September 06, (THEWILL) — One of the interesting things about becoming a better golfer is that you gradually learn that having more options does not necessarily make every decision easier. There was a time when standing on the tee of a par four, one of the longer holes on a golf course, automatically meant reaching for my driver. It’s the club for hitting the ball the farthest, so the logic seemed straightforward: if you can get closer to the hole, why opt for anything less?
Experience teaches you why. Some holes punish distance without direction. The fairway, the closely mown strip you ideally want to land on, may narrow precisely where your longest shot is likely to finish. There may be bunkers, water or thick grass waiting at that distance. Sometimes a less powerful club leaves you better positioned for the next shot. The question changes from How far can I hit this? to Where do I need to be next? Sometimes, the smartest club in your bag is the one you decide not to use.
That lesson extends far beyond golf. As we become more successful, we acquire more clubs of a different kind. Money gives us options. Position gives us authority.
Experience gives us confidence. Relationships give us access. Reputation gives us influence. Yet one of the paradoxes of maturity is that increasing capacity should often produce greater restraint, not less.
The inexperienced leader may feel compelled to demonstrate authority. The mature leader knows that possessing authority and exercising it are different things. You can win an argument and damage a relationship. You can impose a decision and weaken ownership. You can respond to every criticism and inadvertently amplify it. You can afford something and still decide that buying it makes little sense. The ability to do something is not, by itself, a compelling reason to do it.
A very current development in Nigeria brings this principle into sharp focus. This week, The Will reported that Uber ended its Nigerian operations after 12 years. The global ride-hailing company entered Lagos in 2014 and subsequently expanded its footprint. Following what it described as a review of the business, Uber decided to wind down its Nigerian operations.
The backdrop is challenging. Rising fuel and vehicle-maintenance costs have squeezed drivers, while ride-hailing platforms must balance affordable fares, commissions, driver earnings and their own commercial viability. Uber’s departure also comes as the company reassesses parts of its African operations. I do not know the numbers behind Uber’s decision, so I cannot say whether leaving Nigeria was ultimately the right call. But its departure raises a fascinating strategic question: When does persistence stop being a virtue?
Nigeria remains a huge market, and Uber is a global company with considerable resources. But having the capacity to remain in a market is different from having a compelling strategic reason to remain there. Twelve years already invested should not automatically determine whether resources should be committed for a thirteenth.
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I have encountered versions of this dilemma repeatedly in nearly three decades of business and leadership. One of the hardest decisions is often not whether to begin something, but whether to stop something into which you have already poured considerable time, money, reputation, and emotional energy. The longer you have carried an initiative, the easier it becomes to defend yesterday’s investment rather than interrogate tomorrow’s prospects.
This is what economists call the sunk-cost problem: letting the effect of resources already spent that cannot be recovered dominate what we should do next. It explains why organisations continue funding failing projects, leaders defend outdated strategies and individuals remain committed to decisions whose original assumptions have fundamentally changed. Walking away can feel like admitting that the previous investment was wasted. Sometimes, however, the greater waste is continuing simply because you have already come this far.
Golf presents the same temptation in a less expensive form. Imagine facing a shot with water between your ball and the green, the prepared area where the hole is located. You know that on your very best strike you can clear the water. You may even have successfully played the shot before. But that is not the real question. The better question is whether attempting it now gives you the best probability of producing the score you want.
Golf has a way of exposing ego. Someone alongside you hits a magnificent drive, or the flag sits temptingly behind a bunker, and suddenly you want to prove you can match it. If the shot requires your very best, think twice. Sound strategy rarely depends on perfection.
The same is true in business. Companies sometimes pursue acquisitions because they can finance them rather than because they should own them. Entrepreneurs expand because capital is available, not because the organisation is ready. Leaders enter battles that have little bearing on their larger objectives. In each case, metaphorically speaking, the biggest club in the bag is inviting us to swing.
Restraint is easily mistaken for timidity because action is more visible. We celebrate the bold acquisition, aggressive expansion, and spectacular shot over the water. What we rarely see are the opportunities disciplined people declined, the investments they walked away from, the argument they chose not to pursue, and the risks they quietly decided were unnecessary.
This is especially true of power. I have observed that one of the clearest tests of leadership is what people do when they no longer need permission. When you have enough authority to insist, enough money to indulge yourself, enough influence to retaliate or enough status to disregard others, restraint becomes a measure of character. Power reveals itself not only in its exercise, but also in its voluntary limitation.
Restraint is not the absence of ambition; it is ambition governed by judgement. In business and life, the best decision is often determined by what it makes possible next. Before deploying capital, accepting an appointment, entering a partnership, or making a major commitment, perhaps we should ask not only, Can I do this? but also, where does this leave me for the next shot?
Ultimately, golfers are not rewarded for demonstrating how far they can hit the ball or how many difficult shots they can attempt. The objective is to complete the course in as few strokes as possible. Life has its own version of that wisdom. Success is not demonstrated by exercising every option available to us, but by knowing which ones advance the larger purpose and having the discipline to leave the others alone.
The next time opportunity, authority, money, or ego places a powerful club in your hands, perhaps the most important question is not whether you can use it, but whether the larger objective would be better served by leaving it in the bag.
The author, Meka Niyi Olowola (FSPIN, FIMC), is a seasoned business leader and entrepreneur with three decades of experience and an avid golfer.
•The author, Meka Niyi Olowola (FSPIN), is a sustainability and communications expert, business leader and avid golfer.
