Do you find it easy to ask for help?

…or are you like the majority who just push and work harder at figuring it out for yourself,

‘I’m Ok Thanks, I’ll work it out for myself’?

It often takes much longer to do this and the result will be limited by your own knowledge and experiences.

It is a bit of a joke I know, but it is often said that a man will drive around for hours trying to find a particular address and will resist stopping to ask directions whereas a woman will just get to the point and ask. I don’t think this is really a gender thing but it certainly has some truth in it.  I realise that when my wife Carole and I go shopping I will often wander all over the store trying to find what I want myself and in contrast Carole will walk in and just ask an assistant.

If you hadn’t guessed yet – I’m drawing parallels with the work environment. My working days as a Business Coach are split between helping existing clients with whatever aspect of their business needs attention and the other half is talking to business owners who are “absolutely fine on my own, thanks” and busy working it out for themselves. The fact is that only a tiny minority of business owners look for help – or even accept it when it’s offered!

We have been Conditioned

From a very early age in the schooling system we are conditioned to do this. To copy or ask another one of our peers was and still is considered cheating and is often punishable too. So there is no wonder we act like this as this habit has been perfected over many years and like any habit it takes awareness first and then persistence to break this habit.

When you look at it logically, it’s easy to believe that we’ll get much faster results by asking for help from someone who’s ‘been there and done that’ and can give us the shortcut. The very word “shortcut” can imply “cheating” and people avoid it. Seriously, I see it all the time, people in business being paid by the hour to work out answers to things that many thousands have already done before. It’s not a recipe for success

In business we call this market research. We have a look at what everyone else is doing, pick out the best bits and add our twist to it and this is perfectly acceptable.

In my line of work I see both extremes of this in the business people who think they have to do it all right through to the open minded ones who generally have a full team of advisors. I’m sure you can guess which businesses generally get the best results.

Top Performers

Similarly in sport the top performers are the ones with a team of advisors and the performers. Success is often publicly attributed to the team behind them. I challenge you to come up with a top sportsman or team who do not surround themselves with a team of helpers.

So if you want to succeed to faster and to a higher, how about asking for some help from those who know the answers? It could be your accountant, your bank manager, a solicitor, or maybe it’s a virtual PA or bookkeeper to actually do some of the things for you that you’d take ten times as long to do yourself. Business can feel tough enough so does every turn and every step need to be a personal challenge, reach out and ask for some help – today!

Chris Wharram, Action Coach 28th March 2017