Being Too Helpful At Work Can Hurt Your Career—Here’s How To Say No

Pitching in to be helpful at work is important, but sometimes it can hold you back. Employers often need workers to help out and complete tasks outside of their job roles, but the problem is that this work isn’t shared equally. Women are more likely to take on the behind-the-scenes duties at work, and research shows it’s taking a toll on their careers.

These helping behaviors at work can include tasks like welcoming new employees, pitching in on others’ projects and organizing the team’s work and social events. Often referred to as “office housework” or “organizational citizenship,” these jobs are typically outside of an employee’s formal job duties. While completing these extra tasks is generally appreciated, employees who spend time helping have less time for their primary job tasks. As a result, their career progress slows.

Diane Bergeron, a senior research scientist at the Center for Creative Leadership, authored a 2025 report on helping behaviors at work and has extensively studied the issue. At one consulting firm she studied, she found that employees who helped more got better performance reviews, but logged fewer billable hours and were promoted more slowly.

Not only does volunteering for these tasks result in career setbacks, but the extra effort expended in helping can lead to burnout, increased stress and difficulty balancing work and home life.

Bergeron also points out another risk, known as “job creep,” where a one-time favor can quickly become an ongoing expectation. Over time, the helping task becomes a permanent part of someone’s role. In addition, once they start volunteering, some employees also feel growing pressure to continue saying yes to additional office housework in order to remain valued at work.

Some might wonder why women don’t just say no to these extra requests. Unfortunately, it’s not that simple. Women often face pushback when they step outside of expected roles, like being helpful and accommodating. Saying no can make them seem less likable, simply because it challenges the expectations of how women are supposed to behave.

How To Step Back From Doing Office Housework

Fortunately, Bergeron has some suggestions to help women stay focused on their careers and avoid getting sidetracked by office housework. She explains that, because women are expected to be helpful, it’s easy for them to feel compelled to volunteer for these tasks. Indeed, other researchers have found that when an undesirable task is presented to a group of men and women, women volunteer twice as often as men, but only after it’s clear that no one else is going to step up.

Bergeron suggests resisting this temptation to volunteer from the start. “The first part is not to create those extra tasks for yourself initially, because then you’re setting the stage to get asked more,” she explains.

She also recommends that if someone asks you to take on an extra task, letting them know about your current workload helps them understand your situation. You might say, “I’m currently working on A, B and C—where should this new task fit in?” Asking the requester to prioritize the new task may prompt them to reconsider who should take it on.

Bergeron also advises against responding to requests immediately. When someone, especially a higher-up, asks for your help, it’s natural to want to say yes immediately. However, Bergeron says pausing gives you breathing room. It allows you to step back, consider your workload, reflect on your career goals, discuss it with a mentor and decide whether it’s something you should take on. It also gives the asker a moment to reflect on whether the request was essential or just something they asked impulsively.

Finally, if you do step up to help, Bergeron says not to brush it off with comments like “It was nothing” or “No big deal.” Instead, let people know it was a meaningful contribution that took time and effort.

How Organizations Can Make Office Housework Everyone’s Responsibility

Organizations also have a role to play in making this work more fairly distributed. First, they should ensure that no one volunteers women for these tasks without their consent. And they should refrain from focusing on women when there’s an undesirable task to be completed.

In one study of university professors, women reported receiving 378 new work activity requests over a four-week period, compared to 118 new work activity requests for men. If organizations informally track who is taking on these extra duties, perhaps in performance reviews, they can ensure that they are being distributed fairly.

Bergeron also highlights a common double standard: Men are often overly praised when they step in to help; research indicates that men are more likely than women to be rewarded for helping behaviors at work. As a result, she says her second piece of guidance for organizations is “not over-complimenting men who helped, because I felt like I saw that in every organization I was in.” Overly celebrating men for doing this work sends the message that it’s exceptional when men contribute, but expected when women do.

Ultimately, she urges organizations to consider the bigger picture. “If your organization requires a lot of employee heroics to get the job done, this may be a red flag that there are missing, inefficient or faulty roles, processes or systems,” she notes in the report.