A secondary benefit of a good intake procedure is that it often leads people to withdraw their requests. It’s common, for example, for a boss to shoot off an idea to an employee on a whim. When this request gets formalized, however, and the boss sees that they need to provide you with more information, and they’re confronted with the reality of your current workload, they might simply respond, “On second thought, let’s put a pin in this one for now.” Sometimes, a little friction is all it takes to slow down a torrent of incoming work.
