Do you need “help”?
I have spent my career partnering with smart people to help them achieve their goals. My expertise in language, communication, teaching, program planning, and everything I’ve learned from my years in universities is useful in many different contexts. I can help someone set up a class, give an engaging talk, make sure their paper makes sense, or design a successful program, among other things. But what might motivate someone to ask for help or seek a partner to elevate their work? Whether you are teaching or working on other ways to motivate students or staff, or are thinking of asking for help yourself, I am interested in this challenge of how to best be available and ready, and the obstacles people may face in taking advantage of your expertise.
When I first started supervising student workers, I gave them guidelines and told them to ask me if they had more questions. Guess what? They didn’t ask! Over time I structured more training and required them to send me updates periodically, where one of the required questions was to let me know what questions they had. That worked much better. I think part of the challenge is that students don’t know what they don’t know. When you are working on something and not sure what your next steps are, you may not know what to ask. That’s the moment when it’s best to have a conversation, but you likely don’t know quite what to say, which is why instructors often see students who are at more of a crisis point. I have talked to instructors who get frustrated that students only come to them at the last minute, before the exam. How can you set things up so that the process is more scaffolded? Planning periodic, low-stakes opportunities to check in with students you teach or people you supervise definitely helps!
The other challenge I hear is that students ask easy questions they should be able to answer themselves, but they don’t ask the ones they really should be asking. “Let me Google that for you,” is one refrain I hear regularly, especially from academic support staff. You want students to ask questions that will help them learn and think more deeply about a project, at the same time that you want them to be resourceful and able to find the answers to basic questions, especially information they can find in the syllabus. Having dedicated class time devoted to those straightforward questions (my former professor called this “housekeeping,” and we always started class with it), designing a syllabus scavenger hunt, or otherwise making sure class rules, policies, or deadlines are easily accessible can be one strategy to cut down on the questions you don’t want, and an important part of helping students develop agency and learn to be proactive.
The one caveat to this is that sometimes the “easy” questions are a gateway to something deeper and more important. I have had many meetings that started with a simple issue, but turned out to be about something else entirely. A student with a question about paper formatting they could easily look up actually has deeper concerns about her research topic, a professor with a simple question about grading rules turns out to be very worried his students aren’t learning anything, the list goes on. So make sure you aren’t dismissing all of those questions too quickly, lest they be a cover for a deeper issue that you really do want to talk about.
In my case, in my many roles, I am always working on ways to lower the barriers to asking for support, and to help people see that consulting with me is a good idea. Framing seems to be another challenge. Yes, I can help, but it is difficult for many academics to ask for help, since they may feel they should know everything already, or there is a stigma attached to needing “help.” Maybe you can do the basic task on your own, but if you partner with someone else, you can do more or better. Maybe you can achieve way more than you ever imagined! That is the strength of a true collaboration. There is nothing better than having a real partner who is aligned with you and can help you achieve your goals. Academic work can be solitary, but it doesn’t have to be.
Want a partner to think through a project with you, or someone to help you engage your students in smart questions? I am always here.
