Saying no at work is easier said than done, especially when the person asking is more senior than you. So what do you do when you're asked to take on just one more thing when your week is already jam-packed?

Saying no was never something I was good at. For many years, I regularly overcommitted and then overworked rather than risk being seen as unhelpful or not being able to handle a fast-paced environment.

But that didn't always work out. I burnt out multiple times. I ended up letting people down and missing deadlines because I had too much on my plate. I ended up saying no when I shouldn't have or pushing back in the wrong way. And it never really felt like I was as in control of my workload as I could be.

Why is it so hard to say no to senior people at work?

Why is it so hard to say no, especially to your manager or other managers or people in more senior positions?

The first reason that comes to my mind is that we want to be helpful. Not only that, we want to be seen as helpful and as team players. Nobody wants to work in a company where people don't help each other.

If you are new to your team or in a junior position, you might also worry that saying no will be received negatively and affect your reputation at work.

Or perhaps, you might assume, like I did, that people in more senior positions know better than you when it comes to priorities. Especially early in my career, I thought my manager had full visibility of both the bigger picture and the finer details of their team's daily work.

Finally, it's hard to say no to senior people at work if you don't see other people doing it. If you don't see someone at your level pushing back successfully against someone more senior, you can't know how it's done in your organisation. You don't even know if it's part of the culture at all.

All of these reasons lead to hesitancy to say no, even when you know you should.

Why is it important to say no at work when you need to?

It's important to pause before saying yes at work if you don't have the capacity or bandwidth to take on what's being asked of you. It's also important to question whether you are the right person for the task if you don't have the skills or the experience to do the work.

Not saying no when you should risks over-commitment, increased stress, hidden overtime, working through lunch, or compromising on other work to try and fit more in.

And instead of being seen as dependable, saying yes all the time could make you seem overwhelmed, unreliable, or unable to meet the required standard of work. This definitely happened to me earlier in my career. I tried so hard to be reliable that I became unreliable.

How do you end up being the "go-to" person at work?

Before we look at how to say no to senior people, it's worth considering why they keep asking you to take on more work. There are many possible reasons, but one that's worth mentioning is the cycle of expectation.

If your default answer to a request is "no problem", or if you are in the habit of saying yes immediately and always, that creates an expectation that you will say yes the next time. And if a senior person is busy and wants to move a task forward, they'll go with the path of least resistance for delegation. They're going to go to the person who always says yes.

How do you say no to someone more senior than you?

With all this in mind, how do you say no to someone in a more senior position?

First, it depends on who is asking. If it's your manager, you will respond differently to somebody from another team or department. If it's someone you know well, you respond differently to a senior person you're meeting for the first time.

The key is that pushing back effectively is never emotional - it's about resource management and capacity management. You need to move from a subjective feeling of "I'm too busy" to knowing exactly what's on your plate, how much time you have, and what will be impacted if you say yes to something else. This logical approach allows you to clearly articulate your position and either help them understand your constraints or work together to reprioritise.

Essential strategies for saying no effectively

1. Always pause before responding

Don't be like I used to be - immediately saying "no problem" before my brain had even processed the request. Instead, ask for a few minutes to check your workload.

You can say: "Can you give me five minutes?" or "Let me check my workload, and I'll get back to you in half an hour."

Use this time to ask clarifying questions if needed: When is it due? What exactly is involved? What will it be used for? Understanding the full scope of the request is crucial for making an informed decision.

2. Review your current workload objectively

During the pause you've created, take a realistic look at your current commitments. Check how the new request fits with your existing priorities and deadlines.

Sometimes, you might find you actually can accommodate the request with some timeline adjustments. Other times, you'll see clearly that taking it on would mean dropping other important work.

This review gives you the confidence and context for your response, whether that's yes, no, or yes with conditions.

3. Communicate with context and alternatives

When saying no, provide context about your current priorities. If saying no to your manager, offer to sit down and review your workload together. If declining a request from someone else, you could:

• Offer to check with your manager if you're the right person to help
• Suggest a viable alternative person who might assist
• Offer partial help ("I can't do all of it, but I could help with this specific part")
• Propose a different timeline ("I can't help this week, but I could assist next Tuesday if you still need support")

Helpful phrases for different situations

For buying time: "Let me quickly check what's on my desk for the next two days, and I'll get back to you within the hour."

For optional or voluntary projects: "Thanks for thinking of me, but I'm currently fully committed to [specific project] with deadlines coming up."

For conflicting priorities: "I'm happy to take this on. Just to make sure we're all on the same page, could we check with my manager about which existing tasks should be deferred or deprioritised so I can help with this?"

Understanding your decision-making authority

It's crucial to know when you can make workload decisions on your own and when you need to involve your manager. This depends on your role, seniority, and time in the company. Have a conversation with your manager about:

• Which requests should go through them first
• When you have autonomy to make decisions
• Whether they want to act as a shield for certain types of requests

Misaligned expectations here can create unnecessary chaos in your workday.

Take Action Today

Here are three things you can do right now to improve your ability to say no when needed:

1.  Audit your current capacity: Look at your workload for this week. If someone asked you to take on something extra, could you? If not, what would be impacted?

2.  Align with your manager:  Set up a conversation to agree on priorities and understand how much involvement they want in fielding requests for your time.

3. Manage expectations proactively:  Identify senior people who frequently make requests of you. Consider having regular check-ins to update them on your workload and capacity before they make requests.

Saying no is a skill worth developing.

It's not always easy to say no at work, and you'll probably make mistakes - I certainly have, and so has everyone I know. But if you never say no for fear of making that mistake, you're setting yourself up for bigger problems: overwhelm, burnout, and becoming unreliable despite your best intentions.

Learning to say no effectively isn't about being unhelpful. It's about managing resources wisely, maintaining quality work, and ensuring you can deliver on your commitments. That makes you a more valuable and dependable team member in the long run.

Ready to transform how your team works? Niamh helps organisations build more productive workplaces where people thrive without burning out. Schedule a conversation to explore how Niamh can support your team's performance and wellbeing.