Why treating everything as 'URGENT!' makes government less effective

I don't have to tell you that public service is hard work. The missions before us are vast, almost unending. Meanwhile, budgets and teams are even smaller than they used to be.

Faced with doing more with less, the result may sound familiar to federal managers: emails with "[Urgent!]" in the subject line, last-minute meetings put on calendars and having lunch at your desk or skipping a farewell party because there simply isn't enough time.

Urgency can be a form of care. Managers, in particular, feel pressure to keep work on track. It signals that our mission matters and that "good enough for government work" has no place in our workplace.

But after 15 years in government, I've come to believe that discernment, not a sense of urgency, is the more important leadership skill.

The costs of urgency

Urgency narrows our attention. It activates a stress response that makes us more reactive and less able to consider the broader picture or tradeoffs of working at high speed.

Sometimes these tradeoffs are strategic. Federal work is complex and depends on stakeholder engagement, collaboration across organizational units and navigating policy and bureaucratic constraints. When timelines become compressed, we skip consultation, cut short discussions about alternative approaches or settle for the status quo rather than something more generative.

Sometimes they are relational. When meetings follow agendas in rigid ways and deadlines are treated as immovable, employees can begin to feel like cogs rather than people. Over time, this erodes trust and contributes to burnout, disengagement and attrition.

And yes, dear federal managers, the tradeoffs can be personal, too. We do not do our best work when we're not able to slow down and make time for our health and family.

Leadership is choosing the right pace

Government will always have moments that demand speed. Emergencies happen. Windows of opportunity close. Sometimes asking more of a team and ourselves is the right choice.

But when this becomes an unquestioned reflex, we risk winning the battle and losing the war. When we don't slow down, we communicate, intentionally or not, that relationships, strategic thinking, recovering between periods of intense work and celebrating wins aren't important.

Good leadership is about discernment. It means distinguishing the moments that require immediate action from the moments when it's time to do the other important things: check in with a key stakeholder, zoom out to consider different approaches or extend a deadline so your team can take a breath.

I often think about Amy, a mentor from my State Department days. At the end of long days, she would remind us, "No one will die if we don't finish this today. Go home."

Urgency is a leadership decision

Perhaps it's time to let go of the idea that caring about our work always means rushing ourselves and one another.

The best public service leaders don't reject urgency. They use it as a tool, recognizing when speed advances the mission and when it undermines it.

Alex Snider is a former public servant and the author of Sometimes You Should Be Late. He served for 15 years in government, including at the State Department, Senate, and General Services Administration, and is the co-founder of Mindful Fed, a cross-government mindfulness community. He writes the Substack Slow Mindfulness.