Drop the Ball: A Strategic Guide to Letting Go

Why Dropping Balls Intentionally Creates Capacity, Develops Others, and Opens New Opportunities

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We are thrilled to share a guest post by Chaitali Narla, a tech executive with 15+ years of experience building and scaling products and teams. She is also a mom and regularly juggles a demanding career with parenthood. She writes about her leadership and life lessons at ChaiTime.

In this post, you will learn what happens when you “drop balls” (at work and home), how to distinguish (and decide) between glass vs rubber balls, and how to mitigate the risks of dropping the wrong balls.

An essential read to maximize your time and output ROI.

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I’m often asked the “work-life balance” question.

You know.

The one that starts with how I “do it all” – growing in my career while parenting and managing household responsibilities and also getting an adequate amount of sleep.

The simple answer is I don’t.

Today’s post is about dropping balls — at home and at work– and why it might be the most important skill you never learned.

This post is loosely based on Tiffany Dufu’s book Drop the Ball. I say loosely because some of the lessons I mention here are from her book, but I have added many more of my own thoughts and learnings, along with a bunch of personal stories for a more complete picture of this topic from my perspective.

The Myth of “Doing It All”

We live in a culture that celebrates the juggler.

The person who keeps seventeen balls in the air while walking a tightrope, blindfolded, during an earthquake. We’ve made heroes out of hustlers who boast about their 5am wake-up calls and their ability to “crush” every single thing on their plate.

But here’s what I’ve learned after years of trying to be that person: The best leaders don’t catch every ball. They know which ones to drop.

Because when you try to catch everything, you end up catching nothing well.

Two Ball Drops

Here are two of my most memorable ball drop stories.

There are many many more (and we’ll cover some more today) but these stick in my mind as defining moments.

Dropping the Ball at Work

The laundry was piled high, the beds were unmade, and my then-2-year-old was home with a bad cough and cold. We had just survived a rough night with constant wakings due to said cold. I had an important meeting in a few minutes that I had moved to naptime, hoping for uninterrupted time, but that hope was vanishing fast as my toddler clung to me, refusing to nap.

I was at my worst self as an employee and mom at that moment. All stressed and unable to enjoy either role. My husband came into the room just then with a warm cup of chai for me and some haldi doodh for kiddo. He asked me why I didn’t take the rest of the day off. I could nap with my toddler to get some much needed rest and she’d probably nap better and recover faster that way too.

A lot of responses rose in my mind to that.

Some indignant.

Some angry.

Some whiny.

But something made me stop in the moment and consider if maybe there was a way I could do just what he suggested and take the afternoon off.

I messaged one of my reports to see if they could handle the meeting. I sent off a couple of emails and messages to my team explaining my situation. And then I switched off my work profile on my phone and took a nap with my toddler.

I dropped the ball at work and it was the best thing that happened to me and my family that day!

If you are wondering what happened next at work — absolutely nothing!

The meeting happened smoothly without me. My very competent report, who had prepared for it, handled it well. In fact, you could say it was the best thing that happened to him because he got visibility without me overshadowing him, which later helped in his growth.

Dropping the Ball at Home

Planning vacations was always my task for the first 10 years of our marriage.

I’d bring the same rigor to it as I did to work, making spreadsheets and checklists and researching our destinations via books, searches and online communities. Then everything was loaded on our family calendar and it was my job to hustle the family into following it the same way I hustle my teams to stick to project schedules.

Some things always predictably happened as a result of this:

• First, my very outdoorsy husband and I would always have at least one fight on vacation because I’d built in spa time (which I enjoy) but not a hike or other sporty activities (which I reluctantly enjoy only when dragged to them, but he really likes).

• Second, I’d come back from vacations feeling like I needed another vacation because of all the planning and schedule-sticking I had to do.

In the fall of 2021 I started my executive MBA at UC Berkeley Haas School of Business while also continuing my demanding job as an eng director managing a global organization of 200+ at Google. It was the busiest I’d ever been. I had negative time that year to plan our annual December vacation since I was buried in work and studies. So my husband picked up the planning.

A few wonderful things happened during that December vacation to Puerto Rico! First it was completely well planned with all the hotel, flight, car bookings completed, even though we stayed at multiple places during the trip and even spent part of the trip with friends. Next, it was a MUCH better balance of relaxing and sporty activities than I’d ever planned. Lastly, since I didn’t know any plans, I didn’t have to take the responsibility of hustling everyone which helped me really relax and enjoy the vacation!

Fast forward to now.

We’ve completely switched roles and my husband plans all the vacations while I take a break from my usual planner persona to enjoy them!

Why Drop Balls?

The above stories are two of many at work and home where I’ve dropped balls. Sometimes intentionally, sometimes unintentionally.

Here’s what I’ve learned about the strategic value of letting go.

1. Dropping Balls Creates Capacity

As my work story illustrates, dropping the meeting ball created the capacity for me to think about what my sick toddler needed (comfort) and I needed (rest) to get back to 100% again. Dropping the ball also allowed me to later come back to work more energized and focused.

The capacity principle: Every ball you hold takes up mental and emotional bandwidth, even when you’re not actively juggling it.

Think about it.

When you’re the person responsible for remembering that the car needs an oil change, planning the team offsite, and keeping track of everyone’s dietary restrictions for the company lunch, part of your brain is always running that background process. Even during your “off” hours.

Other smaller examples of ball drops that create capacity:

• Not answering select emails, especially ones I know will be answered by someone else.

• Not doing certain household chores that are clearly another person’s responsibility. Example: laundry every weekend is my daughter’s responsibility now. Letting her manage it frees me up for other chores.

• Not micro-managing a design review meeting that I have fully delegated to a report.

2. Dropping Balls Gives Others a Chance to Shine

In both my ball drop stories, someone else got the chance to step up and shine. At work, it was my report; at home, it was my husband.

If I had continued with my “only I can do it” mindset and held onto the ball in both situations, we’d all have had a suboptimal experience. Instead, someone else made the experience much better than I ever could!

This is where many high-performers get trapped.

We become so good at catching balls that we forget other people have hands too.

Here’s what I’ve observed: The people who struggle most with delegation aren’t bad managers. They’re often the most competent people on the team. They can see exactly how they would do the task, they can anticipate the potential problems, and they genuinely believe (often correctly) that they could do it faster and better themselves.

But “faster and better” isn’t always the goal. Sometimes the goal is development. Sometimes it’s sustainability. Sometimes it’s simply freeing yourself up to work on things that only you can do.

Take the example of the time when I had to frequently miss monthly business reviews in my VP’s organization due to MBA classes. I set up a “rotation” with my reports to represent us. Each of them was exposed to the broader business context, learned executive presence, and gained visibility as a future leader through this exercise!

3. Dropping Balls Reveals Better Opportunities

Again, in both stories, I was able to do something more interesting and meaningful to me by dropping the ball. In the work story, it was spending time with my sick toddler; in the home story, it was focusing on my MBA.

The lesson was this:

When you’re constantly in reactive mode, catching every ball that comes your way, you never get the space to ask the bigger questions: What should I be focusing on? What opportunities am I missing while I’m busy being “responsible”? What could I create if I had more bandwidth?

As a frontline manager, I had the responsibility of publishing a biweekly newsletter for my team’s work. I took this responsibility seriously, putting in a lot of effort to curate content and create what I thought was an engaging newsletter. I was so obsessed with putting out a great newsletter that I even worked on it during my vacation once. One day I was complaining to a mentor about how the team always dumped poorly written updates on me and I had to edit them into a great team newsletter.

My mentor asked me why I was doing this solo when the visibility benefited the entire team equally. They also asked me how I hoped to grow future tech leads if I was the only one who knew how to put together this newsletter. These questions completely changed my perspective and helped me see that I was missing out on the team growth opportunity while I was busy being “responsible” for this newsletter.

Some Balls Bounce, Others Shatter

Not all balls are created equal.

Some balls are made of rubber – they bounce when you drop them.

Others are made of glass – they shatter.

This metaphoric distinction matters when you are selecting which balls to drop vs which ones to juggle.

Identifying Your Glass Balls

Glass balls are non-negotiable responsibilities that, if dropped, have significant consequences for you or others.

These might include:

• Core job responsibilities that only you can do

• Commitments to people who are counting on you (especially when they don’t have alternatives)

• Health and safety issues

• Legal or compliance requirements

• Promises you’ve made that people have unmovable plans around

Personal example: I had been neglecting my health for a long time as I climbed the corporate ladder to more senior roles. A sharp wake up call was when an annual checkup revealed how close I was to being a diabetic and how much weight I had put on with poor exercise and sleeping habits. This was a glass ball that I was slowly dropping and it was time to catch it quickly!

Recognizing Your Rubber Balls

Rubber balls are tasks that feel urgent or important but can actually bounce back or be caught by someone else.

These often include:

• Tasks others can do (even if not exactly the way you would)

• Nice-to-haves that you’ve elevated to need-to-haves

• Responsibilities you’ve taken on out of habit rather than necessity

• Work that’s teaching you nothing new and growing no one else

• Busy-work that should be nobody’s job

The trick is that rubber balls often disguise themselves as glass balls. They show up with urgent emails, tight deadlines, and stressed people asking for your help. But when you look closer, you realize they’re not actually your responsibility, or someone else could handle them just as well.

The Ball Drop Risks (And How to Mitigate Them)

Dropping balls comes with risks, like all parts of leadership.

Never dropping balls will prevent you from finding new opportunities and growing. It could also lead to burnout from trying to do too much at the same time.

But dropping the wrong balls could also have significant personal or career consequences.

Risk 1: Dropping a Glass Ball

The Risk: Serious consequences for you or others when something truly important falls through the cracks.

The Mitigation: Before dropping any ball, ask yourself:

• What happens if this doesn’t get done at all?

• Who else is counting on this getting done?

• Is there a deadline that can’t be moved?

• Are there safety, legal, or ethical implications?

If the answers point to serious consequences with no good alternatives, it might be a glass ball.

Risk 2: Nobody to Catch Your Ball Drop

The Risk: You drop a ball assuming someone else will pick it up, but no one does.

The Mitigation: Make ball drops explicit, not passive. Instead of just not doing something and hoping someone notices, have a conversation:

• “I won’t be able to handle X anymore. Can you take it on?”

• “This task needs to be done, but I don’t think I’m the right person for it. Who should own this?”

• “I’m going to stop doing Y. If that’s going to be a problem, let’s talk about alternatives.”

Risk 3: Reputation Damage

The Risk: Being seen as unreliable or not a team player.

The Mitigation: Be strategic about which balls you drop and how you drop them. Some guidelines:

• Don’t drop balls during crisis periods when everyone is stretched

• Drop balls from a position of strength, not desperation

• Explain your reasoning when it’s not obvious

• Offer alternatives when possible

The Compound Effect of Strategic Ball Dropping

Here’s what I’ve observed after years of practicing strategic ball management: The benefits compound over time.

When you drop your first ball and the world doesn’t end, you get a little braver about dropping the next one. When you delegate a task and someone does it better than you would have, you start looking for more opportunities to step back. When you create space in your schedule and use it for something meaningful, you start protecting that space more fiercely.

The people around you also start to shift. They stop automatically assuming you’ll handle everything. They start stepping up more readily. Your team becomes more capable, your family becomes more self-sufficient, and you become more strategic.

As a mom and an executive in tech, one area where I’ve seen the positive compounding effects of ball drops is going on work travel. Over time, mommy traveling for work has changed from being a disruptive, high-touch event to a routine activity in our household. As a family, we now know how to schedule work travel around our glass ball moments and don’t worry as much when some rubber balls get dropped as a result.

Your Next Ball Drop

So here’s my challenge for you: What’s one ball you’re holding right now that someone else could catch?

Maybe it’s a recurring meeting you attend but don’t contribute much to. Maybe it’s a household task you’ve been doing out of habit. Maybe it’s a work responsibility that would actually help someone else grow if you passed it along.

Start small. Pick a rubber ball – something that feels a little scary to let go of but probably isn’t actually critical. Drop it mindfully. See what happens.

I’m willing to bet you’ll discover what I did:

Sometimes the best thing you can do for everyone is to get out of the way.

What ball are you ready to drop? I’d love to hear about your experiments with strategic letting go.

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Thank you, Chaitali, for showing us that “work-life balance” does not mean doing it all and for shining the positives of “dropping the ball.”

For more leadership and life lessons from Chaitali, connect with her on LinkedIn, subscribe to her newsletter, and watch her talk with Jason on the career and personal challenges faced by women in tech.

If the topic of ‘Work-Life Balance: How to Have Both’ is of interest to you and you’d like to learn from both Chaitali and Ethan, signup for the course email list. Pending the popularity and demand for the course, we may open a cohort in the future.

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