How to ask for help from someone who can help you?
7 ways our school doesn’t teach us:
1. Do the work:
Don’t just say “I need your help”.
Do what you can do.
And then ask for advice on what could be better.
You get more improvisations on taste on a cooked meal than on raw materials.
2. Please ask over email.
(Especially if it is something that requires them to think.)
When you send a text message, you add one more noise to an existing array of 100 noises in their palm.
With email, people process it at their own pace, and respond when they are at their best.
3. If it is a paid assignment, respect the scope of work.
You may certainly want to exceed the scope, but in those cases, be a professional and request for their charges.
Don’t expect to get a quality of Louis Vuitton with an attitude of Sarojini Market.
4. Be clear in your ask
Don’t just leave with a “hi”.
It is unwise to expect a “hi” in return from a busy person, and then for them to help you out. State your ask politely, and leave it to them to decide.
5. Ask questions that require perspective, not google/AI search
Help should be something their experience could answer, and not anything that tech could replicate.
6. Do not share your questions as statements, for them to decode.
Someone wrote to me: “I do not know what is included in content writing”.
It honestly made me sad – because they shared their problem without asking the true question, and giving the onus to me to figure. Unless I am your Mom (which I am not), I won’t do the hard work. No one else would too.
7. Please be grateful.
I really have no idea why people are not grateful for the help someone extended to them.
I really don’t.
It’s time we bring the Moral Science subject of school in action.
The world would love to help you, if you learn to seek it the right way.
After all, we all stand on shoulders of each other, said Einstein.