How to Be Useful: A Beginner's Guide to Not Hating Work

by Megan Hustad

  Of course, you can always search beyond your office walls for people to lust after professionally, but that, too, can be demoralizing. Here’s how it always seemed to work for me:

  One of the more forward-looking among us junior publishing types—this was never me, by the way—would organize an evening for the lower ranks from different publishing houses. It even had a name—“Overtime,” it was called. (Because it was like work but yet it wasn’t really, like, work, y’know?) This orgy of connection-making was held every few months in a downtown bar, the only requirements for the venue being $5 gin and tonics, a black leather couch to throw our ratty coats on, and a sound system that blared Coldplay. Far from hewing closely to Hill’s prescriptions for a definite purpose, I, and many of my colleagues, would arrive with only the vaguest notion of “meeting people.” When aspiring editors were asked what kinds of titles they hoped to work on, you’d hear murmurs of “narrative nonfiction” or “pop culture.” People who might not otherwise have met got to meet, which is a good thing, but the conversation—after “Can I get you another drink?” “I’m sorry, what?” “DRINK! ANOTHER DRINK!”—tended to devolve into venting and gossip. After three hours of making stock footage of twenty-somethings in a bar, I’d take the subway home, alternately vowing to make more of an effort next time, or, on the other hand, never to “network” like that again. No one I’ve spoken to could recall anything significant developing from these Overtime events.

  We had all the building blocks for Hill’s Master Mind—people all pretty much the same age, none of us making very much money, all doing something mildly humbling in our jobs and eager for change, wanting sincerely to produce quality books, and all enjoying a surplus of free nights. We were all willing to share information, too. That we failed to meet the first criterion for the Master Mind—meeting twice a week—is obvious. But could the entire setup have been flawed? The secret to making these putative meetings of the mind work, Hill wrote in his preface to Think and Grow Rich, was to “KNOW WHAT IT IS THAT YOU WANT” (His caps.) The Master Mind’s “definite purpose” had to be something very particular, something you could get your hands on. More money wasn’t even a legitimate goal in Hill’s eye—you had to pick the exact dollar amount if you were going to have any luck at all. The purpose could be stacks of coins worth $200,000, or it could be a nationwide chain of Betsy Ross Candy Company outlets (one of Hill’s many shortlived entrepreneurial ventures)—but every member of the Master Mind had to come to the table ready and unembarrassed to articulate exactly what it was he or she was there for. So could it be that the problem with “networking” is not that it “moves fast, and comes with a plan, and doesn’t really value people for who they are,” as one reluctant schmoozer told me, but that it isn’t specific enough about what that plan might be?

  Here’s what you can get out of Hill, even if you’re unconvinced that his whole Master Mind theory holds water: Do all the mingling you want, even lean over that folding table, marker cap in mouth, to fill out a “Hello, My Name Is_” sticker, and you might just as well stay home as long as you don’t know precisely why you’ve come. Or as long as you think that “trying to meet new people” is a precise goal. Trying to stay “open to the possibilities of the moment,” as another, more wide-eyed partygoer suggested to me, more often than not just means you stay too late and wake up at 7:30 the next morning bleary-eyed, anxious, and combating a vague, existential dread.

  In other words, maybe when the young man in the tweed jacket leaned in and asked, “So what kind of stuff are you working on?” I should have plainly told him that I had nothing I was particularly jazzed about at the moment but was hoping to work on a book about Alice Paul, or the changing racial politics of inner-city high schools, or an anthology of artists’ writing, or a book like Paul Fussell’s Class, but updated—the things I actually wanted, in other words. And then asked him if he knew anyone working on such projects. But this would have taken some forethought, some preparation, and an ability to keep talking even when the self-irony starts kicking in. More on that later.

  Here’s another reason why Overtime was unsatisfying, even in an industry that supposedly ran on the fumes of our collective love for literature. Maybe, in addition to not getting together often enough, not being definite about what we wanted, we weren’t walking into that bar looking for people who’d completely blow us out of the water.

  Hill was adamant on this point: For the Master Mind to do you any good, you had to invite people whose accomplishments outstripped yours, or who were smarter, funnier, quicker on their feet, altogether more sparkling than you. Possibly even better-looking. It almost goes without saying that this is difficult; in fact, it’s completely at odds with instinct. Suppose you spot that person who’s always at these parties, that guy who stands straight at 6’1“, is extremely articulate and frighteningly clever, is fluent in German and Arabic, plays in a band on Saturdays but makes it to services on Sundays, and who works in the same field as you but has a more high-profile job. When you see him across the room, tossing his head back and laughing, showing off very white teeth, your first thought is probably not, “I bet he’d like to be my friend. I should go over and talk to him.” You’re more likely to turn to the bartender and order another drink. If jealousy doesn’t get in the way, insecurity will, because the moment you stand next to this person is the moment you become the shorter, sillier one—the funny friend to his romantic lead (the Janeane Garofalo to her Uma Thurman, and so on).

  By Hill’s definition, though, every successful person was someone who didn’t mind doing this. It came naturally to Hill himself, and he freely admitted that he was susceptible to hero-worship—always eager to learn, ever ready to pick up pointers from people he understood knew better than he. But he couldn’t abide being outshone for long, which is probably why so many of his relationships rotted from the inside out. He would start out apprenticeships with a bang (“… came to the office early, stayed late, and worked tirelessly in between,” according to his biographer). He poured himself into partnerships (starting up one magazine, then another) with people who raised his game. Then he’d find something to get upset about and break things off or send the other party screaming in the opposite direction. By the time he wrote Think and Grow Rich, Hill seems to have figured out intellectually that anyone who had to be the tallest tree in the forest was not capable of making a Master Mind happen. But actually acting on this intellectual understanding and changing his habits proved impossible for him.

  Which is probably why he couldn’t illustrate the benefits of having smarter friends with examples from his own life. His favorite story for that purpose was Henry Ford’s 1919 libel trial against the Chicago Tribune. The newspaper had published an editorial labeling Ford an “ignorant idealist” some time earlier for his efforts in preventing American engagement in World War I. While Ford had never prided himself on his book-learnin’, he was not happy with the label, and decided to file a lawsuit against the paper. The case eventually found its way to court in Dearborn, Michigan. If the Tribune’s lawyers could prove Ford was an ignoramus, they’d prevail. So they put Ford on the stand and lobbed a series of questions aimed at establishing that while he knew a thing or two about cars, Ford was, generally speaking, dumb as rocks. They asked him who Benedict Arnold was. “I have forgotten just who he is. He is a writer, I think.” When did we fight the American Revolution? “1812.” According to observers, Ford sat sharpening a pocketknife on the bottom of his shoe until he’d had enough. He leaned in, pointed his finger at his questioner, and as Hill tells it, spewed out the following:

  If I should really want to answer the foolish question you have just asked, or any of the other questions you have been asking me, let me remind you that I have a row of electric push-buttons on my desk, and by pushing the right button, I can summon to my aid men who can answer any question I desire to ask concerning the business to which I am devoting most of my efforts. Now, will you kindly tell me why I should clutter u
p my mind with general knowledge, for the purpose of being able to answer questions, when / have men around me who can supply any knowledge I require?

  Ford won the case but was awarded only six cents in damages. As Hill saw it, there was no shame in Ford’s tenuous grasp of history. (“History is bunk,” Ford said from the stand.) The point of the story was that you didn’t need to worry too much about groping around for knowledge yourself as long as you had a reliable Master Mind at your disposal.

  But is that enough to help people over any lingering insecurities about being the sidekick? Probably not quite. It’s worth exploring Hill’s ground rules a little more deeply, because it brings up some interesting potential complications. Here’s part of the schema from Think and Grow Rich, one more time, verbatim from page 147:

  (a) Ally yourself with a group of as many people as you may need for the creation, and carrying out of your plan____

  (Compliance with this instruction is absolutely essential Do not neglect it.)

  (b) Before forming your Master Mind alliance, decide what advantages, and benefits, you may offer the individual members of your group, in return for their cooperation.

  No one will work indefinitely without some form of compensation. No intelligent person will either request or expect to work without adequate compensation, although this may not always be in the form of money.

  Master Minds ran on volunteer labor, in other words. As per his experience with Carnegie, Hill believed that a little willingness to be exploited went a long way. In the ideal world, everything would even out in the end—one person would extend himself for a while without compensation, then some day, don’t know where, don’t know when, he would reap his reward. But he had to chip in regardless.28

  There’s risk involved here. Say you do your bit for the Master Mind, and then your “friend” says thank you very much and scampers off without contributing his fair share. Or say your Master Mind group works for a while, and some members start to advance as you all hoped and planned for, but not everyone in lockstep—as is rarely the case—and you’re the one lagging behind. Or what if your turn never comes? Or you get duped by someone without a conscience? The Master Mind, looked at this way, sets people up nicely for disappointment and betrayal. (This is certainly the gist of books like What Makes Sammy Run? or movies like The Devil and Daniel Webster; both of which came out in 1941, around the height of Hill’s popularity. Both played on the fear that you cooperated only to be hip-checked and backstabbed by a mean little twerp—that is, if your “friend” and the champion of your ambitions didn’t turn out to be Satan himself.)

  Speaking of the devil reminds me of an incident at one of my early jobs. There was a much-loved editor who was known to be messy, so messy you couldn’t see the carpet of his office for the piles of paper. He was perhaps not the savviest when it came to technology, either, and his friends at work knew he never—ever —shut his computer down. Which made him vulnerable. One night, they slipped into his office and tinkered with his Microsoft Word AutoCorrect feature so that every time he typed in his name it would revert to “Prince of Darkness.” When he noticed this—it was at least a day later—he spent several hours trying to figure out what had happened. When the prank was revealed, he could laugh along. But it made others uncomfortable, just being witness to it. It was as if he’d been exposed, as if people knew him too well, and were perhaps too comfortable zeroing in on his weaknesses. It almost served as a warning to keep your cards closer to your vest.

  Hill knew he was advocating something very difficult, especially for people employed by companies. He even conceded that achieving a functioning Master Mind might be nothing short of miraculous. So miraculous, in fact, that occasionally he resorted to imaginary friends to populate his networks. Every night for years—he unselfconsciously writes in Think and Grow Rich—just before bed, he would dream up clandestine roundtables around which were seated not only Andrew Carnegie, Henry Ford, and Thomas Edison, but also Ralph Waldo Emerson, Thomas Paine, Charles Darwin, Abraham Lincoln, Luther Burbank, Napoleon Bonaparte, and himself, Napoleon Hill. “I would shut my eyes, and see, in my imagination, this group of men seated with me around my council table. Here I had not only an opportunity to sit among those whom I considered to be great,” he writes, before ruining the effect completely by adding, “but I actually dominated the group, by serving as the chairman.” (An astounding sentence that pretty much explains why Hill had so much trouble. Most people would cede the floor to Bonaparte, or failing that, Lincoln.)

  The solution to this need to dominate, this fear of being exposed—in fact, to all stumbling blocks to networking—lies in Hill’s emphasis on “definiteness.” The more precise, the more specific, you can be about what you will do for the group, and what you don’t need to do because someone else better qualified will be doing it, the more you can let your guard down. You can relish what might at first seem a subsidiary role, too, and tell yourself it’s complementary, cooperative, and necessary in order to achieve that elusive spirit of harmony. When you got right down to it, Hill concluded, the Master Mind was a force far greater than the sum of its parts. “No two minds ever come together without, thereby, creating a third, intangible, invisible force which may be likened to a third mind.”29 No mere apologist, Hill believed that combining friends and business could actually lift you to a higher plane of human understanding.

  I’m not entirely convinced, but I do know that once you’ve found people with whom you can openly, sincerely discuss what you wish for, you spend less time dwelling on the pedestrian events of the day, or the smell of your cubicle neighbor’s tuna sandwiches, and more time talking about things you actually want to bring into existence. “Just one person who, when you tell them you have an idea, or that you’d like to accomplish something, will not only get you but toss another log on the fire,” remarked the ambivalent New Jersey banker—that’s what he wanted. And when I think about people I admire, I see a number of Hill’s principles in effect. They don’t conceive of it as such, but they essentially do build small teams. They are constantly referring so-and-so to so-and-so, introducing old acquaintances to newer acquaintances, and matching people who have problems with people who might offer interesting solutions. They know their friends’ strengths and talk incessantly —gleefully—about their friends’ strengths. They know what they themselves are good at as well, and admit to being driven, idealistic, and susceptible to hero-worship—all at once. They write e-mails, they write thank-you notes, they surround themselves with people who will not agree so much as ask the right questions. They are deliberate and precise about their allegiances. But somehow over time their calculations morph into an unusual variety of selflessness, and they’re somehow able to celebrate their friends’ triumphs as enthusiastically as their own. Which means they get to celebrate a lot.

  Still, if the idea of a Master Mind strikes you as too cold, you might want to bear in mind that the alternative is essentially deciding to go it entirely alone. That way, you get the satisfaction of knowing that both your triumphs and failures are yours and yours only. Which is, I think, about as elegant a life strategy as stealing from a public library. Should you decide to attempt the Master Mind yourself, some other considerations also apply:

  Do be interested. Emily Post and Dale Carnegie already said as much, but Napoleon Hill’s take on the matter was different. It had less to do with getting other people interested in you and more to do with simply noting other people’s strengths. If you were too focused on yourself, you might not notice that so-and-so had a particular gift—or a cabin in Vermont you could use for annual retreats.

  Do keep your mouth shut when you don’t have anything to say. Hill himself is said to have been a real chatterbox, although he cautioned against it. Talking too much can hurt your chances of corralling the people you need for your Master Mind, which is to say it’s tempting but ultimately counterproductive to form alliances through gossip about a third party. Once, while trying to endear myse
lf to a magazine editor, I wondered aloud why a mutual acquaintance was such a sourpuss; she seemed polite enough, but otherwise pouty and distracted. “What’s her problem?” I asked. Cancer, was the answer. Her problem was that she was twenty-four years old and had breast cancer.

  If it doesn’t backfire immediately, as it did here, it can in time, if only because your audience might assume that a trash-talker is always a trash-talker. By spending time chatting with you, they’re only giving you material for trashing them later, once they’ve left the room.

  Don’t ask a favor of anyone you haven’t yourself helped in a while. Hill

  didn’t think you should be shy about asking people for help. (Not least because it gives you information—if someone hesitates when you ask them to contribute to your project, or says yes but

  How to Be Useful

  leaves you somehow wishing you hadn’t asked, you know he or she isn’t Master Mind material.) “But in seeking the help of others, you must be prepared to make an even trade,” is another Hill chestnut. “You can’t come empty-handed.” We can assume he meant “even” in terms of size of contribution, not outcome. (The outcome, again, is completely beyond your control.)

  Do understand that someone will take credit for your work. You may

  function as a shadow member of someone’s Master Mind, and not really be aware of it. This happens when higher-ups take your good ideas and run with them, and it happens plenty. There’s very little you can do about it. (So enjoy!) Interestingly enough, when Hill was young the fact that employers sometimes poached ideas from employees was seen as a positive, even quite progressive, development. Department-store king Marshall Field—to name just one—got a lot of press and praise for taking the suggestions of hourly-wage employees as seriously as those of his highly paid senior advisors. Some even said his department stores were the best because he implemented so many employee ideas. Whether the girls at the perfume counter felt the same way is difficult to say.