Appreciation
Do you want to know why small gestures of appreciation work so well? Because they rarely happen.
In the book The Way We’re Working Isn’t Working, the author Tony Schwartz talks about the incredible value of appreciation.
In one study, researchers found that giving a small gift of candy to medical residents improved the speed and accuracy of their diagnoses. Another study found that a 10 percent increase in something called “motivating language” from leaders boosted worker satisfaction by 10 percent and performance by 2 percent. The neuroanatomist Jill Bolte Taylor came to believe that positive encouragement lay at the heart of her recovery from a stroke that nearly killed her. “I needed those around me to be encouraging,” she wrote. “I needed to know that I still had value. I needed to have dreams to work toward. I needed people to celebrate the triumphs I made every day because my successes, no matter how small, inspired me.” Every leader would do well to heed Taylor’s prescription. (167)
You could change someone’s day by something as simple as a handwritten note. You could have a life-changing habit if you set aside one hour a week to write notes.
