TURN DAYS OF SILENCE INTO A REAL ANSWER
SIX DAYS.
That’s how long your proposal has been sitting in someone’s inbox.
Not rejected.
Not approved.
Just quiet.
You’ve already written the follow-up in your head twice.
Something polite.
Something patient.
But before you send another message, stop.
“No response” is usually a symptom.
There may be a question, concern, missing detail, or unclear next step sitting underneath it.
LET’S FIND IT IN 10 MINUTES.
STEP 1 — FIND THE BLOCKER
🔴🟡🟢 COPY THIS INTO CHATGPT OR YOUR AI TOOL:
Act as my project chief of staff.
I'm going to give you a proposal or request that has not received a decision yet. Review it from the perspective of the person who needs to approve it.
Identify:
- Questions the proposal does not answer
- Anything unclear about cost, ownership, risk, Timing or next steps
- Information the reader may need before making a decision.
For each possible blocker, explain exactly what is missing or unclear
Rules:
- Do not assume you know why the reader has not responded
- Separate what is actually missing from what is only a possibility.
- Do not invent objections
- Be specific.
- Keep it concise.
Proposal:
[paste your proposal here]
Now you have a list of things that could be slowing down.
Don’t send this list.
Use it to fix the proposal.
STEP 2 — FIX THE PROPOSAL
Go back to the findings from Step 1.
Do not add information you cannot verify.
And don’t make it longer just because AI found more things to say.
Sharper beats longer.
STEP 3 — CHECK IT BEFORE YOU SEND
If the answer is no, go back to Step 1.
Watch for this phrase:
“Just following up on this.”
It tells the reader you are still waiting.
It does not give them a reason to decide.
SEND IT
Resend the proposal with the gaps addressed.
If the workflow works, save it so you can reuse it the next time something stalls.
Save it as: Approval Blocker Fix v1
HOW DID IT GO?
Did you use the workflow?
WHAT YOU JUST DID
You stopped waiting for a decision and started looking at the decision itself.
You found the questions the proposal left unanswered.
You fixed what you could.
And instead of sending another message asking, “Any Updates?", you gave the other person something easier to respond to.
Not every stalled decision has a problem you can fix.
Sometimes the answer is still no.
Sometimes the person is simply busy.
Before you grab today’s Field Kit:
Tell us about your role and the kind of work you’re dealing with so we can build workflows around problems that actually show up at work.
The proposal got approved.
Fast, even.
Two weeks later, someone discovered that the approval depended on a number nobody had actually checked.
Not because anybody lied.
Nobody ignored a warning.
The approval simply felt like the end of the process.
Thursday, we’ll look at what happens when “approved” starts to mean “correct”.
And the one check that can stop that from happening.
TODAY’S FIELD KIT(APPROVAL BLOCKER FIX):
Inside the Kit:
The full prompt sequence
A pre-send objection checklist
A ready-to-use blocker-diagnosis template
This kit lives in our learning community. Sign up free to get access.
