This week, I learned once again that sometimes the best action is no action at all, at least not immediately.
On the farm, I found myself standing at the entrance gate, aware that a deer had somehow gotten inside my 8-foot fence. My first instinct? Try to control the situation and guide the deer out. But without taking a moment to pause, I ended up pushing the deer into a corner. It panicked, ran into the fence multiple times, and finally crashed through it. Instead of a calm solution, I was left with a fence to repair and the thought that I caused unnecessary stress for that poor animal.
If I had simply paused for a moment, I could have thought through my options: open the gates wide, create a clear and safe exit, and let the deer find its own way out calmly.
This situation reminds me of how we should lead in business. When we encounter a new challenge or an unexpected problem, it’s tempting to react immediately, to force things, to act out of urgency. But in most cases, unlike a true emergency, a pause is the wiser move.
Taking that brief pause to run through possible scenarios and visualize the likely outcomes helps us avoid mistakes that can set us back or cause more damage than the original problem.
A short pause to think instead of jumping to act can be the difference between a broken fence and a peaceful exit. Or, in business terms, between a setback and a breakthrough.
This post first appeared on July 11, 2025 in Sowing Success, my weekly LinkedIn newsletter on leadership and organic farming. Read the original on LinkedIn.
