Adam Grant

I'd become a caricature of a giver.

And after the article came out, people started seeing me as the generosity guy.

It was like a flashing neon sign for takers.

This guy will say yes to anything.

I got flooded with thousands of emails from acquaintances and complete strangers wanting things.

Hey Adam, will you review my book?

It was a wake-up call.

I realized that there's a big difference between pleasing people and helping them.

In her research, Vanessa Bonds has found that saying no doesn't have to burn bridges.

Once you accept that it's acceptable to say no, you need some boundaries.

I certainly did.

My favorite way to set them is to create personal policies.

Instead of treating every request as a separate dilemma, I made a list of guidelines for what kinds of requests I wouldn't fulfill.

I don't work for companies for free.

I don't give career advice to strangers.

I don't write forewords to books.

It's one thing to set boundaries.

It's another to communicate them.

For more than a decade, I've been test-driving strategies for saying no, and I've found three that consistently work.

They tend to avoid negative reactions, and sometimes even elicit positive ones, like, wow, I respect your boundaries, and huh, I need to do more of that myself.