Loan officers know this feeling: the market is heavy, the phone is quieter than it should be, and every decision feels like it takes three times the energy it used to. You are stuck in the molasses. As a leadership performance coach, this is the exact conversation I have every week with loan officers and executives who feel the market keeping them down and need a way out.
The Heavy Market Feeling and Decision Fatigue
When you are feeling stuck, you are feeling decision fatigue. It is rarely the market alone that keeps you down. It is the weight of a thousand small calls: Should I call this borrower back now or wait for rates to settle? Should I run that campaign or hold the budget? Should I follow up again or is that going to be too much?
None of these decisions are hard on their own. Stacked together, they become a wall. Decision fatigue is real, and it is the enemy of momentum. By mid-afternoon you have spent so much mental energy that the obvious next step feels impossible. That is the molasses. Movement is possible, but everything feels thick and slow.
Stop Focusing on the Goal. Focus on Strategy.
The best thing I advise as a leadership performance coach is not focusing on the goal. I say it plainly: forget the goal for a minute. Let's focus on strategy.
The goal is the destination. Strategy is the very next step you control. When your attention locks onto the volume number, the annual target, the 20 pounds, you hand your energy to something you cannot move today. The market decides that outcome. You do not. But you do control the next step. Pull your focus there, and you get out of decision fatigue and out of feeling stuck with one simple, small action.
Small Actions Equal Traction
Small actions equal traction. That is not a slogan. It is the equation.
You do not dig out of the molasses with one heroic move. You dig out with the next action, then the next. Small actions equal traction because every small action does two things: it moves the needle, and it proves to you that movement is possible. Traction is momentum you can feel. It is the energy that shows up on a day the market gave you nothing.
Stop waiting for the market to shift. Start moving, and let your own traction change the game.
Don't Stare at the 20 Pounds. Just Put Your Shoes On.
Here is an example. If I want to go to the gym and start losing weight, I am not going to focus on the 20 pounds I have to lose. I am going to focus on just putting my shoes on.
The 20 pounds is the goal. Putting your shoes on is the strategy, the very next step you control. It is almost embarrassingly small, and that is exactly the point. Small enough that decision fatigue cannot stop it. Once the shoes are on, the gym is an easy yes. The workout becomes possible, and the 20 pounds starts moving on its own.
Nobody loses 20 pounds in a single heroic afternoon. They lose it one pair of shoes at a time.
Applying It to Business: One Call, One Email, One Follow-up, One Conversation, Then Another
Now bring it back to your pipeline. This week, do not think about the month, the quarter, or the market. Think about one call, one email, one follow-up, one conversation, then another.
One call to a past client. One email to a referral partner. One follow-up you have been avoiding for two weeks. One conversation that turns a no into a maybe and a maybe into a yes. Every single one is an action you fully control. None of them need the market to cooperate.
That is how loan officers build traction in a tough market. Not through one giant move, but through one call, one email, one follow-up, one conversation, and then another, until the pipeline starts feeding itself again.
The Assignment: Momentum Instead of Molasses
Here is the assignment. Right now, before you close this article, name the one small action you can take today. Not the goal. The next step you control. Write it down, and take it. When you finish, choose another.
This week, string together one call, one email, one follow-up, one conversation, and then another. Watch what happens. The molasses thins. Momentum replaces the stuck feeling.
I have watched this work for twenty years of sales and leadership. The market will do what the market does. Your job is simpler: keep moving. And if you want a partner in building the strategy and the next steps, let's talk. The first step is always small. That is the point.
Make Shift Happen.
The Build Your Niche Takeaway
The same principle that small actions equal traction teaches is the reason to Build Your Niche. When you know your niche, your purpose, and your ideal customer, you get remembered and referred. You do not dig out of a heavy market with one heroic move, you dig out one call, one email, one follow-up at a time, and the same goes for chasing strategy instead of goals and making shift happen. Book your 90-Minute Private Coaching session below and let your own traction change the game.
Frequently Asked Questions
How to Build Your Niche
The 90-Minute Private Coaching session ($995) walks you through the 3-part Build Your Niche framework: your niche, your customer, and your purpose. In one session we identify the next steps you control, so you can move even when the market will not, the way Shift Happens. Ok, Now What? shows. Book your session through the Build Your Niche button below.
Why do small actions beat big goals in a slow market?
Because the market decides the outcome, and you decide the next step. Small actions move the needle and prove to you that movement is possible. Traction is momentum you can feel, even on a day the market gives you nothing.
What is the first step when I feel stuck?
Put your shoes on. Name the one small action you can take today, not the goal, and take it. When you finish, choose another, and string together one call, one email, one follow-up, one conversation, then another.
I feel stuck, how do I discover what I want to do?
Feeling stuck usually means you are in the echo chamber, surrounded by the same voices that got you here. The way out is building a niche around your genius zone, where your purpose and your strengths line up. That is the exact work we do in Build Your Niche.
Stuck in a career plateau? The question isn't effort, it's positioning.
A plateau feels like an effort problem, and it rarely is. You can row harder in molasses and stay put. The move is positioning: choose the ONE customer and problem you want to be known for, and let your energy focus where traction actually lives. That is the front door of Build Your Niche, and the 90-Minute Private Coaching session runs the whole framework in ninety minutes.
This is part of the Build Your Niche framework: Build Your Niche.
Craig Davis is a Leadership Performance Coach and the creator of the Build Your Niche framework, helping leaders break their echo chamber, for themselves, their team, and their business.
Craig was a speaker at our annual Sales Summit this year and he was fantastic. He really got our crowd excited to take what they learned and apply it to both their career and personal lives.
Chelsea