This is both professional and personal counsel. It definitely works.
Always try to do good things to aid other people who need your help. Always do so without motivation for recognition or reward. Sometimes you even do good things asked for by morally unadmirable people but you know it will help decent individuals who require assistance.
Professor Adam Grant has studied givers, takers, and matchers.
Givers have the best careers and most fulfilling lives (Grant, 2017). Givers want to help others learn, grow, and win. Be generous with others as a friend, mentor, co-worker, member of the profession, and a citizen in your community. Yes, you may get let down from time to time but it’s always the best way to live your life and conduct your career in the long run.
Matchers are constantly calculating to be certain they share only as much with someone else as they specifically got or expect to get in return from that person.
Takers don’t understand that selfishness is self-defeating. This behavior also leaves you alone and makes you miserable. They will never truly succeed in the long term in a profession or industry. Takers only call when they need something for themselves. It’s the old line, “If you only hear from them when they have a need, but they never help you succeed, clap when you win, or bother to call when they know your family has had a tragedy, you now know the real relationship.” They make horrible leaders.
No one really wants to work for or with or recommend a taker. Takers never last professionally. They are also unhappy people trying to compensate for something that’s missing. They have no genuine friends ending up lonely too.
I’ve seen this many times. Your reputation is everything and it is your identity in a profession, industry, and community. It either creates or takes away both professional and personal opportunities.
If you want to succeed as a leader and a professional, you have to help others even when you are not getting something in return. At a minimum, at least understand and practice reciprocity. When a solid professional and quality individual helps you professionally or your customers or company, look for an opportunity to do the same for them.
It makes sense to send business to those who are good at that business. It builds your trust and reputation with individuals and within a profession and community. I never hesitate to mentor, refer business, provide a good reference, offer a positive quote about their new book, aid in problem-solving, and help others win too. Don’t keep score – that’s what matchers do (Grant, 2017). Feel free to give more than you receive.
Recruit, hire, evaluate, and promote individuals for being givers. Be friends with the givers. More importantly, live your life as a giver. The research confirms we are content. It turns out that the more I think of others and less of myself, the happier I will be and the better my career will be too.
