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Hey Subscriber First Name,

A while back I had a conversation with a PM who was close to quitting. Not because the work was too hard. Because she felt like she was failing, despite doing everything right.

Her projects were on track. Her teams liked working with her. Her stakeholders trusted her judgement. But every week she walked away from her reviews feeling like she'd come up short. Why? Because she was measuring herself by things she couldn't control. Whether the client changed scope. Whether a supplier delivered on time. Whether the senior leadership team moved the goalposts again.

She was exhausted, not from the hours, but from the constant feeling that no matter what she did, the scoreboard never moved in her favour.

I recognised that feeling because I'd had it for years without ever naming it.

Mark Manson writes about this in The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck (excuse the title, it's actually a brilliant book). He argues that most of our misery doesn't come from our problems. It comes from the values we use to measure ourselves. Pick a value you can't control, and you'll always feel like you're losing, no matter how well you're actually doing.

He gives an example that stuck with me. Pete Best was the original drummer of the Beatles. He was fired just before the band became the biggest act in history. For years, he was devastated. But decades later, he said he was genuinely happier for being let go. He'd built a family, found stability, found peace. His metric had changed. When he was measuring himself by fame and success, losing the Beatles was the worst thing that ever happened to him. When he started measuring by the life he actually wanted, it was the best.

Same events. Completely different experience. The only thing that changed was the scoreboard.

I think most PMs are stuck on the wrong scoreboard without realising it. We measure ourselves by whether the project came in on time and on budget, but half the variables that determine that are outside our control. Client satisfaction depends on politics, expectations that were set before we arrived, and promises made by people we've never met. Whether things went smoothly depends on suppliers, weather, approvals, and a dozen other things we can influence but never fully own. And yet we carry the score as if it's entirely ours.

That does something to you over time. If your scoreboard punishes you every time something goes wrong, you stop putting yourself in situations where things might go wrong. You play it safe. You take the smaller projects. You avoid the difficult conversations. You optimise for looking good instead of doing good work. And slowly, without noticing, you stop growing.

Here's why this matters so much for PMs specifically. Most of your best work is invisible. Clearing blockers. Reading the room in a stakeholder call. Absorbing pressure so your team can focus. Noticing that a risk register hasn't been updated and chasing it before anyone asks. None of that shows up on a dashboard. None of it gets celebrated. But without it, the project falls apart.

If your scoreboard only counts the visible, measurable output, you're ignoring the work that actually holds the project together. You'll finish a week where you prevented three problems, kept a team motivated through a difficult phase, and had a tough conversation that saved a month of rework, and you'll still feel like you didn't achieve anything. Because none of it was on the scoreboard.

So here's what I've changed. I stopped measuring myself by whether everything went to plan and started measuring myself by whether I made good calls with what I had. Did I escalate the right things? Did I protect the team's time? Did I have the difficult conversation early instead of late? Did I tell the truth when a comfortable lie would have been easier? Those are things I control. And when I measure myself against those, the scoreboard moves in a direction I can actually influence.

Outcomes still matter. Of course they do. But outcomes are the result of hundreds of small decisions, many of which are made by other people. The part that's truly yours is the quality of your judgement and the honesty of your communication. Measure those, and you'll have a much clearer picture of whether you're actually doing your job well, regardless of whether the stars aligned this quarter.

If you're exhausted right now, take a step back and look at your scoreboard. Really look at it. Because if it's full of things you were never in control of, no amount of effort will ever feel like enough. Change the scoreboard, and the game changes with it.

MAKING IT HAPPEN: Your Weekly Strategy

Write down the three things you currently use to judge whether you had a good week. Be honest about what's actually on your mental scoreboard. Now ask yourself: how many of those are within my direct control? If the answer is less than two, rewrite the list. Replace the uncontrollable metrics with ones that reflect your decisions, your judgement, and your behaviour. Try running on the new scoreboard for one month and see what changes.

ONE THING I'M THINKING ABOUT

With AI becoming part of every facet of work and life, I can't help but wonder how it will shape the behavioural side of the scoreboard. When organisations have more dashboards, more tracking, and more automated reporting than ever, will that make it easier to measure what actually matters, or will it just make us better at counting the wrong things? I don't have the answer yet. But I think it's a question worth sitting with.

CHEAT SHEETS

The free cheat sheet library is here. I'll keep adding to it. Save the link and grab whatever helps.

If this one landed, forward it to a PM who's been working harder than everyone around them and still feeling like they're falling behind. The problem might not be the work. It might be the scoreboard.

bilaljamil.com | Newsletter archive | Hit reply and tell me what's on your scoreboard right now. I read every one.

Take care and speak soon, 

Bilal