How to build a “culture of giving” in your organization?

Four years ago, Adam Grant published a book called Give and Take. It was about how generous “givers” add far more value to organizations than quid pro quo “matchers” or selfish “takers” do. Givers share their knowledge freely and they volunteer to do the heavy lifting. Although givers are the most valuable people in organizations, they’re also at the greatest risk for burnout. When they don’t protect themselves, their investments in others can cause them to feel overloaded and fatigued, fall behind on their work goals, and face more stress and conflict at home. In his TED talk also, Adam Grant says that the more people share their knowledge and provide mentoring to each other, the better it is for customer satisfaction and employee retention. Then he talks about how to build a culture of giving by -

• Encouraging help seeking,
• Protecting givers from burnout &
• Weeding out takers.

 Adam’s book made the case that givers can rise to the top, but it only scratched the surface on the question of how. Adam Grant and Reb Rebele have spent the past four years studying what givers can do to sustain their energy and their effectiveness. Recently, we had the pleasure of reading yet another HBR article on the same topic by them.

At KarmaCircles (KC), we tend to agree with Adam Grant's research. We believe that givers are more likely to give if you -

• Make it easy for them to give at their own terms.
• Let them know that it is okay to say that you are busy and won't be able to help for time being.
• Make them feel valued whenever they give, no matter how little they give.
• Let them know that they will also be helped by others when they need help themselves.

On the other hand, receivers should be encouraged to -

• Seek help as often as required without inhibitions.
• Express gratitude whenever they receive help.
• Reciprocate or make sincere efforts to pay-it-forward.

We also felt that it is possible to design an ecosystem with a few rules which can help create a culture of giving within organizations (be it companies, alumni associations or co-working spaces). With these core beliefs expressed above, Deepak founded KarmaCircles to facilitate “giving” across borders and at scale. Deepak also discussed the entire framework of KarmaCircles in his TEDx talk. KarmaCircles actually doesn't use the term "taker" because it believes that the professional advice/help can only be given or received. "Take" is more appropriate when after the act of giving, the giver has less of it and the taker has more of it. KarmaCircles makes the case that after the act of giving, both the giver and the receiver are better off than before.

KarmaCircles is a mobile app which makes it easy for people to ask for help, allows givers to give back at their own terms and makes givers feel good about the help they give. While KarmaCircles allows any organization to build a culture of giving at a large scale, interestingly its key features also align well with the some of the research shared by Adam Grant and Rebe Rebele in their HBR article. The text in italics is taken from their HBR article -

1.     Identify two or three ways of offering unique value to others — things you do well and enjoy. As giving aligns with your interests and skills, it becomes less stressful for you and more valuable to others.

At the time of sign up at KarmaCircles, all members identify their areas of key skills & core expertise that they are willing to share & help in. Receivers can search for givers based on their skills & expertise and directly seek their help by simply sending them a meeting request.

2.     Employees who consistently demonstrate the motivation and ability to lend a hand get “rewarded” with the bulk of requests and often find themselves drowning in meetings and emails. How can you decide who really needs and deserves your time? To prevent generosity burnout, you have to hone your skill at prioritizing requests and screening for sincerity.

Whenever a giver receives a request on KarmaCircles, the giver can review the request as well as the profile of receiver which is a combination of their Facebook or Linkedin profile(s) and the activities of the receiver on KC. Giver can also see if the receiver has been helping others on the platform, is he/she always asking for help from others and does he/she responds when someone sends a request to him/her. Giver can then either archive the request (system sends a message to the receiver that the giver is busy) or schedule time to offer help. The system can also help prioritize the requests for the giver.

3.     When you’re dealing with people who have a history of selfishness, don’t reinforce their behavior by being too generous. Approach them the way “matchers” would: Ask them to reciprocate or help others.

On KarmaCircles, you don't need to request your "receivers" to reciprocate. Just because they are on KC, they are also potential "givers" by design and anyone can ask them for help. Secondly, the thank you notes (a.k.a KarmaNotes) on the platform are public, which helps everyone know who is helping who and givers receive their due credit. The actual give & take occurs directly (via audio/video call or in-person meeting) and the conversation remains private between the giver and the receiver. Cialdini says that "People are less likely to reciprocate when they can stay anonymous." He says that one of the reasons why we reciprocate is, “because there is a general distaste for those who take and make no effort to give in return, we will often go to great lengths to avoid being considered a moocher, ingrate, or freeloader.” Taking a clue from Cialdini, all the thank you notes on KC are public by default to inspire everyone to step up.

4.     We’ve discovered that productive giving comes in three flavors: being thoughtful about how you help, when you help, and whom you help.

On KarmaCircles, givers give at their own terms. They decide if they want to give help via phone or Whatsapp/Skype call or in-person. The giver schedules the meeting for a day & time of their choice and for whatever duration they want. Only the giver can schedule the meeting, the receiver can only confirm the meeting or request a new time. The app integrates seamlessly with the calendar of the giver as well as receiver.

5.      Reactive helping is exhausting, but proactive giving can be energizing.

On KarmaCircles, you can post a query and givers can offer their help proactively. Another interesting feature is that whenever you post a query, your KarmaNetwork (people who you have helped in the past) is notified about it. It is in your own interest to help as many people as possible so that you can reach out to a large set of people when you may need help yourself.

6.      It gives you license to turn down requests that aren’t in your wheelhouse, because you have a track record of helping.

On KarmaCircles, when a receiver views the profile of a giver, it prominently displays the number of requests that are currently pending for the giver and displays all the thank you notes that the giver has received till date. This allows the receiver to know that the giver is busy but has a track record of helping. We also believe that there are some fake givers who will read Adam's book and justify to themselves that it is ok to NOT give just this time because they already do a lot of giving. They can take a look at their karma trail (sequence of thank you notes) to see for themselves that they are not giving enough.

7.     Psychologists asked people to perform five random acts of kindness every week for six weeks. Participants were randomly assigned to either “sprinkling” or “chunking” their acts of kindness. Sprinkling meant spreading them out by doing one a day. Chunking meant picking one day for all five helpful acts. The "chunking" participants experienced a boost in happiness and energy that lasted for the entire study while the "sprinkling" of giving did nothing whatsoever to improve their moods. When we ask executives to guess which group got the energy spike, they assume that a little giving every day is a reliable way to lift your spirits.

On KarmaCircles, chunking could be accomplished via "Instant Karma" feature. Any giver can turn the "Instant Karma" feature ON and a receiver can initiate an “instant” meeting request to that giver, thereby allowing an exchange to begin instantly. A queue is created when multiple receivers request meeting at the same time. We also believe that "sprinkling" is actually superior to "chunking". It may seem productive for the giver to give to several receivers one after the other but the experience of the 3rd and 4th receiver is not as great as the first two receivers. We believe that "sprinklers" can experience a boost in happiness & energy by setting aside two minutes every week to read the thank you notes sent by their receivers during the past few weeks.

We believe that the next wave of productivity gains for the organizations will be delivered by unlocking the potential of their human capital by facilitating exchange of the knowledge & skills effectively and KarmaCircles can help them achieve that goal. To learn more, you may contact Deepak Goel ([email protected]).