This week, I noticed that a couple of business influencers I follow have made drastic changes with their business. At the heart of each decision, they chose to say YES to a NO. Making choices like this is never easy, and shouldn't be, but I celebrate their courage.

Out of the two, the one I'd like to dive into is Marie Forleo's big news. As an alumnus of her B-School program (an online business course), I joined the alumni Facebook group that they moderated. It was an added bonus to connect with other students who were made up of various businesses. I found the group an opportunity to hear and share stories with other B-Schoolers and expand my network. 

I valued the fact that the group was moderated to keep the conversation's focus not only on business development but also on keeping the sales pitches at bay and communication positive. But even with moderation, the downsides of social media couldn't be avoided.  

I noticed as the conversation in the last few months became more emotionally charged with racial discussion as the Black Lives Matter movement became centre stage. The topic of racism has never been part of the B-School program, so there was no precedent in including it in the conversations.

To Marie's credit, she attempted to manage dialogue and speak to the issues as the influencer she is. Her efforts to participate in the conversation missed the mark as the pushback on the Facebook page became more and more vocal. I think she realized her role is support Black Lives Matter in ways that make sense to her and it wasn't her role to be a voice of it. 

To be honest, my interest in the Facebook group waned a couple years ago. I would scan through posts, but never felt I had the time or content to engage. And recently the challenges of 2020 kept me focused in other areas. So when a notification of a name change to the group occurred, my curiosity was peaked. I signed into the group to figure out why and saw a post from Marie.

The news was shocking. It was a decision to abruptly disassociate the Facebook group from the B-School program. Because she respected the community and the value that the members gained from it, she didn't dismantle it. But the repercussions meant that there would be no new additions and no assigned moderators.

The reaction from the 30,000+ community was polarized. Many were supportive of it, and also many louder voices were unhappy with the news. While I was in shock at the abruptness of the move, I supported Marie's choice. It took courage to make such a big decision and balls to quickly rip off the bandaid. She chose to focus on her core business instead of depending on third-party platforms.

In the aftermath, I knew this wasn't a group I would find value in and left. I have lifetime access to the original B-School platform, and I can engage with the program whenever I need to.

I don't know about you, but I find life circumstances to be oddly connected. In David Duchiem's latest podcast, A Beautiful Anarchy, he spoke how saying YES to NO is where you get your most important work done. I saw a connection with Marie's choice. She chose to say YES to her mission by saying NO to the Facebook Group.

How about you? 

Is there something about your company that needs you to say YES to a NO? Is there something about your workflow or product development that if you said YES to NO that could open up doors? And in a real mind game, are you aware that some of your NO's are really YES's to something else?