The 5-Minute Favor

Organizational psychologist Adam Grant never turns down an opportunity to help others.

Grant is the youngest-tenured and highest rated professor at Penn’s Wharton School. He has published more papers in his field’s top journals than those who have spent a lifetime trying.

This guy is the opposite of the four-hour workweek.

A full inbox is an opportunity to help, not just tantamount to answering emails.

When you look to helping others succeed, you succeed. No one ever failed who also helped another.

Grant says there are givers, takers and matchers:

“The takers are people who, when they walk into an interaction with another person, are trying to get as much as possible from that person and contribute as little as they can in return, thinking that’s the shortest and most direct path to achieving their own goals”.

“At the other end of the spectrum, we have this strange breed of people that I call “givers.” It’s not about donating money or volunteering necessarily, but looking to help others by making an introduction, giving advice, providing mentoring or sharing knowledge, without any strings attached”.

“A matcher is somebody who tries to maintain an even balance of give and take. If I help you, I expect you to help me in return. [They] keep score of exchanges, so that everything is fair and really just”.

If this intrigues you as it does me, try what Adam Grant does. He hardly ever says no to the “five-minute favor”.

Here is an interview with Adam Grant, author of Givers and Takers that describes the benefits and research that backs up the concept that helping others helps us.