Asking for Help Saves You Longer-Term Pain.

The best leaders ask for help.

Why? Because they know they can’t know everything or always get it right on their own. Who could?

So, why is it we are so afraid to ask for help?

Why is there a stigma attached to asking for help?

Asking for help means: They know I’m not the expert, or the person they thought they hired, or the right person for the job.

In reality – the people who ask for help are those who build trusted relationships, expand their understanding and awareness as well as becoming more knowledgeable, faster. Help can be in the form of questions, but it can also be about admitting when something isn’t right, or it’s not worked out quite as planned and it’s time to correct course with external resources.

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I will never forget one of the most painful days at work, where I sat for hours on information that I knew would make not only me look bad, but the company I worked for (or at least that’s what I thought).

At that time, I was in a management consultancy, and we always worked in the client’s office. So, there was me with the bomb of anxiety building in my stomach as my teammates and my manager were buzzing around doing the normal day tasks – in and out of meetings, working on important project docs etc.

I was sitting on the fact that I had sent an email by mistake to a senior person who wasn’t supposed to be privy to the information I had shared. At the time, I was covering my colleague’s holiday, so she had done a great handover, and it was definitely my fault this email had got into the wrong hands.

Hmm, my fault.

My fault, or an honest mistake?

My responsibility – yes. My fault? No.

My fault was it all going pear shaped, sitting on the information all day, waiting for the ‘right time’ to admit my mistakes to my manager who was wholly accountable for the overall project outcome but also the relationships between our company and key stakeholders in the client business.

So of course. Sitting and waiting = unparalleled anxiety and fraught option-building in my head. If I say this, maybe that sounds better than that, but if I admit this, then that makes me look….

The final outcome? My impassioned manager brings me into office, throws his notebook on the table and says, “Why the hell didn’t you come to talk to me about this earlier?!”

And, he is absolutely 100% right.

My email had gone all the way to the top.

Ugh. Pain-ful-sick-feel-ing.

I could have spoken to him about the mistake at any time. But I was scared. I was scared about the repercussions and how I would look. Ultimately, I feared for my safety to stay in the project, or worse, stay in the company.

But I learned a very hard lesson that day – asking for help doesn’t mean admitting fault – it’s about taking responsibility to make things better. It’s not about attributing fault to a mistake. Blaming the scapegoat might feel good for the blamer or absorb us of our ‘guilt’ – but it achieves nothing.

Admitting you’ve got it wrong, asking for help means the opportunity to correct the course as quickly as possible and mitigate damage.

Now this is an extreme story – one that sits front of mind. Trauma always does! I will never forget that day and I am truly grateful for my manager at the time who taught me two important lessons:

1.?????? Making mistakes is OK; asking for help is about taking responsibility to correct the mistake, not be blamed and hussled into the scapegoat corner.

2.?????? 80% right is better than 100% right to save time – because no one person when collaborating can get it perfect on their own (…that’s for another article)

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Asking for help doesn’t make you weak; inexperienced; to blame; at fault; under-qualified; not-the-expert … It just means you’re human.

How you manage your behaviour or responsive actions – that’s the tell-tale sign of a great person. And a great leader.

Sometimes it’s hard to have courage and admit you need help.

However, having the courage to do so will contribute to values that matter: honesty, integrity and trust.

The more you practice asking for help, the more you will notice that there’s something really genuine about people who do so. Perhaps even comforting. Or maybe even just ‘real’.

So, the next time you’re stuck - ask for help and save yourself a lot of unnecessary pain.

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