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In Negotiations, Givers Are Smarter Than Takers

Generosity is a sign of intelligence, and givers are the rising tide that lifts all boats.


By Adam Grant

March 27, 2020

In 2010, a Costa Rican diplomat named Christiana Figueres set out to do something that many people saw as impossible. The United Nations had appointed her to build a global agreement to fight climate change. She needed to get 195 countries on board, and one of the biggest challenges was Saudi Arabia. Their economy was dependent on oil and gas exports, so they had every incentive to keep profiting from that rather than reducing their carbon footprint.

When the pie seems fixed, it’s common to panic and treat resources as scarce. In crisis, we often do whatever it takes to protect ourselves. That’s especially clear today: In the past few weeks, we’ve seen hoarders collect thousands of bottles of hand sanitizer, and spreaders ignore warnings to maintain physical distance to avoid infecting vulnerable groups. We’ve watched policymakers withhold emergency funds. “It’s give and take, but it’s got to be mostly take,” President Trump said in 2015, summing up his negotiation philosophy. “You got to mostly take.”

That was the art of the deal: Be a taker. But now there’s a science of the deal, with decades of evidence on what separates great negotiators from their peers. It tells a different story: Being a giver may actually be a sign of intelligence.

In one of my favorite studies, researchers tested people’s intelligence with a series of quantitative, verbal and analytical reasoning problems. Then they sent them off to negotiate. Intelligence paid off — but not in the way you might expect. The smarter people were, the better their counterparts did in the negotiation. They used their brainpower to expand the pie, finding ways to help the other side that cost them nothing.


This isn’t an isolated result. In a comprehensive analysis of 28 studies, the most successful negotiators cared as much about the other party’s success as their own. They refused to see negotiations as win-lose or the world as zero-sum. They understood that before you could claim value, you needed to create value. They didn’t declare victory until they could help everyone win.

This isn’t limited to negotiation. Economists find that the higher that Americans score on intelligence tests, the more they give to charity — even after adjusting for their wealth, income, education, age and health. Psychologists demonstrate that the smarter people are, the less likely they are to take resources for themselves — and the more likely they are to give to a group. I’ve discovered in my own research that when success is a sprint, givers may well finish last. But if it’s a marathon, the takers tend to fall behind and the givers often finish first.


https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/27/smart...e=pocket-newtab

I prefer the Forgivers.

Did I take a wrong turn and end up in the Goofy thread?

Givers, takers, and matchers

What’s the difference between these types?

Takers are self-focused and put their own interests ahead of others’ needs. They try to gain as much as possible from their interactions while contributing as little as they can in return.

Matchers like to preserve an equal balance of giving and taking. Their mindset is: “If you take from me, I’ll take from you. If you give to me, I’ll give to you.”

Givers are others-focused, and tend to provide support to others with no strings attached. They ask themselves, “How can I add value for this person? What can I contribute?”

Types of Reciprocity - Lemonade Blog

So what type are you? Turns out most people hover in the middle, and behave as matchers, answering option B above (I’ll introduce you to my college friend, but I need help from you).

Humans have an innate tendency to be reciprocal, and givers and takers represent two extremes.

But while givers are the most generous in our society, matchers play an important role. They make sure what goes around, comes around. They reward givers for their generous behavior, and seek revenge when they, or others, are being mistreated.
Givers, takers, and matchers at work

Guess which of these types is the most successful at work.

Turns out, givers tend to be the worst performers. They’re at a disadvantage across a wide range of occupations, because they sacrifice their own success to help others succeed, according to Grant’s research.

So that must mean takers or matchers are the top performers, right? Not exactly.

It’s the givers again.

Yeah, you read right. The worst and best performers at work are others-focused, and takers and matchers tend to land in the middle.

Givers, Takers, and Matchers at Work - The Lemonade Blog

Why is that? Since takers develop reputations for putting others last, matchers tend to return the favor and try to knock them down, research shows. That’s why takers rarely succeed in building strong relationships and networks.

On the other hand, matchers root for givers to succeed, since they tend to match good deed with good deed. Everyone loves, trusts, and supports givers, since they add value to others and enrich the success of the people around them.

In short, givers succeed because their giving leads to quality relationships, which benefit them in the long run. With such strong relationships, it’s no wonder givers are also happier people than takers.

But wait, back up. If being a giver creates stronger relationships (and even makes you happier), why are some givers at the bottom of the success ladder, while others are at the top?
Selfless givers vs. otherish givers

There are two types of givers: ‘selfless’ givers and ‘otherish’ givers.

Selfless givers, as you may guess, are the ones who drop everything to help people all the time, which means they tend to fall behind on their own work. Therefore, they usually end up at the bottom of the success ladder (though they’re still happier people than takers).

On the other hand, otherish givers are smart and strategic about their giving. While they’re just as much givers as the selfless givers, they’ve learned to successfully navigate a world with matchers and takers, so others don’t take advantage of them.

At this point, you must be asking: what steps can I take to become a successful giver? After all, being a successful giver comes with many perks: stronger relationships, increased happiness, and better performance at work.

Well, we’re glad you asked. Here are a few tricks and tools successful givers have up their sleeves to help others while avoiding burnout.
How to be a successful giver

1. 5-minute favors

What to do:

Do other people small favors that take no more than 5 minutes – like making an introduction, giving feedback, and offering advice.

Why it works:

Made famous by serial entrepreneur Adam Rifkin, 5-minute favors are those small yet impactful favors you do for others that take no more than 5 minutes. Doing these quick favors for a coworker or friend can go a long way in strengthening your relationships.

2. Ask for help

What to do:

Ask a friend or coworker for help on an issue you’re having, without taking up too much of their time.

Why it works:

While asking for help doesn’t sound like a quintessential giver move, doing so comes with some surprising benefits. It gives them the opportunity to be a giver, but also makes them feel good and smart.

According to Grant, one of the best ways to build strong relationships is to seek advice, because it creates meaningful opportunities for someone to contribute to your life, and feel fulfilled by it.

3. Give all at once

What to do:

Devote a particular day or part of a day each week to helping people out.

Why it works:

There are two ways to give: you can sprinkle random acts of kindness throughout your week, or chunk all of your giving acts into one day. Which is most effective? The chunking, research shows, because it leaves you with a bigger psychological boost of feeling appreciation and meaningfulness, which will motivate you to continue being a giver.

Give All at Once - Lemonade Blog

4. Specialize in favors

What to do:

Pick one or two ways of helping that you enjoy and excel at, rather than being jacks of all trades.

Why it works:

This way, you can help in a way that energizes you instead, of exhausts you. This trick will also allow you to gain a reputation as a person with a particular expertise you’re willing to share, rather than as a nice person who’s freely available.

Bonus? People won’t come to you for favors that don’t fit these skills.

5. Keep an eye out for takers

What to do:

Spot takers early, based on reputation and past experience, and only help them if they like you.

Why it works:

Takers like to milk givers for favors, because of givers’ reputations. To avoid this, take on the mentality of a matcher. In other words, if a taker asks for help, say “sure, I’ll help you if you agree to help me with something else in return.”
Give, give, give!

Practice these tips and tricks, and you’ll be a successful giver in no time. But the key to being a successful giver is also being an authentic giver. The less you try to give to get, the more you’ll succeed.

Are you a giver, taker, or matcher?

Here are a few more questions from Adam Grant’s Give and Take quiz to help you find out.

1. You and a stranger will both receive some money. You have three choices about what you and the stranger receive, and you’ll never see or meet the stranger. Which option would you choose?

a) I get $8, and the stranger gets $4

b) I get $5, and the stranger gets $7

c) I get $5, and the stranger gets $5

2. In 2006, after the devastation caused by Hurricane Katrina, a US bank executive led a team of employees on a trip to help rebuild New Orleans. Why do you think he did this?

a) He wanted to make headlines for being a generous, giving organization

b) He felt compassion for the victims and wanted to do whatever he could to help

c) He wanted to show his support for bank employees who had family members in New Orleans

3. You’re applying for a job as a manager, and a former boss writes you a glowing recommendation letter. What would you be most likely to do?

a) Go out of my way to make a good impression on my new boss, so I can line up another strong recommendation for the future

b) Offer to write a recommendation letter for one of my own former employees, so I can pay it forward

c) Look for ways to help my former boss, so I can pay it back

4. You’re working on a project with two colleagues, and there are three tasks that need to get done. As you discuss how to divide tasks, it becomes clear that all three of you are extremely interested in two of the tasks, but view the third as quite boring. What would you do?

a) Try to convince one of my colleagues to do the boring task

b) Volunteer for the boring task without asking for anything in return

c) Volunteer for the boring task and ask my colleagues for a favor later

5. A few years ago, you helped an acquaintance named Jamie find a job. You’ve been out of touch since then. All of a sudden, Jamie sends an email introducing you to a potential business partner. What’s the most likely motivation behind Jamie’s email?

a) Jamie wants to ask for help again

b) Jamie genuinely wants to help me

c) Jamie wants to pay me back

Are You a Giver or a Taker?
The answer might surprise you.

Posted Jul 24, 2015


"Work is about a search for daily meaning as well as daily bread…" —Studs Terkel

Psychologist Adam Grant divides the working world into three groups of people: Givers, Takers, and Matchers. Givers seek out ways to be helpful and give to others. Matchers play “tit for tat”—they reciprocate and expect reciprocity. Takers focus on getting as much as possible from others.

But there’s a twist. There are times when everyone—even Givers—can operate like Takers.
iStock © Victor_Tongdee
Source: iStock © Victor_Tongdee

Those of us who are not Takers run the risk of starting to operate like Takers, Grant claims, when we don’t realize why what we’re doing matters to other people.

How does he know this? One of the first studies Grant ever did was an examination of university fundraising phone-callers. (These are the people who bother you in the evening trying to get you to donate money.)

These callers face tremendous motivational challenges. The chances that the alums on the other end of the line will give are low, and when they do, the dollar amounts are small. The challenges of the job are so overwhelming that it is typical for annual turnover at a university call center to exceed 400 percent. (In other words, every three months, the entire staff might quit.)

When Grant looked at one group of callers, “They were pretty burned out,” he told a group at an Aspen Institute gathering. “We had one caller who posted a sign by his desk that said, ‘Doing a good job here is like wetting your pants in a dark suit. You get a warm feeling, but no one else notices.’”

According to Grant, executives often assume that employees will do better when incentivized for performance with money, recognition, promotions, etc. With the callers Grant was studying, all of these strategies had been tried, but nothing had improved performance.

Although the purpose of the calls was to raise money for the school, a job one might assume would appeal to Givers, “these callers were operating like Takers,” Grant maintains, “because they didn’t know how they were giving—they didn’t know where the money went.” Grant surmised that continuing to reward people in ways that assume self-interested motives might actually perpetuate self-interested behavior and create Takers out of Givers.

Believing that providing the opportunity for callers to see the positive impact of their work would inspire them and improve their effectiveness, Grant decided on the following experiment: He had leaders from the school come talk to the fundraising callers about the statistics regarding where the money was going. The callers learned how much went to faculty and staff salaries, buildings, scholarships, etc.

By way of background, Adam Grant, the highest-rated teacher at the 
Wharton School, the youngest tenured professor in the history of the University of Pennsylvania, a former advertising director,
 and even a former junior Olympian, is the author of the book, Give and Take: A Revolutionary Approach to Success.
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He was named one of
 BusinessWeek’s favorite professors, and his clients 
include Google, the United Nations, the 
U.S. Army, Navy, and Air Force. Suffice it to say, he’s a pretty smart guy, and he knows his stuff.

So did his experiment work?

“It did no good whatsoever,” Grant reports. “In fact, a lot of the callers did worse.”

What was going on? Eventually, Grant realized that rather than being inspired, the callers were skeptical that giving them information about where the money went was a ploy to try to get them to work harder. (And it was.)

So Grant invited a scholarship recipient to speak with the fundraisers. No one else was allowed—no executives, no school personnel. Only the callers and the scholarship student. The student spent about five minutes telling the callers how those phone calls made a difference in his life and how much he appreciated it.

“The callers spiked 142 percent in weekly minutes on the phone and 171 percent in weekly money raised,” Grant reports, “and that actually turned out to be a conservative estimate, because in another study, we found a more compelling scholarship student who had a more powerful story to tell, and average callers spiked more than 400 percent in weekly revenue.”

To be clear, nothing in the circumstances of making the phone calls had changed. The callers used all the same materials in the same environment with the same goal. The only thing that changed was the umwelt—the callers’ subjective world of making fundraising calls.

Your umwelt is like a lens through which you see the world, and it impacts how you interact with whatever is going on in your life. In some situations, your umwelt creates a reality in which you act effectively, and in others, you are unable to see any possibility for effective action—your umwelt is not serving you. A shift in your umwelt doesn’t change the situation you confront, but it does alter the impact that situation has on you, and the ways in which you interact with it.
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Before speaking with the scholarship student, the callers’ umwelt (the subjective world of the job) was one of trying to convince alumni to donate to the school—or more cynically, “to swindle alums into giving their hard-earned dollars away,” Grant jokes.

Their effectiveness was determined by that umwelt; the lens through which they saw everything they were doing. After meeting a real person whose life was positively impacted by their work, the callers’ umwelt shifted to one of a meaningful opportunity to make a difference.

Perhaps most intriguing is this: Although survey reports demonstrated that after meeting the scholarship student, the callers were more motivated, found their work more meaningful, and thought the job made more of a difference than they did before that 5-minute interaction, in interviews afterward, none of the callers said that their experience of the job or their effectiveness had been impacted by that visit from the scholarship student.
iStock © Rawpixel Ltd
Source: iStock © Rawpixel Ltd

“Because who is motivated by one 5-minute interaction?” Grant quizzes. “That doesn’t make any sense.” Yet clearly that 5-minute interaction created a profound umwelt shift. “It seems like that interaction—and we’ve replicated this about a dozen times in other settings—was a catalyst for starting to think about, ‘Why does my work matter and who is affected by it?’”
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Try This at Home: Consider what your umwelt is for your job. What is the lens through which you see your work? Then ask yourself, “Why does my work matter and who is affected by it?” Does it make you think about your job differently?


https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/...-giver-or-taker