One of the biggest time sucks

One of the biggest time sucks is when someone from the c-suite asks you to "look into" why a certain KPI dipped.

Signups. Activated accounts. PQLs. Self-serve purchases. Those are the most likely suspects for us product growth folks. Traffic and channel performance for the marketers.

Always flattering to have the c-suite asking you for help. But usually not a good use of time. Unless you're directly focused on impacting the metric - 99% of the time, it's change is a normal fluctuation.

But juuust in case something else is going on... you want be the person who finds it, right?

That's what I told myself.

In reality, this was my people pleaser tendencies getting the better of me. I've fallen into this trap more than I care to admit.

If I could go back in time, I'd do it a little differently:

First, I'd educate the c-suite on the cadence we should be looking at these numbers, to avoid fire drills.

Then, I'd create reporting alerts to flag anything outside the normal range of deviation, to avoid false alarms.

That would help me stop rage clicking around the analytics tools.

Don't be a rage clicker like me. Set up a system to ignore the noise and stay focused on your long-term goals.