Give and Take

Grant, the youngest professor to earn tenure at Wharton, starts from a simple question: at work, do the generous or the selfish do better? He classifies people into three styles. Takers seek to receive more than they give; matchers keep the ledger even; givers help without expecting an immediate return. The surprise in his data is that givers occupy both ends of the scale: they are the worst in productivity, income and promotions... but also the best. In business you don't have to choose between being a good person and winning, because generosity practiced well produces enormous benefits.

Three ideas to remember:

• The distinction between the selfless giver and the strategic giver, whom Grant defines as someone who cares about others and also about themselves. The first burns out and gets walked over; the second lasts, because they give in a way that also energizes them.
• The five-minute favor, the rule of Adam Rifkin, the most connected man on LinkedIn according to Fortune: do any favor that costs you five minutes or less without thinking about the return; the value of a network lies not in the contacts you have but in the ones you've helped, and in the dormant ties that reactivate years later.
• The taker can be detected before it costs you: Grant describes how successful takers are charming upward and cruel downward, and cites Enron's Kenneth Lay as the archetype; the tell is how they treat someone who is of no use to them.

Grant devotes chapters to showing how givers win at activities that seem made for takers. In sales and negotiation, "powerless communication" — asking questions, admitting doubts and seeking advice — builds more trust and closes more than aggressive assertiveness. In spotting talent, the giver sees potential where the taker sees current performance, and that's why the giver develops people better. And in venture capital he uses the case of David Hornik, an investor who offers founders open terms and tells them to talk to whomever they want before deciding: he loses some rounds, but he attracts the best.

The practice he proposes is giving in blocks: the givers who survive best don't help in drips all day long, but concentrate their generosity in defined windows, for example one day a week, and protect their focus the rest of the time. Grant cites studies where a hundred hours of volunteering a year, about two a week, is the point at which generosity improves health and satisfaction without sacrificing performance. A simple place to begin: set a fixed two-hour block for five-minute favors, intros, advice, pitch reviews; make a list of three dormant ties, people you haven't contacted in years, and reactivate one; and in your next hire or investment negotiation, watch how the other person treats the waiter, the assistant or the founder who is of no use to them. That's where you'll know if they're a taker.

The author's line, which Grant takes from Rifkin: "You should be willing to do something that will take you five minutes or less for anybody."

As a founder, part of your role is to create an organization that makes many people successful, and this book helps you make that part of its culture.