Steven Robbins here. Welcome to the Get It Done guys quick and dirty tips to work less and do more.

Today's topic is dealing with coworkers who give too much advice. Spike wrote in, how do you deal with

co-workers who are, shall we say, enthusiastic with their advice? My coworker is competent and nice, but if she has her way, I'll be her personal assistant

before long. I need her on my side, but this could get out of hand fast. I'm looking for

advice dealing with co-worker relations specifically. Thanks for writing, Spike. I loved you on

Buffy the Vampire Slayer. I'm glad you listened to the episode on saying no,

because no matter what else you do, saying no will be a big part of dealing with this control freak.

Stay calm. It sounds like you're afraid that rejecting her advice will upset her, and she'll come

after you with rubber gloves, a chainsaw, and a snack-size-z-z-block baggie for your remains.

If the threat of her anger can't get you to

knuckle down and become her administrative love slave, you getting angry won't solve things either.

Understand her motivation. When someone does stuff that bugs us, we usually have a theory

about their motives. The closer we are to someone, the more our theories resemble a horror

film. When a complete stranger suggests we wash our hands

after handling raw chicken, we think,

how nice, they're concerned about our health.

When our schmoopee-whoopi suggests we change our shirt

before a nice evening out, we think,

That evil Satan's spawn is just trying to assert their power,

destroy my humanity,

and force me to subjugate myself to their will forever.

From your description, it sounds like you two are already quite close.

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