How long will that take?

We’ve all been there multiple times. Your boss randomly asks you a question, you come up with a reasonable solution on the fly, and then you get the hard question following: How long will it take?

Practice this: “I don’t know, can you give me an hour and I’ll get back to you?”

I’ve been practicing this for about a year after repeatedly answering incorrectly for years before that. Before, I’d give a quick estimate, and almost every time I’d be wildly incorrect. It’s no surprise when you’ve been given about two seconds to think about it.

So now, I ask if I can have a bit of time to think about it, dig into the details for awhile, then text my boss with an informed estimate instead of a guess. There are two important consequences to this practice:

You give better estimates
Your boss knows you’re spending the next hour estimating something (and thus not getting your other work done)

Occasionally, you’ll also discover that the project is completely impractical and have to start the conversation over. It’s much easier to discover this now than after telling your boss it’ll be done in three days.

The hard part is remembering to stick to “I don’t know” as a default answer. It’s hard not to give your boss an answer. It’s hard to admit you don’t know. But, this simple trick will pay huge dividends for you, your boss, and your company as a whole.