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from the unfortunately-I-cannot-appear-to-be-less-competent dept.
You hear a lot about fears of heights or spiders or clowns, but down deep, most people are most afraid of this one thing: sounding dumb. New research shows that people shy away from asking for help for fear of appearing less competent, but that this is an unfounded fear: Asking for advice actually makes you seem more capable.
Across five studies, a research team led by Harvard Business School’s Alison Wood Brooks finds that people think better of others when they ask for advice — mostly because people really love to give advice. Being asked for advice seems to give us a self-confidence boost, which in turn enhances our opinion of the advice-seeker, Brooks and colleagues write in the paper, which will be published in an upcoming issue of Management Science.
[Paper] (PDF)
(Score: 2) by e_armadillo on Monday August 25 2014, @10:13PM
Anonymously, of course. Gave me no end of grief for asking advice of people outside our immediate group, even though the people I approached were the absolute correct people to ask about their particular topic(s), and our company is very flat (it is very common for people to openly have skip level meetings without prior clearance from their immediate supervisor).
This particular manager worries that approaching others outside this manager's organization would appear to indicate that this manager hasn't properly equipped the organization . . .
God, I am glad to have a sane manager now :-)
"How are we gonna get out of here?" ... "We'll dig our way out!" ... "No, no, dig UP stupid!"
(Score: 1) by Ethanol-fueled on Monday August 25 2014, @11:19PM
Asking for advice can be done in a wrong way. We had a guy who would ask one person a specific technical question which in context leaves little wiggle-room, then right away afterward within earshot ask another tech the same question. Then afterward another tech the same question.
We thought he was either senile, a dick, or a corporate plant trying to gauge everybody's capability (especially after his evil grins and constant references to "the great purge").
(Score: 2) by e_armadillo on Monday August 25 2014, @11:37PM
Absolutely, yes. There is a huge difference between political information seeking, gossip, turmoil generation, and finding the right person to answer a genuine question. I like to believe that I was in that last category :-)
"How are we gonna get out of here?" ... "We'll dig our way out!" ... "No, no, dig UP stupid!"