I'm generally disinclined to accept and seek help from others.
I was reminded of that this week when I was working on something that "had to get done today." My boss offered to have a colleague help me. I knew from her perspective that it would be irrational for me not to accept the help. So I unenthusiastically accepted the help with a "uhh OK."
The reason I'm disinclined to seek and accept help from colleagues is because I generally expect it not to be of net help. There are transaction costs. I have to explain the task; the project has to be broken up and reassembled; and I end up responsible for somebody else's work quality, or lack thereof.
I'm also slow/reluctant to ask for direction from higher ups. Part of that is that I like to figure things out myself and another part is apprehension about getting direction not to my liking. Another part is that I don't like to impose on others' time. But I still run things by the boss to avoid being a loose cannon and a liability. And the direction is often helpful after all. It often gets me unstuck.
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