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Saying "no" can get you into trouble in a hierarchy. There are many ways leading to no without saying "no", such as:

• I'll look into it

• I'll see what I can do

• I'll review that right away

This isn't me saying "say these things", I'm just pointing out this is an age-old problem, and saying "no" inwardly is different than saying it outwardly. Various ways of inquiring about options are also commonplace.

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The solution is to have a conversation with your manager about the work you want to take on, not to play word games where you pretend to take on a task but don’t do it.

If you say you’ll review something or look into it, you still have to follow through on it. Using those phrases to dodge the work isn’t much different than failing to do the work. It will be noticed

If I tell someone to do thing A and they look into it and decide to not do it, the reason better be a whole lot better than I didn’t feel like it or I wouldn’t be promoted if I did that.

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