“My son, if you become surety for your friend, if you have shaken hands in pledge for a stranger, you are snared by the words of your mouth; you are taken by the words of your mouth. So do this my son, and deliver yourself; for you have come into the hand of your friend: Go and humble yourself; plead with your friend. Give no sleep to your eyes, nor slumber to your eyelids. Deliver yourself like a gazelle from the hand of the hunter, and like a bird from the hand of the fowler.” – Proverbs 6:1-5, NKJV

Ever found someone close to you made promises that they aren’t able to fulfill? From asking one to be a surety, to work promises, or even payment promises, overpromising is a common theme that happens almost once too often in anyone’s professional and personal life.

I’ve recently seen a couple of incidents where friends claim to be able to get something done on time “yes! I can do it in 2 hours”, “yes! I can do it”, only to fall short of the initial deadline to payment promises that went overboard out of last minute disagreements.

While I’ve written about how we can all do with less overpromises in my previous ebook, this post is to serve both as a reminder to myself while re-looking at ways to go beyond preventing us from making promises that can’t be fulfilled, to actually getting out (as in clearing) and overcoming one’s word / promise debt. Here are 3 things to do when you’ve overpromised.

1. Be accountable.

“Go and humble yourself; plead with your friend.”

We love to hustle. I get it. Some of us are into the whole bragging “Look at me, I’m super busy! I’m working on 10 things at a time!!” approach, such that certain areas of our lives start to get out of balance and getting one into a promise debt (financials: bill reminders; productivity: missed deadlines).

Here’s one thing about calling oneself as “busy”: it’s an excuse. To be specific, it’s an excuse made to show oneself “stronger” than his own, as though he is in control.

Saying “I’m working until 8pm, and I got some things to do till 11pm, and I’m only home by 5am” doesn’t really help with actually solving the promise debt that one had made. It gives a perception that the person is trying to avoid the topic altogether, while in reality, he has no clue how to go about solving it on his own.

Hence, accountability.

One way to get accountability done right is to avoid saying all the “many-wonderful-things” that you’re doing right now, but refocusing by saying the things that you’re doing right now that may help in getting you out of your promise debt.

Instead of saying:

“I’m working till 9pm, with other appointments around 11pm, and I could only get back home at certain days the very next morning, which my work starts again at 3pm.” or “I’m working till 9pm, but I can do this within 2 hours!” or “I’m paying 20 bills at a time!”

Say something that shows you’re actually making effort to get things cleared:

“My check haven’t came in, I’m actually a freelancer with an income stream that’s from the US. A payment was missed in December (possibly due to the festive season) hence I wasn’t able to have cash to clear this bill. However, payments are usually cleared and sent on the 15th, and it takes 10 days by mail to reach me and bank which would clear in another 2 days, could I clear this amount on the 30th of the new month?”

2 reasons:

First, this gives you a clear picture on what’s going on in your own situation, and revealing that allows others to know that you are actually in control while perhaps it was a one off instance that the payer is facing an issue where he has limited control over.

Second, you’ve successfully negotiated an extended grace period where the payee understands your situation along with a deadline that is genuine based on the factors that you’ve listed while accounting to them.

What about work debt? Couldn’t get work done on time? Instead of saying:

“I’ll work on it this evening.”

Say:

“I’ll get working on it before 10pm tonight, you would be receiving it tonight at 12am or before morning 9am.”

It’ll work when you’ve given your word previously that this work is to be done at a certain deadline. You’re already in a promise debt, while this statement clarifies things up by re-presenting to the receiver that you’ll be working at that time, while they can expect to receive the work done before they start work the next morning.

What if you’re genuinely unable to get work done because you may had over committed yourself to too many tasks at once? Good question. Leads us to the next point.

2. Get productive.

“Give no sleep to your eyes, nor slumber to your eyelids.”

Dual perspective.

First, read it as though you are to keep watch over your words, thoughts and actions. This means being aware of the things around you, that time is a commodity and that things you have in your hands, including money, are tools to get work debt done.

That’s right. Time is a commodity, you control your words, thoughts, actions, based on the 24 hours that’s given to you everyday. Money is a tool, where you can sow sparingly through paying others to get tasks done faster (less outsource = more tasks you’ll have to do) and reap sparingly, or sow bountifully (you know what work needs to be done, being specific in the tasks and the payment expectation, and then source it to colleagues who get tasks done faster and better than one can do alone) and reap abundantly.

Keeping watch over your words, thoughts, and actions allows you to know 3 things, respectively:

• Words — Being certain of your words — let your yes be a yes — before committing words into action
• Thoughts — What’s in your mind right now? Occupy positive thinking rather than going all worrying throughout the day
• Actions — Like how most entrepreneurial and personal development blogs would ask the readers, same question goes to you, “would you be spending 2 hours of your time watching the TV, or building a side project that may become your new income stream?”

Second, read it as it is, where you don’t get to sleep until work is finished.

Wait what?

For example, if a task was agreed and set with a deadline of 3 weeks to be completed, get it done immediately with your own actual timeframe of 3 days once the first payment is received.

But what if you’re already facing a deadline crunch and you’re not yet at the standard to clear it as the example given above?

Skip your sleep if the task can be completed within a day.

If it’s a bigger task that requires 3 weeks to over a month to get done, quitting your job and getting work done is a viable option (caveat: have no debt and with a months’ over savings to get you through from work to profitability). Otherwise, outsourcing to another worker is another option, too comes with a cost.

You’re telling others to quit their jobs? What on earth?

In this context of being productive, yes. Get no sleep till work is finish to pay off a work / promise debt.

3. Do overdeliver

“Deliver yourself like a gazelle from the hand of the hunter, and like a bird from the hand of the fowler.”

Give no chances to hunters or fowlers to shoot you down. Combining the 2 points above of being accountable, and getting productive (being aware of your words, thoughts and actions), be aware of your surrounding that you will be able to deliver yourself (overcome) yourself from the hunters (careless overpromises may get one into trouble).

But no. Not all people are out there to hunt one another. I’d prefer to think in a way that people are generally good; we may turn nasty, bossy, or very direct at times when one carelessly overpromised and failed to deliver.

Solution?

Underpromise and overdeliver.

Here’s how you can effectively underpromise and overdeliver with your work:

Instead of saying, “oh, no I can’t do this” or “I don’t know how to do this” to everything that you actually know how to do so, change the way you frame your words to something specific and directive, “While other agencies do up to 3 samples to show their clients, I’m a one-person show, so I could only do one with the things that have worked for me and have been seeing sales with the sites that I’ve built … Would you prefer to have this started so it would (add users’ needs; not wants)?” with the quotation that states the essentials necessary to get your work done (underpromise), letting you get things done and overdelivering with the resources that’s given to you.

Of course, saying “no” to things that are not in quotation / invoice / contract helps to get you and others to focus on the core things at hand without going overboard with requests and careless overpromises.

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“A promise made should be a promise kept.” – Steve Forbes.