Ask for Help

A Distributed Work Tool

Team members simply ask for help about something work or non-work related.

This experience yields solutions but also creates personal connection and bonding. More importantly, it develops the norm of team members reaching out to one another.

Basic Version

This experience begins with the leader saying, “Today we are going to ask for help. In this activity, you’ll have the opportunity to ask for help on anything. It could be work related, or it could be personal. It can be big, or it can be small. You’ll have to summarize your challenge in one minute or less. Then, we’ll all give you ideas, resources to investigate, or even connect you to other people to talk to.” 

The leader may choose to do a few rounds for a couple of team members to ask for help or can facilitate short rounds of each person on the team sharing and getting help. 

Variations

Breakout Groups

Utilizing virtual breakouts, this version allows for team members to get the maximum amount of help in the shortest amount of time. Send people to breakouts of no more than four people and encourage them to take turns asking for and receiving help.

Sign up for Help

Every week a team can dedicate 15 minutes of work time to the “Ask for Help” exercise, where people who need help on something can sign up ahead of time to take center stage at the meeting or request a breakout group to ask for help.

Rapid Ask

Especially useful for big teams or teams short on time, you can do a “Rapid Ask” where people ask for help in one or two sentences to make others aware of needs (this can even be done using the chat function). They can get some immediate rapid feedback by having people type into the chat or e-mail solutions to the challenge.

Integration: Projects

During a project, you can have people ask for help on things. It sounds simple, but almost everyone on your team is probably wasting time working on something like a design, a research finding, or a contact that someone on your team can immediately help with by sharing a quick idea or a few minutes of help.

Why This Works

Groups of individuals together can produce ideas that individuals cannot 

This activity leverages that simple truth. Further, it has a connection-building benefit, as researchers also find that we tend to like people more who come to us for advice and who we help. Lastly, “Ask for Help” breaks the social norm that even when it would be easy and useful to ask for help, we simply don’t. By asking for help, teams create new norms that improve how the group functions.