Knowing When Saying No is the Right Thing to Do
Why the willingness to take a pass is so important
It’s taken me something like 60 years to see it, but sure enough, smack dab in the center of the word “know” is another word we all know well: “no.” To know, we also have to know when to say no. To be poetic about it: No “no,” no know.
The news this past weekend was, among other things, a good reminder of how important it can be to say no at significant moments in our lives. On Saturday, as you likely know, about 7 million Americans came together to make the rest of the country hear their collective “no” loud and clear.
While our own individual “nos” are generally less attention-getting than that, they are, nevertheless, of great import. Knowing when to say no and how to do it in thoughtful, intentional, caring and dignity-centered ways is a life skill that, to my knowledge, is really never taught in school. We’re taught a lot about “knowing,” but the art of “no-ing” is mostly taken for granted. It might be time to up our ante. Embracing strategic “naysaying” can help us create the kinds of lives and businesses that we want.
This sort of naysaying is not about repeating “no” the way a tired 2-year-old might. Rather, it’s meant as a thoughtful, strategically sound, and ethically oriented action step. Author, friend, speaker, and leadership thinker Nataly Kelly described this work wonderfully in a LinkedIn piece she published this week:
I make choices. Each and every day. So do you.
The question isn’t whether you’re making trade-offs.
You are. Everyone is.
The question is whether you’re making them intentionally or by default.
I fully agree with Nataly. When we’re making choices intentionally and thoughtfully, it is both inevitable and appropriate that the decision will sometimes be not to do something that we might well have done. Others might argue that the option in front of us is a great idea, but for us, it is not. Saying no in the face of near-universal advice to the contrary can be incredibly difficult. I regularly revisit 20th-century psychologist Rollo May’s words: “The opposite of courage in our society is not cowardice, it’s conformity.”
The point is that the “nos” I’m describing here are done knowingly, as a way to live out our vision, mission, values, and intentionally chosen beliefs. They are not done out of overwhelm and reactivity. Here in the Zingerman’s Community of Businesses (ZCoB), we’ve shared our commitment to “Starting with ‘yes’” in our 2032 Vision, and I’m a big believer in “Leading with Positive Beliefs.” However, there are critical moments when leaders must have the courage to say no. We can honestly start with “yes,” but after careful consideration come to the conclusion that “no” remains the right answer.
The story of Zingerman’s, as many of you know well by now, is woven around the long-term vision, mission, values, and beliefs to which we committed long ago. All are positive statements about the future we are dedicated to creating, about the ways we will work together and interact with the world around us as we do it. While we don’t talk about it as much as we do the positive parts, implicit in the commitment to a clear vision, mission, values, and beliefs is what we’re not going to do. In a sense, we are defined as much by what we consistently say no to as what we have built and embraced. A lot of “nos” have been said in order to create the knowledge that forms the basis of our shared philosophy.
One close-to-home example that comes to my mind regularly: In our 2032 Vision, we restate our now-44-year-long commitment to staying rooted in our community. The fifth of 12 sections of this Vision is called “Community Roots; Staying Put in Order to Grow.” Here’s an important part of it:
By choosing to stay local, we have opened up opportunities we never imagined. We understand the wisdom of Zen poet Gary Snyder’s words: “First, don’t move; and second, find out what that teaches you.”
By enthusiastically saying yes to staying local, and by opening Zingerman’s businesses only in the Ann Arbor area, we are saying no to a steady stream of offers to open in places that range from Kalamazoo to California, Detroit to Denver, Nevada to New York. I just received another one this past weekend. The conversations are always kind, appreciative, and dignity-focused. Other doors often open in the process, like “We’d love to wholesale you our candy bars,” or “You might want to come to a ZingTrain seminar.” The answer, though, is always the same: “We’re honored, but our vision is that we only open businesses here in the Ann Arbor area.” It matters not how much money is being offered, how great the demographics might be, or how cool the project is. The response remains a polite, calm, caring “no, thank you.”
We all, consciously or not, make choices of this sort. The key, per Nataly Kelly’s well-taken point, is to make them mindfully, considering how they fit into our vision, mission, values, and beliefs. Trappist monk, writer, and mystic Thomas Merton says it well about his own choices:
By my monastic life and vows I am saying no to all the concentration camps, the aerial bombardments, the staged political trials, the judicial murders, the racial injustices, the economic tyrannies, and the whole socioeconomic apparatus which seems geared for nothing but global destruction in spite of all its fair words in favor of peace.
At times when, or perhaps especially when, we are struggling with uncertainty and self-doubt—as was the case for so many of the folks who were out carrying signs in city centers, town squares, and streets across the country this past Saturday—a purposeful, well-thought-out, and clearly elucidated “no, thank you” can be one of the most important contributors to quality of life we ever make. Knowing what we really want nearly always means also saying no to what we do not.
Even when no one else is saying no, when we’re worried about being out of step or standing out too much, a thoughtful “no” can make an enormous difference. Once one person sees someone else speaking the truth they have in their own heart but have been reluctant to say aloud, a community of thoughtful naysayers can come together. In the process, people can work together to create what Czech philosopher Jan Patocka once called “the solidarity of the shaken.” We may each be struggling on our own, but when we come together, we can accomplish amazing things in our companies, our communities, and our countries. Someone sharing a carefully considered, values- and vision-aligned “no” over here, and a couple of others following suit, can alter the course of what comes next. As Patocka says, this is “What history is about.”
When one person sees someone else say no to something they’re also uncomfortable with, the odds that they, too, will speak up increase significantly. One thoughtful “no” here, another well-articulated “no” there, and before you know it, as Arlo Guthrie sang in “Alice’s Restaurant,” you’ve got three people together and therefore have “an organization.” When you’ve got 50 folks in alignment, as Guthrie sang back in 1967, “you have a movement.”
This is what happened with what the progressive business world now knows as “small giants.” It began when one thoughtful journalist and editor, Bo Burlingham, wrote about Zingerman’s in a 2003 Inc. magazine story. Bo highlighted how we had consistently decided to turn down the chance to franchise, as well as the opportunity to open other delis all over the country. That cover story, titled “The Coolest Small Company in America,” was about one modestly sized organization in a modestly sized Midwestern city and how it said no to the business world’s widely traveled roads of expansion. Two years later, that one “no” spoken aloud in Ann Arbor, evolved into what became Bo’s best-selling book Small Giants. That, in turn, developed into the Small Giants Community, which now has hundreds of members and a packed conference at the end of April every year.
This story of a single individual being inspired to say no, and then others coming in to support them, is not a new one. For example, it’s encapsulated in an old Circassian folk song that Jrpej, the musical collective I wrote about last week, plays. Other traditional musicians in the region perform the tune, too. The “Song of the Dog and the Boar” is a beautiful lesson in this long-standing life pattern. A wild boar and a hunting dog find themselves face-to-face in the forest. A fight commences. The boar, of course, is much bigger and stronger than the dog. The dog, though, is a quicker thinker and more collaborative. It says no to the one-on-one fight but not to the bigger battle. As the members of Jrpej explain the storyline:
The dog goes away to the village and gathers all the dogs she can find. The strong dogs, the fast dogs, and even the blind dogs, the dogs that can’t run. But they all go to the forest together and kill the boar.
In Hope in the Dark: Untold Histories, Wild Possibilities, fellow history major Rebecca Solnit writes that “the Angel of Alternative History tells us that our acts count, that we are making history all the time, because of what doesn’t happen as well as what does.” Here at Zingerman’s, we are what we are in great part because of what we consistently have said no to. What hasn’t happened is actually hugely important to our ability to live and work in ways that are true to our essence. I’ve realized there’s a “no” in “economic” as well. Yes, good businesses begin with vision and values, but what they say no to is just as essential to making them meaningfully healthy. No one will do well when they try to be everything to everyone.
Here’s a quick list of “nos” that have helped define who we are at Zingerman’s:
- No to opening multiple units of our “successful Deli”
- No to franchising
- No to opening shops outside the Ann Arbor area
- No to going public and collecting on the big payoff of an IPO
- No to buying lower-quality ingredients when costs go up
- No to letting our name be used to promote products made by people whose values we don’t share
- No to abandoning our Guiding Principles at times when they might be inconvenient or uncomfortable
- No to consolidating ownership—we now have 19 Managing Partners and 319 staff who own what we call a Community Share
- No to selling the business to some big-ticket buyer who wants “the brand”
- No to changing our Vision when crises like the pandemic come
- No to breaking up my now-44-year-long partnership with Paul Saginaw when things get awkward, as they do at times in all relationships (I always remember the response of George Harrison’s second wife, Olivia, when she was asked to share the secret of a great, long-term marriage: “Don’t get divorced.”)
- No to opening in Disney World (Orlando, after all, is not in Ann Arbor.)
- No to taking things for granted, coasting, or resting on our laurels
There’s a common pattern among organizational outliers like us—businesses, bands, progressive schools, artists’ collectives, etc.—that opt to walk their own way. Organizations and individuals that choose to live mindfully and purposefully, those that exist on the edge, consistently turn down offers and suggestions to shift towards the mainstream. It’s a pattern that Bo Burlingham identified years ago in Small Giants. Leaders in those businesses, Bo writes, had to
overcome the enormous pressures on successful companies to take paths they had not chosen and did not necessarily want to follow. The people in charge had remained in control, or had regained control, by doing a lot of soul searching, rejecting a lot of well-intentioned advice, charting their own course, and building the kind of business they wanted to live in, rather than accommodating themselves to a business shaped by outside forces.
One of the most famous “nos” of modern history happened four years ago this coming winter. On Thursday, February 24, 2022, Russia invaded Ukraine. Vladimir Putin, and for that matter, many Western experts, expected the “war” to be over in less than a week. Fearing the worst, the American government offered to get Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky out of Kyiv on a quick airlift. In one of the more poignant “nos” of recent years, Zelensky turned down the offer with what has now become a line for the ages: “The fight is here; I need ammunition, not a ride.” Nearly three years later, Ukraine is getting stronger, and to many experts’ eyes, it has gained momentum as it defends against the invasion that Russia still refuses to end.
Learning to say no at the right time is, I believe, an important skill for life and leadership. I know I, for one, often have a hard time actually doing it. And I know I’m not alone in resisting saying no, even when I know in my heart that “no” is the right response for me. Hungarian and part-Jewish writer László Krasznahorkai, who’s also the newly awarded Nobel Prize winner, says that it’s “very difficult to say no.” It takes work to learn to do it well. It also takes courage to defy the expectations of others. As Sunita Sah, professor of organizational psychology at Cornell, points out:
Defiance is a practice, not a personality. Defiance is a skill that’s available and necessary for all of us to use. … To defy is simply to act in accordance with your true values when there’s pressure to do otherwise.
László Krasznahorkai has said no in strategically important ways many times in his life. This, I’ve come to believe, is a pattern that everyone who’s lived a life that is true to their essence will inevitably have followed. People like this consistently opt out of things that are out of line with their vision and values. They leave money on the table or take a pass on lucrative opportunities that don’t feel true to who they are. It is often difficult, but they do it anyway. In an interview earlier this year about his own country, Hungary, Krasznahorkai discussed autocratic leader Victor Orban’s decision to stay “neutral” about the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Krasznahorkai made this statement:
A dirty, rotten war is unfolding before my eyes. The world is starting to get used to it. I cannot get used to it. I am incapable of accepting that people are killing people.
We never know what one “no” will lead to until that first “no” has been brought forward. Given his international recognition, Krasznahorkai’s “no” carries a good deal of weight in the world. As Walt Hunter, a poet, writer, editor, and professor at Case Western Reserve in Cleveland, says:
Krasznahorkai’s work throws an obstacle in front of our habituation to violence and war by showing us that what should be surreal or impossible has, in fact, become our reality.
One “no,” affirmed by others in the know, can carry the whole thing even farther. Hunter writes:
In its choice to honor [Krasznahorkai’s] prophetic body of work, the Nobel committee has broadcast a reminder that the political relevance of art lies, paradoxically, in its sense of feeling apart from time.
This work of saying the strategic no out loud is of equal import in our personal lives. Author Anna Holmes shared this story in an Atlantic essay entitled “How About Never?”:
A few years ago, on the eve of my giving a commencement address at Emma Willard, a girls’ boarding school in upstate New York, the mother of one of the graduates approached me with a question: “If you could go back to your younger self—say, six years after you’d graduated from high school—what would you ask?”
I thought about it for a second and then said, “I’m not so sure I’d ask my younger self anything, but here’s what I’d tell her: that she needs to remember to listen more carefully to the voice inside her head, especially the one saying no.”
Successfully owning and designing our lives requires the effective application of well-conceived, strategically placed “nos.” We each can and need to say no to different things. As Nataly Kelly writes:
To make room for the things I prioritize most, I don’t really: go out that much, watch much TV, or spend much time scrolling news feeds or social media, which I’m fairly careful to timebox.
The trade-offs are real. And they’re highly individual to each person.
I have many of my own “nos” that fit into Nataly’s good framing. I stopped watching TV long ago. Uncomfortable as I am in group social settings, I simply decided to stop going to parties and, for that matter, nearly all social events. I don’t go to movies. I decided to stop watching and going to sports events, too. I use social media mostly for research. I opt not to offer the books and pamphlets I publish through Zingerman’s Press on Amazon. None of these are rules I follow religiously—I bend and break them when and where I choose to. But, for the most part, those “nos” have helped me to learn, grow, and “know” so many other things that I have given myself time to study. That said, when I’m speaking on stage, I do actively share my email address and, at times, my cell phone number because I’ve found that great connections and conversations that would likely not happen otherwise come out of it. I’m not suggesting that any of these choices are remotely right for anyone else. They are, though, working well for me.
In every “no,” then, there is also an invitation to a “yes.” When, after graduating from the University of Michigan, I decided not to move back home to Chicago, it opened the door to what became the rest of my life. My “no” to going to law school, as my mother so determinedly believed would be best, gave me the chance to be a line cook. Later, this choice made it possible for me to partner with Paul and help build the ZCoB. More recently, my purposeful decision to turn away from the antipathy and negativity in the news, to say no to the apparent attempts to impose autocracy, has created new opportunities. Specifically, it has opened the door to an affirmation of dignity and democracy, and my efforts to turn apricots into a positive symbol of that work. (For those who haven’t seen them, new apricot t-shirts and sweatshirts are now for sale thanks to Underground Printing. The backstory is here, and proceeds go to the nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization Democracy Now!)
Speaking of democracy, it seems clear that the freedom to say no without being immediately, rudely punished or summarily removed from an organization—or a company, family, or country—is a key sign that we are living in a functioning, though ever imperfect, democratic kind of construct. As author Peter Block says, “Partners have a right to say no.”
How do we learn to be these kinds of constructive naysayers? Saying no—and I’m going to assume for the rest of this piece that we mean a well-thought-out, values- and vision-focused “no”—is a skill that takes practice. Five years ago this week, Romanian-born, Alabama-dwelling poet and writer Alina Stefanescu published a piece entitled “21 ways to end a poem or leave your lover.” Number 11 on Alina’s list is about learning to say no more effectively:
Practice saying NO at different pitches. In different places. With different props. … Aim for the most irresistible no you can manage, and give it texture, sonics, beat, passion, lyric. The most magic no.
Stefanescu also suggests that we can say no by putting our thoughts and feelings “in a poem about refusing.” The thought of it makes me smile. I know. No “no,” no know.
Italian writer Umberto Eco reminds his readers that examining what we have chosen not to do in our lives is often as interesting as looking at what we have opted to do. As an author, Eco appropriately focuses the conversation on books. Nearly everyone who reads a lot (certainly me!) must have dozens of books they bought with good intentions but have not actually read (yet). Eco calls this “a library of the unread,” and it is an interesting way to understand our lives. It’s also an intriguing journal prompt: Consider for a couple minutes all the life options you’ve said no to. Expand them into short stories to create your own “library of the unlived.”
Author Leslie Jamison has done something similar. She says she decided
to make something I called the “Notebook of Noes.” On every page, I wrote down an opportunity I had decided to decline: a speaking gig, a magazine commission, an invitation from a friend. Then I drew a line across the page. Underneath, I wrote what saying no had made room for.
The benefits of well-placed, values-aligned “nos” can be hugely beneficial to our personal health. The Mettinger Clinic, in a collaboration with Psychology Today, tells it straight: “Saying no can create more mental health stability by helping with self-care and build your self-esteem and confidence by setting boundaries. Saying no may be daunting, but there are ways to do it.”
To be clear, saying no can be done with dignity. We don’t need to disrespect the person who asked. We can be courteous, caring, and thoughtful in how we turn something down. I try to, more often than not, offer a chance to continue the conversation in ways that work better for me. About nine years ago, I decided not to join any more boards. I do, though, offer “yes” by sending my cell phone number to anyone who asks me to join their board. When they need help, I suggest they simply call me.
All of this emphasis on choice works well only when we are making our choices freely, and when we wholeheartedly own all the decisions we make. I’ve written extensively on this in Secret #32 in Managing Ourselves, “It’s All About Free Choice.” Author Courtney Martin, writing for The On Being Project, reinforces the import of making choices that are right for us:
Forget balance. Balance is bullshit. What I mostly crave is integrity and joy—a sense that I’m doing what I do excellently and getting a lot of pleasure out of it, that I’m used up and useful.
You say no so you can say yes. It’s sad in the way that all limitations are, but also liberating. You are human and finite and precious and fumbling. This is your one chance to spend your gifts, your attention, most importantly your love, on the things that matter most. Don’t screw it up by being sentimental about what could have been or delusional about your own capacity. Have the grace to acknowledge your own priorities. Prune and survive.
Learning to say no, has certainly made my life far richer. I feel freer, and I spend almost all of my time doing things I actually want to do! Nataly Kelly’s wise words are a good way to frame the work that’s involved in doing this sort of naysaying skillfully:
Choose what you love. Choose what matters.
Whatever you do, don’t choose because of what you see someone else doing.
They are not you. You should not want to be them.
…
When you stop trying to be all things to all people, you free up enormous mental and emotional energy. You stop feeling guilty about what you’re not doing and start feeling proud of what you are doing.
My good friend, the Irish writer Gareth Higgins, taught me that you’ll “never know where a story will end, especially when you’re in it.” In this context, we never know where one well-placed, carefully considered, and life-affirming “no” can lead. Someone has to start so others can follow. One person who decides to deliver a well-considered, principle-centered “no” can change the course of a company, a community, or even a country.
In the spirit of which, I’ll close here with a mention of Rosa Parks, who delivered one of the most important “nos” in American history. Parks passed away 20 years ago this week, at the age of 92. Born into the then-segregated state of Alabama in the winter of 1913, Parks was active in civil rights work throughout her life. In the 1940s and early ’50s, she was an active member of the NAACP, serving as secretary of the Montgomery, Alabama chapter for many years. In the summer of 1955, Parks attended the Highlander Folk School in Tennessee—one of the only spots in the South in which integrated meetings could be conducted. It was also a leadership training center for civil rights activists and the alma mater of civil rights activist and nonviolence expert Bernard Lafayette, who I wrote about last week. Parks’ now-famous “no” came 70 years ago this fall.
Parks was not the first Black citizen of Montgomery to say no on a segregated city bus. Earlier that year, a 15-year-old high school student named Claudette Colvin had also refused to give up her seat to a White rider. The incident passed without much hubbub, but Parks’ situation later that year got far more attention. At about 5:00 on December 1, 1955, Parks left work and, after stopping at the store to pick up a few things, boarded the bus to head home. In that era, Black people were required to sit in the seats in the back part of the vehicle, while up front it was “Whites only.” When the “White seats” filled up that evening, the driver directed the Black riders in the middle of the bus to move further back. Parks famously refused. The driver went to a pay phone and called his bosses, who directed him, in turn, to phone the police. Shortly after, local law enforcement officers boarded the bus and arrested Parks.
Rosa Parks’ “no” that Thursday evening, almost an hour after dark on that late autumn day, was not reactive; rather, it was well-thought-out, carefully considered, and very much values-centered. As she explained later:
I felt that, if I did stand up, it meant that I approved of the way I was being treated, and I did not approve. … People always say that I didn’t give up my seat because I was tired, but that isn’t true. I was not tired physically, or no more tired than I usually was at the end of a working day. I was not old, although some people have an image of me as being old then. I was forty-two. No, the only tired I was, was tired of giving in.
That simple, determined, dignity-centered “no” initiated what became the Montgomery Bus Boycott. In court, Parks pleaded not guilty, but she was convicted and fined anyway. About a year after Parks’ arrest, the Supreme Court overturned her conviction and ordered that Montgomery buses be desegregated. The boycott ended the following afternoon, after 381 days. The BBC called Parks’ decision “the ‘no’ that sparked the civil rights movement” and a “courageous act of defiance [that] set in motion a chain of events that ended segregation in the U.S.”
Rosa Parks’ remarkable courage and values-based “no” illustrates the importance of what historian Timothy Snyder writes: “A tiny bit of courage, a tiny bit of truth, can change history.” Nobody knows which history-changing “no” could be next. I do know that we have the power. A wisely spoken and deeply felt “no” next Wednesday, or any other day, just might alter the world.
Let me k-no-w what you think!
