Asking a favour: does yes mean a freely made choice?
Asking for an urgent review or occasional assistance is part of everyday management. The managerial question is specific: how can we ask a colleague for help without treating their acceptance as proof that they could genuinely say no?
What the literature establishes
Francis J. Flynn and Vanessa K. Bohns (2008, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology) show across several studies that people asking for help underestimate the likelihood that others will agree. Requesters consider the cost of providing the help but give less weight to the social cost of refusing. A direct request can therefore produce more positive responses than its author expects.
The social cost of refusal
Vanessa K. Bohns (2016, Current Directions in Psychological Science) reviews research on this tendency to underestimate our influence. She highlights an asymmetry in perspective: requesters do not experience the awkwardness of saying no as directly as the people they approach. This mechanism suggests a distinction between the effectiveness of a request and the freedom available to its recipient.
The premature conclusion
The convenient conclusion would be to advise managers to ask more often and more directly. This research supports the idea that we can be overly pessimistic about the help available, but it does not make every acceptance an expression of willing support. A yes alone establishes neither a colleague’s availability nor the absence of pressure. (our executive and employee training programmes)
What the evidence cannot settle
These studies do not evaluate requests between managers and employees in businesses on the Swiss Riviera. Hierarchical dependence, ongoing relationships and workload trade-offs may change the situation; their local effects remain to be examined. Adding “you can refuse” therefore does not demonstrate that refusal is a realistic option, particularly when its consequences remain implicit.
A practical check in Vevey
In Vevey’s environment of global food businesses, group headquarters and Riviera SMEs, SHR’s Communication programme can offer an exercise on occasional requests for help, excluding normal job obligations and safety emergencies. For two weeks, each request specifies the expected effort, the deadline and the option to suggest another deadline or decline; an anonymised log distinguishes acceptance, counterproposal and refusal. The main indicator is the proportion of refusals and counterproposals actually respected without insistent follow-up, checked with both requester and recipient. This record does not prove that pressure is absent, but it tests whether the stated room for manoeuvre survives in subsequent actions. To go further: explore the Communication training in Vevey in the canton of Vaud, or browse our executive and employee training programmes in Switzerland.
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