Reflecting Through Books: Balancing Real-Time Decisions with Long-Term Thinking

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Borrowed & Learned

I remember, early in my career, believing that great leadership meant being ahead of everything. Being reactive meant you hadn’t planned well enough. I thought the goal was to anticipate every problem before it showed up and build a roadmap to outsmart uncertainty.

But that’s not how business (or life!) works. No matter how much I planned, things would shift. A client would change course. A project would hit a wall. Someone would leave. New opportunities would pop up with no warning. A plan can be helpful, but more often than not, what matters most is how you respond when things don’t go to plan, for better or worse.

Over time, I started to understand the value of reacting. Not as something to avoid, but as something to learn to do well. I thought it would be interesting to revisit some of the books I’ve read over the years to see how and where this concept shows up.

In The Path of Least Resistance, Robert Fritz describes what he calls a “reactive-responsive orientation.” He writes: “One way to describe the reactive-responsive orientation is as a way of living in which you predominantly react or respond to circumstantial stimuli that are beyond your direct control.” He goes on to say that for many people, this isn’t just a tactic. It becomes a full-on life orientation. You act based on whatever situation you find yourself in, or what you think might happen next.

That idea brought to mind how often I find myself navigating new inputs, shifting priorities, and unexpected changes. I wouldn’t say I’m always in reactive mode, but it’s easy to slip into it, especially when things are moving quickly. That’s where I’ve had to be intentional about not losing sight of values or longer-term goals just because something urgent shows up.

Stephen Covey, in The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, makes a clear distinction between reactive and proactive people. He writes: “Reactive people are affected by their social environment… When people treat them well, they feel well; when people don’t, they become defensive or protective.” Proactive people, he says, are different. They don’t allow their emotional state to be dictated by others. They’re guided by their values, not by their conditions. That’s a challenge I come back to often—responding thoughtfully without letting circumstances dictate my mindset or direction.

At the same time, speed and decisiveness matter. In Working Backwards, the authors Colin Bryar and Bill Carr explain Amazon’s approach in this way: “Speed matters in business. Many decisions and actions are reversible and do not need extensive study. We value calculated risk-taking.” That line about reversible decisions helped me rethink how much pressure I put on each move. Not every decision needs a long runway. Some just need momentum. Some of our best progress at Barrel has come when we stopped overanalyzing and simply put something into motion.

But too much reactivity without rhythm creates its own set of problems. In Scale at Speed, Felix Velarde writes about companies lurching between extremes—too much work, not enough work, then back again. He describes the cycle: “We have too much work on to be bothering with lead generation or pitches. We don’t have enough work—let’s focus on lead generation!” I’ve seen that pattern up close. It’s a natural response to pressure, but it’s unsustainable. Without a clear sense of where you’re going, you end up reacting to the latest fire over and over again.

Planning and reacting aren’t opposites. They work best in tandem. Planning gives you a point of view. Reacting keeps you close to what’s real. Neither works well without the other. When you hold too tightly to the plan, you can miss the signs that it’s no longer relevant. When you react without direction, you end up busy but disconnected from anything meaningful.

Some of the most impactful decisions I’ve made weren’t part of the plan at home, at work, and in life. They came from paying attention to what was happening in the moment and choosing to respond with intention.