: I caught myself in violation of all my best subtraction thinking this week. To be honest, a few very thoughtful podcast hosts caught me, or helped me catch myself.
I knew when I — somewhat impulsively — committed to creating the 100 Day Subtraction Practice that it was not an insignificant commitment. And perhaps biting off a bit more than I should chew, in the quarter that I was also going to be polishing my book proposal.
But it felt thrilling, daunting, and important, meeting Michael Bungay Stanier’s test for a Worthy Goal. I had some great models (The Book of Alchemy and Creating the Impossible) to inform the design of it. And I knew that it would advance my understanding of — and ability to describe — systematic subtraction, thereby serving my goals for the book.
So I took on the big project, but proudly made concessions so it wouldn’t be ‘too much’. I pushed back the start date so I’d have a few weeks in January to thoughtfully design the practice, rather than diving in on my first day back to work. I spent those weeks gathering topic ideas and songs that aligned with those topics, and playing with different formats for each day’s post.
At this point, in case we haven’t worked together before, I should share: my superpower — and Achilles heel — is that I am prolific with ideas and not shy of starting them.
This combination enables me to do fabulously creative, engaging, and impactful work. And it can also lead me to spend far more time, effort, and energy implementing a bright idea than that idea actually merits.
I know this about myself, and can see what it costs me in terms of effectiveness in all the dimensions that matter to me. Which is exactly why this practice of systematic subtraction has been so powerful for me. Instead of working more hours to keep up with the bright new ideas, plus the ongoing work (and life) tasks I have to maintain, I am seeing opportunities to trim on either or both sides.
If you’re here, I’m guessing that you also have a version of this tendency to get in over your head, whether to shiny new ideas or your boss’s / client’s / family’s ‘suggestions’… And that you too are quite aware of your inclination to overcommit, and might even see yourself doing it in real time. And still don’t stop yourself.
I’m sharing this real time revelation, and what I’m doing about it, in the hopes that it will be helpful for you, fellow over-worker.
I recognized the problem while answering the question, “What does a day in the life of a subtraction strategist look like?”
I realized that my days have been joyously full of writing these essays and daily prompts. Which makes my heart full, but if I’m being honest, it crowds out the deep research, relationship-building, and opportunity-exploration I need to be doing if I’m going to have the impact I care about having. I was broadcasting, but not building the conditions for my work to actually serve my audience.
I could feel it before anyone named it: I had hit a familiar flattening curve.
I asked some smart friends for feedback on the latest post. [Thank my lucky stars to have such smart, generous friends!]
They nailed it: resonant, well-written, thought-provoking. But also dense. They wanted more space within the essay to really think about the topic. And time to process their own relation to it.
So here I was, yet again, overdoing it. I was spending more time and energy than the task merited. The law of diminishing returns strikes again! After a certain point, our efforts return less than they used to.
It’s essential, but not easy, to recognize that flattening curve as soon as possible so you can redirect energy to something more impactful toward the goals you’re working toward.
Using the subtraction sequence led me to STOP, in those podcast interviews, and recognize my error. Now, my DROP experiment is simple: one topic a month, which I can explore more thoroughly in four essays that will be less time-consuming and more digestible — and thereby more impactful. The energy I’m saving there is already reappearing where it actually compounds: ROLLing into research, strategic outreach, and real relationships.
I already learned this lesson of diminishing returns more than a decade ago. I was the Executive Director of a nonprofit, living in the community center that we ran in the Middle East. I enrolled in an executive MBA program, and started spending about 10 days of each month away from the center for class and other meetings halfway around the world. I was so concerned that my team would fall apart, feel neglected, lose motivation. I was dialing into calls, responding to emails, and gripping tightly to weekly reports and other metrics.
After six months of this, I was exhausted and they were fed up. Turns out, I was a far better leader when I was away for a third of the time. The team had time to work out their own solutions to problems. They stepped up to make decisions that did have to be made in my absence. They coordinated, supported, and motivated themselves.
My approach to management had hit the ceiling of diminishing returns. When I did less of that, I freed up energy to offer the strategic insights, partner support, and international positioning that I was actually best qualified to bring.
That was such a gratifying, win-win-win insight. And yet, here I am 10 years later and supposedly wiser, similarly throwing myself up against a flattening return curve — writing too prolifically for anyone to make good use of.
I’m not beating myself up for landing in the same trap, I’m just grateful to have noticed in month 2, rather than month 6, thanks to my Systematic Subtraction lens. And to have broken the law of diminishing returns in just this one area of my work, rather than my entire role.
Where in your life are you overdelivering?
Take a minute to think about it. There are times when overdelivering is a reasonable strategy. Maybe you’re having fun with it, learning a new role or skill, or trying to get someone’s attention.
But a lot of times, we overdeliver (or over-prepare, over-think) by default (or trying to pay the prove-it-again tax) and it’s not serving anyone. Indeed, overdoing is often a power move in disguise — a way to feel essential, impressive, or in control.
Recognizing that tendency and then redirecting energy to an area where there’s more upside is an immediate path to having more impact, without doing more.
