The One and Only Reason to Help
Competent people are insulted when you try to help them do their job. They think, “You don’t trust me.”
Managers must know when to step in or stay out. Help too quickly and you’re a smothering meddler; delay too long and you don’t care.
When it comes to helping others, their confidence levels matter. Overconfident people crash and burn before accepting help. Under-confident people stall unless they receive help.
Be prepared to help when:
- New threats arise.
- Employees feel isolated or out of the loop.
- Staff feels confused. Your greatest asset is creating clarity. Clarity enables action. Tip toeing through confusion blocks performance.
- People feel under-appreciated. Employees pour themselves out for organizational objectives. Organizations refill employees with compensation, recognition, appreciation, and opportunity.
A key to when:
Frustration tells you when to step in or stay out.
Some are frustrated when you help. Let them struggle. However, don’t leave them hanging. Tell them you are available if they need something and then step away.
Some are frustrated when you don’t help. Explain your reasons for not helping. Give them clarity, permission, resources, training, and timelines to move forward and then step away. You can’t constantly help.
Appropriate levels of frustration enhance performance. Too much frustration stalls performance.
The one reason:
The goal of helping is enabling. Real help takes people to the place where they don’t need help. Any other reason is a dead end.
- Doing things “for” someone doesn’t help.
- Doing things “with” someone helps as long as they grow.
- Letting them struggle helps as long as they are making adequate progress.
Organizational objectives:
Timelines and deliverables may prevent you from taking the time to help. In this case reassign or compensate with added resources or people.
How do you determine when it’s time to help?
Do you tend to help too much or too little?
I so like the opportuntities you provide to reflect on situations such as these, Dan.
My inclination is to not help until the person asks for it. This emerged some years ago when I realized I was being overly helpful, thinking I was doing the ‘right’ thing and then, facing that I was taking away peoples’ autonomy, creativity and ability to stretch and learn for themselves.
Now, I have discussions early on saying that I trust they will do their best to figure out challenges they encounter and to come to me when they reach a stalemate – and that doing so doesn’t reflect failure.
My first inclination when I see a frustrated co-worker is to offer help. I have found if I offer to take some of the time consuming, nitty gritty or boring parts of the work from them, I get a better response. This way they don’t get mired down in the million little things making up the project, they are free to contribute with their strengths & not feel overwhelmed or bogged down. This way the project gets completed & my co-worker get to contribute their best work. Helps to build relationships too!
I think the point of intervention is the point where progress has stalled. I have found that many people have a very habitual response to frustration. It’s like a poker tell. Once you know what it is and see it happening, it is time to intervene. Of course you have know people pretty well to do so.
I also think the key is frequent communication. Sometimes it is as simple as dropping by and asking, “How is it going?” This way employees that don’t want to come to you with questions, see an opportunity to get an answer without appearing to be bothering you or appearing to not have the knowledge needed to complete the project.
At the risk of being sexist, I have also found that there are differences between men and women and the amount of guidance that they want/need on a new project. Women seem to need more reassurance earlier in a project than men do and tend to ask questions sooner when stuck. This sometimes means that I will check with men more frequently at the beginning of a project to make sure their progress has not stalled out.
This post should generate some great comments!!
To start with your second question first, it may be situational, but I think I definitely tend to help too much, especially when parenting. I tend to think everyone wants the same detailed, step-by-step instructions that I love, and many people just aren’t wired that way. Sometimes my tendency to instruct instruct instruct gets in the way of the frustration you discussed … the frustration that leads to enhanced performance and a feeling of competence on the part of the person trying to learn a skill.
How do you determine when it’s time to help? I think one obvious answer is “when asked,” but sometimes people ask prematurely — they are in the habit of it or (as with kids sometimes) they really want a shortcut. I think as leaders we need a broader ability to determine when it’s time to help – something beyond “when asked.”
There are some great insights and additions posted already. I especially like Lynda’s tactic of taking some of their “ugly” work to free them up for the task they’re behind on. That communicates confidence and is genuinely helpful.
And, as Bonnie noted, if you’re not closely attuned to who your team members are, what they’re doing, and what their normal behavior is, you’re not going to know when or how to help effectively.
I find that if I can identify a desirable glide path for a project or task, employees have a better idea when they fall behind. It’s also easier to identify what has them stalled. Then I try to coach them through the logjam. Once they’re progressing again, I can walk away, and hopefully they have some idea how to solve a similar problem in the future.
Helpful indicators: Work piling up indicates a constraint either at that point or downstream. Idle equipment or employees indicates a constraint upstream. Follow the clues until you find the person who’s struggling. Of course, you have to be with them to see.
A great example of how complex leadership can get at the one on one level and some very useful guidance.
It might be interesting to consider this same issue from an organizational perspective–some places have a culture that encourages help and cooperation while in other organizations, asking for or needing help is a sign of weakness.
When I picture a boss helping when needed and encouraging independent work when necessary, I picture a gentle and wise father-figure. It’s Atticus Finch from To Kill a Mockingbird who mostly comes to mind. Patient observer who steps in to guide and do projects “with” someone instead of “for” someone. That’s the key. Help “for” someone is enabling and help “with” someone is a side-by-side team approach to create solutions.
Plenty to ponder…again!
MMF
Props for the Atticus Finch reference – hooray for intelligent literacy!