The Boss Who Cried Urgent
If everything is a priority, then nothing is a priority
We all remember the boy who cried wolf. Same story plays out in offices everywhere: the boss who cries urgent.
I know a guy—let's call him Dave—who considers everything "URGENT." Morning coffee order? Urgent. Team lunch plans? Urgent. Quarterly report that's been on the calendar for months? You guessed it. His team had a nickname for him behind his back: "Fire Drill Dave."
The real lesson his team took away from Dave's frenzy of urgency? Ho-hum: when everything's urgent, nothing is.
When Urgent Becomes Ordinary
Dave's team had developed what I call "urgency fatigue." When every request carries a red flag, your people stop seeing red altogether. They begin to tune out, prioritize based on their own judgment, and worst of all, they start questioning your leadership credibility. Part of a leader's job is to help his team distinguish between what is really important versus what may feel important. Treating everything like a top priority exposes to your team that you can't actually tell the difference.
Real urgency has specific characteristics: it's time-sensitive, has significant consequences if delayed, and genuinely cannot wait. But Dave was marking routine reports, standard client updates, and even team lunch orders as urgent. His team learned to filter his communications through their own urgency meter, effectively bypassing his leadership entirely.
The breaking point came when Dave marked a routine quarterly review as "URGENT - RESPOND IMMEDIATELY," while a legitimate crisis—a major client threatening to leave—got buried in the noise. His team missed the real emergency because they'd been conditioned to ignore his alarm bells.
The Three-Part Damage
This leadership mistake creates a cascade of problems that damage far more than just productivity:
First, it undermines your team. When you cry urgent repeatedly, you're essentially telling your people you don't trust their ability to prioritize. You're micromanaging their attention and creating unnecessary stress. High performers, in particular, will begin to resent being treated like they can't distinguish between important and routine work.
Second, it derails your mission. True priorities get lost in the shuffle. Strategic initiatives lose momentum because everything feels reactive. Your team starts playing defense instead of driving toward goals. Innovation dies because there's never time to think—everyone's always responding to the latest "emergency." You can't win if you're always on defense.
Third, it sabotages you as a leader. Your credibility erodes with each false alarm. Team members start making their own decisions about what deserves their immediate attention. You lose influence precisely when you think you're asserting it most strongly.
The Path Forward
The solution isn't complex, but it requires discipline. Here's what I've seen work:
Create a real urgency framework. I use a simple system: Level 1 (deal with today), Level 2 (deal with this week), Level 3 (deal with this month). Only Level 1 items earn the "urgent" label, and they must meet specific criteria: immediate client impact, time-sensitive deadlines, or genuine business emergencies.
Practice the 24-hour rule. Before marking anything urgent, wait a day if possible. Ask yourself: Will this matter tomorrow? Next week? If the answer is unclear, it's probably not urgent.
Explain your reasoning. When something truly is urgent, tell your team why. "This client meeting was moved up 24 hours" carries more weight than "URGENT MEETING CHANGE." Context helps people understand and buy into your priorities.
Apologize for past overuse. You'll see an immediate response. Acknowledge that you've diluted the meaning of urgent and commit to using it more judiciously. Your credibility will actually increase because of this honest conversation.
Leading with Authentic Urgency
True leadership isn't about creating constant motion—it's about directing purposeful action. When you reserve urgent for genuinely urgent matters, several things happen: your team starts paying attention when you use it, real priorities get the focus they deserve, and your leadership presence strengthens rather than weakens.
The boy who cried wolf lost his credibility and, ultimately, his sheep. The leader who cries urgent loses something far more valuable: the trust and effectiveness of the team depending on his leadership.
Your people are smart enough to prioritize effectively when given clear guidance. Trust them with that responsibility, and save your urgency for when it truly matters. Both you and your team will be better for it.