Hello everyone,

I have just got back from two days in London with my husband. A friend of his had invited us to a dinner and wine tasting event, and if I am honest, I was not that fussed. But he really was, so I said yes.

But when I did, he immediately started planning more. “Let's not rush back, let's make a proper trip of it”. And I was standing thinking about my diary, about to say no. I cannot give you all of that. I’ve got too much on.

Then I caught myself. Because what I was actually saying to him, underneath all of that, was: you are not as important as my work.

I stopped. I said yes.

Why it nearly went the other way says something important about boundaries that I think is critical to any leader.

People talk about boundaries as if the hard part is holding them. I don't think it is. The hard part is knowing what they are in the first place. And knowing that requires you to be honest about two things: what kind of leader you want to be, and what else in your life genuinely matters.

Those two things together are what tell you where your time should and should not go. And importantly, time is not just time. How you spend it determines what you carry in your head.

If your hours keep getting absorbed by things outside your role, conversations that were never yours to have, problems that are not yours to solve, your mental bandwidth goes with them. You end up with nothing left for what actually matters; the stuff in work that would have the biggest impact, and the stuff outside work that makes life worth living.

You guard your time because that is how you protect your headspace. They are the same thing.

The managers I see struggling with this have almost always skipped the foundational question. They know they should have better boundaries. They just have not sat down and decided what those boundaries actually are. And because they are not written down, not made concrete, they are invisible under pressure. Which is exactly when you need them most.

I encourage all my clients to write theirs down. It acts as a reminder. Because even when you know this, even when you coach it, even when you have learnt it the hard way more than once, a busy week can still make you nearly say no to your husband because work feels more important!

We had such a good time. We walked around, had a long lunch, and ended up with last minute tickets to Les Misérables, which we have seen loads of times but would happily watch again. We came home full of energy. The kind that only comes from actually switching off and being present with someone you love.

If you regularly feel like your time is not your own, and you find yourself being pulled into conversations in your 1:1s where you are not sure whether you are even in your remit, it is a sign that your boundaries are not clear enough yet, even to you.

I go into this much more in my mindset video, where I walk through exactly what you need to get clear on first. The framework is all there. Link is here​

Have a great week.

Helen