In these days and age, some individuals claim that competitiveness at work and school is effective while others argue that cooperation should be more encouraged rather than competing against each other. From my perspective, both of these views have their points that I will discuss in this essay.
On the one hand, competing in workplaces or school environments can enhance people’s productivity. In fact, in some developed countries such as China or Japan, many companies have hierarchical systems that encourage workers to devote harder to their work. Moreover, several studies have shown that people are more likely to try performing better when seeing their colleagues or schoolmates succeed in embracing higher job positions or achieving well-done academic performances. Therefore, in a positive view, competition at work, or school can help people to try harder to achieve goals, which is beneficial for both their personal and professional development.
On the other hand, cooperating should be encouraged more than competing since it could be more advantageous for human mental health. There have been different studies pointed out that a major group of people tends to become depressed when facing competitiveness in work or study environments, especially young students since they are not grown-up enough to deal with those stressful problems. For instance, there is a significant entering university test in Korea, which has a major impact on students’ future lives, especially job careers. Many students have chosen death since they could not stand the challenge and pressure from their parents and school, which raised warnings about the consequences of stressful competition. Conversely, education systems in Eastern countries focus on cooperating, which results in better mental health for the children and puts little pressure on their academic performance, the working aspect is no exception.
In conclusion, each point has its benefits and drawbacks, mainly about mental health. Hence, people need to balance between competing and cooperating in order to have the most effective results in professionals and studies.