4 Ways to Politely Refuse Someone at Workplace When You Are Super Busy!

An office is a place where we work for a common goal while meeting many people we call “office friends”. It's always important to sustain an optimistic relationship with your coworkers to do full justice to your role.

This is how we all tend to grow. Many times when we are super busy with work or not in the mood to say yes to something, we run out of words. Amidst that, we find one of our friends approaching us for help. With a fear that we will be judged or it might put our relationship with that particular office friend at stake, we take up that extra work - unwillingly :(

Let us see what are the 4 ways we can politely refuse our office buddies without acting unprofessional. Just to make things clear, we aren't talking about our superiors but other office-mates. If our seniors approach us, we must prioritize helping them because it will lead to our growth in return. So, let's begin and know 4 ways to politely refuse your office buddies :)

1) Acknowledging Consideration - Simply we can say “I appreciate you choosing me for the help of this role but I already have a lot on my plate.”

2) Offering Help Later or Recommending Someone Else - We can offer substitute help or simply recommend some other name or amplify requests in our network to help our co-worker who has approached us. We can say "Can I help you a bit later or if it's too urgent, let me find someone who can best assist you?"

3) Set Boundaries - Our actions must reflect our personality. If we are over-friendly, there are chances that we will be approached by our friends for help almost all the time. So it's vital to make your actions count and portray that you are sincere about your work first and upon completion, you will take on some other task. We may answer "I will help you but only once I am done with mine."

4) Simply Say No - It's better to sometimes be honest with yourself and others too. If you do not want to help, best is to say No with a smile. This will always be counted as a part of your work and not something sort of arrogance. We can answer "I don't think so I'll be able to help you with this. Please don't mind :)"

So, tell us in the comments, what other ways can you use to politely refuse people in office?