Sucker or Saint?

I think people need to consider whether it's their superior who is sincerely asking them a favor, or it's just one of their coworkers who thinks they have the right to pawn off work on others. Sometimes coworkers see someone who they think is not doing anything and think that means it's their right to give that person something to do. This is wrong. In this case, I would prefer to see the person asked to do such work say that it's not in their job description (or something a little more harsh), because this would show an ability to stand up for oneself, which is more important to me than a yes man.
Also, obviously if there's a serious time or resource constraint, it might be appropriate to ask others for help. However, a worker should take serious consideration of the tone in which they do this. If I see someone who's condescending/ talking down to their coworkers, I would assume this is the way they would talk to clients. Considering my clients are intelligent people with high expectations, and that they like to stand up for themselves also, I would be very concerned with someone who acts superior to someone when they're actually not.

The bottom line is that if you want to become a go to guy, go above and beyond your job description, but you only have to do this for your boss and sincere coworkers, and not necessarily by saying yes to every little task someone asks you to do.

This explains the weak, helpless, cowardly people who cannot imagine responding to muggers and burglars with anything other than abject submission -- who then shore up their self-esteem by congratulating themselves on their nonviolent, pacifist, moral superiority.

This is despite the fact that Gandhi's doctrine of passive resistance required followers to _refuse_ to submit to oppression. Gandhi described three ways of dealing with violent oppression: #1 Cowardly submission, #2 resistance via counter-violence, and #3 passive resistance in which you refuse to obey under the theory that the oprressor cannot kill _everyone_. He wrote his son that passive resistance was the most noble and virtuous, but admitted that if one were not courageous enough to do this, the use of counter-violence in resistance is preferable to cowardly submission.

That such a "nonviolent" person would dial 911 in a moment of danger, summoning a gun-armed cop to his aid, only confirms his contemptible hypocracy.

I think this "either-or" choice doesn't frame the real issue at all. It just makes it seem controversial.

What I've found in my own career is that "doing it all" -- the details as well as the major strategic thinking, and everything in between -- is what catapults you into becoming the go-to person. The one who sets the standard for teamwork and performance. Basically, all workers are either problem solvers, or they're part of the problem. Anyone who would ever tell me "it's not my job" I would consider not a team player and a short timer at best. Not someone you reward, not someone you want leading others.

Depends on your organization. In some places, team players -- people will take on emergency assignments, often menial -- are eventually rewarded. In some places, they're not. That's what determines whether the worker in question is a sucker or not. Good organizations -- where such menial, unexpected work will not happen often, but will be rewarded -- rely on team players to step in and get the job done. And when those team players become bosses, they have a tendency not to be capricious or abusive with their direct reports, and not dump menial work on people just because they can. It seems that one's view of the boss's request in this experiment is totally dependent on the culture of the organization they're part of.

You tell it Wray Herbert.

Dear Mr. Herbert, I realize the researchers don't read a lot of Nietzsche, but they're rewriting The Genealogy of Morals, which discusses "master morality versus servant morality, and maintains that the traditional ideals set forth as holy and morally good within Christian morality are products of self-deception, since they were forged in the bad air of revenge, resentment, hatred, impotence, and cowardice." (Stanford Encyc Phil.) Now there's empirical evidence of this "transvaluation of the values," as a human tendency? Interesting.

What this article calls wimpy or helpful has gotten me results at two consecutive jobs. I have always considered that helping my superiors helps the company and me. Things need to get done and someone has to do them. The result is now im reporting to the gm and i run my own store. "not in my job description" around here means you just shot your upward mobility right in the foot. So i guess wimps make it and rebels stay in the cubicle.

What some call spineless and/or nice actually does yield advantages. I have always had the view that nothing is out of my job description and if something needs to get done, its best done if i do it myself. I have always offered assistance to my superiors and the result, now in two consecutive jobs, is that now i only have one boss instead of many, and i run my own store. "Thats not my job description" usually means you just shot your upward mobility right in the foot.

Hi, i cudnt read the rest of the article, so overcome was i by the office example u gave. gosh, it has happened to me so many times...yes i feel like the lowliest scum on the planet afterwards...and yes, towards the end i have really learnt to say NO...though i STILL start out with a umm-yes-maybe-lemme think - er - maybe not - no!

Sorry, but I don't see how the test proves that the people that chose to help others in need are spineless. You're basically saying that if someone has the desire to do something helpful for their coworkers, they're doing it out of insecurity every time. It may be true sometimes, but have you considered if everyone at the office are friends, it's a casual atmosphere, "it's a slow day, and I'm bored so what the heck?" You're throwing out so many possible factors. You could just as inaccurately have done the same test to prove that people that tend to not help out are generally selfish or lazy.

OMG! talk about removed from reality. only one who worked at a 9-5 unsalaried job could write an article where an answer like "not in my job description" didnt result in immediate termination. honestly - what a joke on the part of the editors. how about a greater understanding that these sort of issues apply to those of us who do not work 9-5?

Every job I have had in the description has had a clause "and tasks as assigned". If the boss asks me to do something he or she is the one responsible for my paycheck so it is my belief the answer is yes I would be happy to do it. This idea of I'm to good to something is pervasive in our culture. It has nothing to with self-esteem which as a parent of two teenage boys I'm finding I spent to much time worrying about and not enough time putting a boot in their sit downs for being lazy. Try getting a middle class kid to take a job doing something unpleasant. They look at you like you are nuts. We built this country on doing what has to be done. Now we are outsourcing many of the unpleasant jobs or look down upon those who do them that is where worrying about self esteem has put us. We even have the gall to complain about the people who come here that want to work and might not speak that good of English. This is where worrying so much about self esteem has got us in a place that is starting to make me ashamed of parenting job this generation has done me included

Every job I have had in the discription has had a clause "and tasks as assigned". If the boss asks me to do something he or she is the one responsible for my paycheck so it is my belief the answer is yes I would be happy to do it. This idea of I'm to good to something is pervasive in our culture. It has nothing to with self-esteem which as a parent of two teenage boys I'm finding I spent to much time worrying about and not enough time putting a boot in their sit downs for being lazy. Try getting a middle class kid to take a job doing something unpleasent. They look at you like you are nuts. We built this country on doing what has to be done. Now we are outsorcing many of the unpleasnt jobs or look down upon those who do them that is where worrying about self esteem has put us. We even have the gall to complain about the people who come here that want to work and might not speak that good of English. This is where worrying so much about self esteem has got us in a place that is starting to make me ashamed of parenting job this generation has done me included.

1.mr. wray herbert,me and my Boss see EYE to EYE.
2.the people of AMERICA ,THAT CALL THEM SELFES CHRISTIANS SHOULD TAKE SEN.OBAMA WORDS
TO HEART. BECAUSE HE HAS SAID TO HEAVEN ,IN THE REPORT HE TOLD YOUR PAPER,
I AM A BIG BELIEVER IN NOT JUST WORDS(BIBLE)BUT DEEDS AND WORKS.I WILL EXPOSE WHAT HEAVEN HAS TO SAY ABOUT SEN. OOBAMA FAITH.HEAVEN

HEY,WRAY HERBERT,HELLO, I Am REV.larry JOHN cazer of st.louis,mo. and i have a story to tell the WORLD>
1. me and my BOss,see eye to eye
2.i read in yall paper some things that SEN.OBAMA said about his faith.AND i believe what he said is true. ANDAND I AM GOING TO EXPOSE THOSE VERY WORDS OF MR. OBAMA