The Art of Relationships: Understanding the Difference Between Assigning a Task and Asking for Help

When a person’s interpersonal skills do not grow with life, it often reflects a deficiency in understanding and handling relationships.

Just as many people often confuse the concepts of “assigning a task” and “asking for help,” along with their own position and role.

I believe many have experienced this: originally a relative or friend asked us for help, but later it seemed as if we were the ones responsible. We end up running around alone, yet may not even be able to easily reach them.

Assigning a task means you pay and I act according to agreement—for example, the superior-subordinate relationship in a company, or a SOHO freelancer taking on an outsourced project. Asking for help means you offer emotion (what modern people like to call emotional value) or a favor, and I willingly help—for example, being able to lend a hand in an emergency gives a sense of achievement, or the rich friendship built between friends allows them to bluntly ask me for help.

However, if you are neither willing to pay nor able to offer a reward that feels valuable, and even completely stop following up after handing the matter to someone else—thinking you are assigning work, yet making us chase you for materials and report progress? Then naturally we do not need to care much about your problem either.

After all, if you yourself do not value your own affairs, why should we be more anxious and more invested than you?

A mistaken attitude about your own role not only affects your relationships but may also cost you others’ trust and support. Therefore, learning to distinguish and respect the difference between “assigning a task” and “asking for help,” and to give appropriately when needed, is the way to build healthier and more solid relationships.