30 Minutes of Discomfort vs. Years of Regret - Pick Your Poison

A lesson that I was really fortunate to learn in my management career was that the conversations that are going to have the biggest impact on my business are the ones that are really fucking hard. It's almost like there's a correlation between the difficulty of a conversation and the impact that it potentially has on my business.

And those are the conversations that we all have like a tendency to avoid, right? Like we have a tendency to create some distractions, to avoid having that tough talk with somebody who maybe... everybody on the team likes 'em and they're trying really hard but they're not getting results. And we've got to go have that conversation with them and say, "Hey listen, appreciate everything you're doing, but you're not getting results and if we don't see some changes then we need to make some changes." And you've got to deliver that message and you've got to deal with the discomfort that leads up to that conversation and during that conversation. And a lot of people just avoid it. Days go by, weeks go by, months go by, years go by. Literally, I've talked to business owners who have allowed a problem to exist within their business for years because they don't want to have the uncomfortable conversation. They feel bad. Or the timing's not right. Or they have something going on in their life. They'll get to it at some point. And there's like a rationalization, there's a justification, but it's making excuses for avoiding problem-solving.

And problem-solving is our job, right? That is what we do as leaders. And avoiding those conversations means we are avoiding our job. It is negligence. And having those conversations is what's going to actually move things forward.

So here's what's helped me is reframing how I think about these conversations entirely. And instead of thinking about the discomfort of leading up to that conversation and during that conversation—the morning of having it on your calendar, and then the 15, 20, 30 minute discussion that we're going to have where it's going to be uncomfortable, and maybe somebody cries, and maybe somebody gets upset, maybe something happens, which by the way, a lot of times it's not nearly as bad as we think it is—that temporary thing that's gonna happen... instead of focusing on that, what I focus on is afterwards. What happens after that? What happens after that 30 minutes of discomfort?

Well, I've had a conversation where I'm going to potentially get the results that I actually want, right? I've done my job. I've now have a feeling of having done my job. That feels empowering. That feels stronger. I'm telling you, when you have that conversation that you've been putting off, afterwards you go, "Damn. I should've done that a long time ago." And in fact, like you may get done and go: "You know... who else do I need to talk to?" Like you feel stronger, you feel better because you're doing your job. Because you know you're doing what you're supposed to be doing and you know it's hard. And you feel better about yourself.

The other thing that I think about is the fact that when you avoid these things—when you avoid the hard conversation—you're not actually avoiding the feeling of discomfort. You're just reducing its intensity and spreading it out over time. Sometimes into perpetuity. Until you solve that problem, you're going to have a nagging feeling in the back of your head that says: "You know you should be doing that, right? Like you know you should have that conversation. You're just kind of avoiding it. You're being weak. You're not being a good leader." And no one wants to fucking live with that voice.

When you avoid that conversation, what you're doing is you're just changing the discomfort and reducing that intensity, spreading it out. As opposed to having that conversation, having a temporary feeling of discomfort and going, "All right, let's call her in, let's have the conversation." And 30 minutes later, then feeling like I now get to live permanently with the feeling of having done it.

Pick your poison, right? Do you want to reduce the intensity and spread it out forever and not get the results that you want? Or do you want to address it head on, deal with the thing for 30 minutes or however long it takes, and start getting the results you want, and feel a hell of a lot better about yourself?

I'm telling you, reframing this for me has been so powerful. And it's even beyond my business life. Like this is how I think about just relationships in general. You have the hard conversation. And when you have the hard conversation, you recognize the immense benefits that come from having had that conversation both internally and externally. And that feeling starts to become addictive. It's like a muscle, like you're starting to build that. And then you have enough of these conversations, you see enough of the benefits that come from them. And now you start to have data points that you rely on. So the next time a problem comes up and you're like: "God, I gotta have this conversation with somebody." You go: "All right. This is gonna suck. But roll up my sleeves, let's get it done. Because I'd rather have that feeling that I know is gonna happen afterwards than have this feeling that I have right now, which is I know I need to talk to somebody and I know I'm avoiding something and I know I'm not being the person that I could be."

So I actually just wrapped up several hours of these conversations in a row. I had them stacked today. And just went through the boom, boom, boom. And it was uncomfortable to go into the day going, "All right, here we go." Because even though I've done it for a long time and I'm pretty good at it, it's still kinda like, "All right, this is probably going to suck." But I'm now confident enough to know what the outcome is going to be afterwards. So, yeah, going into it kind of sucked. Like it always does. And then afterwards was great. Like it always is.

So I thought I'd share this with you because I know it was helpful for me in my career. And if there's a conversation or a problem that you are avoiding, maybe this can be your sign to go address that shit. And tell me, once you do, tell me that you don't feel a hell of a lot better after you've done it. Adios.