We tend to bestow all sorts of virtues to giving but there is no giving without receiving. In films we watch, books we read and stories we discuss, there’s almost a reverence attached to the idea of a hero who’s a giver. This over exposure to “giving” undermines the importance of seeking help or being on the other end of giving. Wayne Baker in his super interesting book All you have to do is ask, tries to impress upon on the idea of asking for help.
Why we find it so hard to ask for help?
- We underestimate other people’s inability to help. We generally do not know everyone around us and how connected they are. This applies even to dormant ties. We refrain from asking our school mates or an old friend for help but doing that rekindles old connections and are almost always perceived positively.
- We over rely on ourselves, primarily because the idea seeking help is so rare and not talked about. Our first instinct is always to dive headfirst and try to do everything alone.
- There is a social cost to asking. This unfounded fear is basically linked to perception of incompetence. There are two types of help seekers – one who are asking for help to solve something on their own and the second who just want the problem to go away. The latter is looked down upon and its right we don’t want to be that but the former, is actually perceived positively. When you seek help to move forward and not get others do to your job, it is looked at positively.
- Our work culture lacks psychological safety and this makes asking appear to be some sort of risk taking when in fact asking to achieve an end goal for the team/organisation is actually a positive step forward.
- Our processes and systems get in the way (hiring a kind of people, incentive structures, silos and departments, etc)
- We don’t know how to make a request. This is either because at times we don’t know what we need exactly or we don’t know how to frame a good request.
- We believe asking is a privilege (earned by first giving) and we haven’t earned it yet. We should remember, asking and giving is a cycle and not an account book. We become givers and receivers everyday and a giver exists because there is a receiver. In that sense its two sides of the same coin.
- We fear seeming selfish by asking for something. This is again our own feelings working against us. Making a request allows people around us to help us achieve our goals and receive satisfaction themselves and the cycle goes on.
Balance giving and receiving
There is a quick survey in the book that helps you understand how often you give or receive at work every day, week or month and then give yourself a score. This is a free survey you can take here and then use the quadrant diagram below to see where you lie. The aim is to be the Giver-Requestors who are the most productive group.
Once you take the survey, you can spot where you lie in the four quadrants
You don’t want to be an excessive giver as it leads to burnout. Giving and receiving both are shown to be linked to mental well-being so there are benefits to being on either side in a balanced manner.
4 simple guidelines for giving and receiving
- Give without any strings attached – without any expectations on return or “i owe you one”
- Give freely but know your limits – this book has plenty of examples on how excessive compulsive giving can cause burnouts. It is important to know when giving is adversely affecting you.
- Ask when in need – when you need something just muster the strength to ask.
- Focus on the long run – shoot for giving and receiving equally in the long run and don’t worry about settling your books in the short term. Remember it’s a cycle.
Anatomy of a good request
A good request fulfils the SMART criteria
- S – Specific (not open ended) or broad. Specific requests trigger people’s memories and connections in a way that broad asks don’t.
- M – Meaningful – explain how your goal is worth something to you, to them or to the world.
- A – Action oriented asks are easier to fulfil. Specify what exactly do they need to do to help.
- R – Don’t ask for the moon and be realistic and in line with the other person’s capabilities
- T – time bound requests are likely to get fulfilled faster. Don’t think putting in a timeline makes it too demanding. In fact it actually makes it easier for people to understand whether they can even fulfil it altogether or not.
One important point here is to normalise getting a No. Rejection isn’t personal. It’s in fact a valid answer. You can always ask why someone isn’t able to help as it is likely to provide new information that can be used subsequently.
How to set up teams for giving and receiving
- Do the assessment linked above to spot people who are “giver requestors” (people who give and receive wholeheartedly) in your interview process. Ask questions like when was the last time you asked for help.
- Establish psychological safety – lead by example and create a culture where asking and giving help is easy to trigger. Taking time to get to know one another, more personal get togethers (difficult to execute in a remote world but possible), etc help in creating trust.
- Standups and Huddles to make asking for help easy. Establishing practices that make it easy to seek guidance or help when someone needs them (the ‘where am i blocked’ question asked in standups are a good way teams do this)
- Try the reciprocity ring – do an all hands where everyone is required to make a request (personal/professional or both). This will create a ring of giving and receiving as a group and normalise help seeking.
- Cross team collaboration can trigger long term unique innovation. This has to be again encouraged by either creating spaces where teams interact or work together. Doing cross team hackathons or brainstorming sessions are a great way to kickstart this.
- Recognise both asking and giving. Unlike Hollywood, recognise and reward both givers and those who ask for help.
I run a startup called Harmonize. We are hiring and if you’re looking for an exciting startup journey, please write to jobs@harmonizehq.com. Apart from this blog, I tweet about startup life and practical wisdom in books.