Leading Beyond the Noise
If everything is urgent, nothing really is.
In today’s workplace, it is easy to get caught up in what leadership thinker Charles E. Hummel famously called “the tyranny of the urgent.” Writing in 1967, Hummel argued that most of us spend too much time reacting to what seems urgent and not enough time investing in what is truly important. If that was true in the 1960s, how much more accurate is the observation in 2025, when we’re surrounded by 24/7 technology, communication channels, and internet access?
Deadlines, emails, and meetings crowd our calendars. Slack messages ping late into the evening. Teams move from one “quick fix” to another, convinced that constant motion equals productivity. We tell ourselves we are getting things done (yay!), but often, what we are really doing is running in place.
The truth is that urgency and importance are not the same thing. And when we fail to distinguish between them, we risk burning out our teams, draining morale, and confusing activity with impact.
The Allure and Cost of Urgency
Urgency is seductive. It creates momentum and makes us feel useful. When something is marked “high priority,” it immediately commands attention. Completing it brings a burst of satisfaction and a fleeting sense of control.
But living in a constant state of perceived urgency has real costs. When everything feels like a fire, we lose the ability to tell what is actually burning. Priorities blur. Long-term planning slips. And soon, teams are working harder than ever without feeling any closer to their goals.
The habit of constant reaction does more than deplete energy. It quietly erodes creativity, trust, and confidence. It leaves no room for reflection or strategy, and it signals to staff that the loudest voice or the latest crisis always wins.
The result is a workplace where progress is measured by how busy people look, not by whether their work moves the organization forward.
Why Urgency Thrives
Urgency thrives in organizations that equate responsiveness with effectiveness. Leaders want to be supportive, teams want to be helpful, and no one wants to appear disengaged. Over time, “getting things done fast” starts to feel like the same thing as “doing things well.”
Technology often compounds the problem. We are never really “off.” Smartphones keep us connected to work long after the day ends, and long after our predecessors in Hummel’s time. Notifications blur the line between the immediate and the important. And because many of us work in collaborative or service-driven environments, there is always someone waiting for a response.
Culturally, urgency also serves as a kind of status symbol. Being busy suggests that we are needed and valuable, and people wear their 12-hour workdays as a badge of honor. Yet, when busyness becomes our primary measure of worth, we lose the ability to discern when we are truly adding value.
How the Urgent Crowds Out the Important
Stephen Covey’s well-known “Eisenhower Matrix” (based on a quote from President Dwight Eisenhower: “The key is not to prioritize what's on your schedule, but to schedule your priorities.”) helps illustrate this tension. It divides our work into four quadrants:
Urgent and important: true crises or deadlines that require immediate attention.
Important but not urgent: strategic work that advances goals, builds systems, or develops people.
Urgent but not important: interruptions that feel pressing but do not add value.
Neither urgent nor important: time fillers that offer little purpose.
Most people spend the majority of their time in the first and third quadrants (urgent and important and urgent but not important). We manage crises and answer constant interruptions but rarely carve out space for the second quadrant – the quiet, important work that drives real change.
The challenge is the urgent work shouts, while important work whispers. Without deliberate boundaries, the noise always wins.
Break the Cycle
Breaking free from the tyranny of the urgent is not about ignoring what is pressing; that won’t work! It is about leading with intention. Doing so requires self-awareness, discipline, and a willingness to reset the norms that keep teams stuck in reactive mode.
Below are a few ways to start.
Name the Fire
Before rushing to respond, ask: Is this truly a fire, or just something that feels hot? Taking even a few minutes to clarify the issue can prevent wasted energy later. Ask questions like:
What is the real deadline? If it’s truly close of business today, this probably falls in quadrants 1 (urgent and important) or 3 (urgent but not important).
Who is impacted if this waits until tomorrow? Is it just your immediate team? In that case this might fall into quadrants 2 or 4 (not truly urgent); however, if it’s a client or your CEO, this might fall into quadrants 1 or 3 (truly urgent).
What would happen if we paused before deciding? Would you ultimately determine that this work doesn’t need to happen at all, or at least at this time? That would probably fall into quadrant 4.
Slowing the pace of reaction allows you to respond based on importance rather than intensity.
Build in Pause Points
Pauses are not luxuries; they are leadership practices. Build reflection into your week, your team’s workflow, and your organization's rhythms.
Schedule time for post-project reviews, quarterly debriefs, or simple Friday check-ins that focus on what worked, what didn’t, and what deserves more attention. Intentional pauses create opportunities to assess whether your team’s effort aligns with your priorities.
Protect Strategic Time
Most leaders say they want to be more strategic, but strategy requires space to think. Protect that time as fiercely as you do meetings. Block uninterrupted time on your calendar. Stay on the same page as your Executive Assessant to make sure they help you stick with your boundaries and priorities. Let your team know when you are in deep work mode; encourage them to do the same.
If you do not protect your focus, no one else will. You’ll constantly find yourself working on issues in quadrants 1 and 3 (the urgent) and rarely in quadrant 2 (the truly important, strategic work that never feels urgent).
Redefine Responsiveness
Being responsive does not mean being instantly available. It means being clear, reliable, and intentional. When someone asks for input, try responding with, “I have seen this and will share an update by the end of the day.” That small shift replaces reactive speed with thoughtful communication and helps normalize more sustainable expectations.
Empower Discernment
A healthy team does not confuse urgency with importance. Encourage your colleagues to question requests that come labeled as “urgent.” If someone asks, “Do you need this today or by the end of the week?” treat that as a sign of strong judgment, not resistance or laziness. The best teams operate from discernment, not default.
Celebrate Calm
Too often, we reward the firefighter and forget the fire preventer. Recognize and celebrate people who stay calm, anticipate needs, and build systems that reduce last-minute scrambles. Calm leadership creates trust. When leaders model steadiness instead of stress, others feel permission to think clearly and act confidently.
Leading Beyond the Noise
Urgency is not only organizational; it is also emotional. Many professionals equate calm with complacency or stillness with stagnation. But calm is not the absence of drive; rather, it is the presence of focus.
Intentional calm signals psychological safety. It tells your team that not every challenge requires panic, and that thoughtful leadership is more powerful than rapid reaction. When you lead with calm curiosity rather than constant reaction, your team learns to do the same. Over time, this shift creates a culture that prizes clarity and purpose over perpetual crisis.
Urgency will always exist. Real crises will happen. Deadlines will appear. The goal is not to eliminate urgency but to prevent it from becoming your default mode. Reclaiming calm means putting urgency in its rightful place. It means leading from clarity instead of chaos and helping your team see what feels urgent is not always what is most important.
In a world that rewards speed, calm leadership is quietly radical. It is how progress becomes sustainable and how leaders move from reaction to direction.
Ready to Lead with Intention?
At transform.forward, we help leaders and teams slow down enough to move forward with purpose. Through leadership development, coaching, and manager training, we help organizations build confidence, clarity, and systems that keep urgency from running the show.
If your organization is ready to reset its pace, strengthen leadership capacity, and create calm in the midst of chaos, we would love to help.
