If the world were split into “givers” and “takers”, many people I know would put themselves into the “givers” category. These people have a tendency to spend their time doing things for other people, often putting the needs of others above their own.
In some cases, this has negatively impacted them, contributing to problems with their own health – either because of the increased stress of continually worrying about other people, or the lack of time left over to take care of themselves. Being a “giver” has come to be seen as almost a negative thing. But it isn’t, and not only because giving to people around you can benefit those you love.
Adam Grant, a psychologist at Pennsylvania University in the US, has written a book and given a TED talk on the subject. As part of his research he identified givers in various areas of work and study, and ranked them against their colleagues or classmates in terms of performance. He found, perhaps not surprisingly to many people, that the givers tended to perform the worst – presumably because they were spending so much of their time and energy helping others.
However, the givers were also the group which performed the best – it turned out that all the takers, and the people who didn’t fit either definition, sat somewhere in the middle. Grant determined that givers can sink time in the short term, but cause huge benefits to a team or company in the long term.
His findings are surprising, and combat the view that giving is a negative attribute. Instead, Grant argues, it’s important to manage that giving tendency appropriately – by preventing burnout, asking for help, and surrounding yourself with the right people.
His advice rings true when I think about the givers I know. It is not the giving nature that is the problem – the world would be a better place if everyone acted like this. But givers need to protect themselves, by setting boundaries, or limiting the amount of time and resources spent on others for example.
It is also vital for givers to be surrounded by the right people. Grant argues that if even one person on a team is a taker, while the rest are givers, it disrupts the team dynamic. In the examples that come to mind of givers blaming themselves for the difficult situations they end up in, there is always another person – a taker – without whose actions there would be no problem at all. So it looks like giving is to be encouraged, so long as it is to the right people.