How often do you give family and friends professional or work advice?

Our reader poll today asks: How often do you give family and friends professional or work advice?

• All the time 6.67%
• Sometimes when I think they need to hear it 25.08%
• Sometimes but only when they ask for it 51.12%
• Rarely — only if I see them making a big mistake 12.06%
• Never — I keep business and personal separate 5.07%

Trying to help. Over 80% of respondents are willing to offer professional and work advice with more than 30% offering it whether it’s solicited or not. For the 51% of you offering advice upon request, ask yourself if you’re telling them what they want to hear or what they need to hear. Sometimes people are looking for confirmation of a decision they’ve already made and they might not be open to advice counter to that position. If that’s the case, you run the risk of shouldering the blame if things don’t work out for them even if they had already made the decision you tacitly approve. For those offering unsolicited advice, be sure you understand their wants and goals. Often we give advice based on what we want our futures to look like. As good as that advice might be for you, it could be exactly the wrong advice for them if they have different goals and aspirations. The bottom line is consider their wants and needs first before giving any advice. If your suggestions are consistent with helping them achieve their goals, it should help them drive the outcomes they desire.

– Mike Figliuolo at thoughtLEADERS, LLC

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These results were originally a SmartPulse poll in SmartBrief on Leadership which tracks feedback from more than 240,000 business leaders. Get smarter on leadership and sign up for the SmartBrief on Leadership e-newsletter.