Being Helpable

In my previous essay, I talked about how & why I decided to quit my high-paying, comfortable job without a plan in-hand. While the thought of ‘what next’ without an external direction or motivation can be unsettling for many, I had consciously chosen it for myself. Hence, to do justice to this time, I started reading about how to navigate the unknown.

All my findings converged into a single word – helpable!

Go and ask for help

Helpable simply means someone who’s capable of being helped. And the first step to that is – asking for help. While asking for help might sound easy, the idea of getting out and asking for help is one of the strongest primitive fears of human beings; especially the idea of asking for help from strangers. It’s about becoming vulnerable, letting someone know what & where you lack, and giving away control. How could one possibly allow themselves to come off as incompetent or weak? This sense of diminishing individual worth is one big inhibitor.

All of this is much more pronounced in a professional setting where you fear being judged or plain incapable in your domain. Sometimes that could even mean a career suicide! And to top it all, the possibility of rejection only makes asking for help even harder. Who knows if people on the other side actually enjoy helping or have the time?

While all of these apprehensions are very real, the fact that we do need help all the time in life is even truer. And the corollary is that - people are more willing to help than we actually expect or believe them to. In fact, asking or giving help allows for far deeper social connections and relationships. This in turn allows humans to form communities or groups exchanging information & resources leading us to become the most dominant species on Earth. In short, it is coded in our DNA.

Know your ask

That leads me to my next point – being aware where you need help and being explicit about it. Lot of times we assume people around us will figure out that we need help by reading our situation or behaviour and offer it themselves. However, that is far from the truth. Sometimes, even if they do understand, most people wouldn’t jump to offer help themselves for the fear of being seen as intrusive or judgmental. So a simple rule is to just step up and – ask!

After you have mustered the courage to indeed ask for help, the next important thing is being aware of exactly what you need help with. And importantly, you are able to communicate it well. This will determine how willing the other person would be to help you and to what length they decide to go in case they choose to help.

Walk that first mile, and some more

During my college time, I used to give tuition to students to make some extra money. One day some of them asked me if I can help them with an extra curricular project. The first thing that I said was, “first show me what you already have”.

We seldom realise that if we have a problem, we can’t just go and ask someone to solve it for us. In the real world, there is only limited time with everyone. And hence, if one has to choose between where they want to spend time, it’s going to be in the endeavours which have the maximum potential of materialising into outcomes. The same is true for getting help. The better prepared you are, the more you can expect someone else to be willing to help you to cover those last miles. VCs bet on people and companies who bring a prototype against those who only have ideas. Promotions in companies go to those who are able to make a case why they deserve it the most (than everyone else on the list).

The bottomline is - if you need help, you are competing for a limited airtime of someone. Make that initial effort to stand out and showcase that the help you receive is going to show outcomes.

Bonus: don’t send empty ‘hey’ messages on LinkedIn with an intention to ask for help! :)

Organisations and the culture of help

Setting up the culture of giving & getting help goes a long way in fostering deeper connections. In this new world, as we have all become thumbnails on screen, helping each other is a great way to form newq bonds.

Thus, it’s important that leaders in an organisation set the `culture of help` by being open to helping, rather than just being ‘approachable’. It’s important to understand that opening office hours or being approachable are good signals but in isolation are not enough. `Helping` is being empathetic about the situation of the person seeking help, and taking those extra steps to actually lead them to realise the end goal.

Seeing their leaders do it, allows everyone in the organisation to confidently ask & give help, both horizontally & vertically.

That said, people should also be encouraged to say ‘No’ and be ok when they hear one. It needs to be propagated through examples and policies that ‘No’ isn’t personal or negative. And that it shouldn’t dissuade people from

• Asking help from someone else
• Asking helping from the same person at a different, more opportune time
• Being more prepared to ask for help

In closing,

Be nice to people! The world is a difficult place and all of us can always use a little help.

Aside: Helpable (help, able, helpable) is a GREAT word to use in Scrabble! :D

P.S. Thanks to my wife Taruna for helping me edit this (and all other) articles! :)