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When you fail to get what you're hoping for, rather than ever consider that it might be because you didn't make your needs known, you start rationalizing. Perhaps, you think, it wasn't within the power of your boss to reward you (budget cuts, top management said to hire an outside person, etc.). Or, you worry, you've overestimated people's respect for your work. Or maybe office politics did you in.

Of course, one of these points could be true. But there's every chance none of them are. Your boss may be very pleased with your performance and have the power (and money) to reward you. The only reason he didn't give you what you wanted is that you didn't ask for it.

Now, it's easy to understand why the squeaky wheel gets the grease on a bicycle, but aren't most bosses smarter than that? Isn't it in their best interest to reward the most productive people rather than those with the loudest voices? Of course it's in their interest, but much of the time there are other factors overriding their common sense.

A boss may be stingy. He may be lazy. He may be preoccupied. He may be afraid of upsetting the apple cart of the department by rewarding one person rather than another He may not realize that you're hungry for a particular reward— or he may have selfishly let events convince him you're not, so that he doesn't have to act. Another interesting force that may be at work: He may not like having to worry about your needs. “Sometimes even good bosses don't like being in the role of caretaker, of having to look out for your interests,” says psychotherapist Marjorie Lapp. “They're much more comfortable dealing with someone who seems responsible for her own destiny.”

Asking is the only sure way to get around any of these problems. If your boss is stingy, lazy, or worried about office dynamics, your asking compels him to consider for the first time that there could be consequences to his passiveness (you could get restless and leave), and he will be forced to take some action. If your boss thinks you aren't hungry for more, you will dazzle him by declaring what you want. If he is preoccupied, this will be his wake-up call.

There is, of course, the chance that your boss really doesn't have it in his power to give or doesn't think you deserve it. But asking can serve you beautifully there as well. If your boss admits that he can't give you money because of budget restrictions, you can negotiate for a better title. If he says you haven't earned a promotion or an assignment, you have the opportunity to explore the perception problems that are hindering your growth.

Now, there will be times in your work life when your boss unexpectedly gives you a bonus, a raise, a promotion, or even a junket to the Maui Sheraton without your ever having had to utter a peep. But consider these fluke occurrences, and do not allow them to lure you into an if-I'm-patient-it-will-come-to-me way of thinking. In fact, when you get handed a surprise perk, consider it a sign that you may not have been asking for enough lately and your boss feels guilty. The motto you should live by: I must ask for everything.

I got my big lesson in being a squeaky wheel when I was the editor-in-chief of Working Woman. I like to call it my $50,000 moment of truth.

One of the reasons I took the job at Working Woman was that the owner of the company offered me, in addition to my salary, equity in the operation. At last, I told myself, this is my chance to make some major bucks. I was supposed to receive all the necessary paperwork the week before I started, but despite numerous calls to his office and his lawyer's office, it hadn't arrived by the time I plunked down at my desk on Day One. If I hadn't been such a chump, I wouldn't even have shown up, but my good-girl gland was obviously secreting. Each time I called about the equity papers, I was told that the lawyers were sitting on them. I soon got immersed in the job, and at my six-month anniversary, I realized I still hadn't heard a thing.

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