People want to be successful. They thrive on being significant.
When an employee senses that they are no longer contributing value, retention efforts are powerless. The sun is setting.
You possess inherent dignity. Loss of dignity is intolerable. Consciously or not, you will fight to regain it, even if fighting means fleeing a current situation.
Successful CEOs know this.
It’s why they express gratitude.
I’ve learned from great leaders to cultivate a mindset of thankfulness. The benefits are amazing: Gratitude promotes emotional resilience, improves your sleep, reduces your stress, builds your immunity, releases dopamine, and enhances your decision-making.
But the best benefit of all, gratitude builds up those you care about the most.
Even The Thankful Miss A Critical Step
You are grateful. If you are like many, you are missing a critical step in expressing it.
“Thank you for…” comes first. You and I do this all the time. You recognize a contribution. You don’t want someone to be overlooked for what they did. You know that people want to be appreciated. You honor their success.
Yet, people thrive on being significant.
That’s where part two comes in.
The Why.
You tell someone how meaningful they are to you, how what they did matters.
I call it closing the loop.
Most of the time, when someone thanks you, it feels like when you download an app and you tap the Get button and the circle starts to form and you stare at it waiting for the loop to close. Only, and often, expressions of gratitude get stuck halfway through, and you are waiting for its completion.
You are so used to the typical thank you that you don’t even think about it, but you feel it; their gratitude feels incomplete. “Thank you.” “You're welcome.” That’s it?
Practice Full Loop Gratitude
Gratitude has two parts: For and Why.
A few examples:
Thank you for pushing hard to meet the deadline; you model the commitment we hope to see from others, and it matters to me that we are building a dedicated team.
Thank you for confronting my ideas in the last meeting; you helped me think better, and it matters to me that others know I am collaborative.
Thank you for your work on the presentation; you gave me just what I needed for the CEO and the CFO to understand what we are needing to do. Without your work, I would have lacked clarity. You give me confidence that we can be on the same page with them.
Make this a different Thanksgiving for you and those who are significant to you. You have time today and over the next few days:
- Pick three people you work with and practice the For and Why of gratitude. Draft it, and then communicate it.
- Practice this with your family or friends on Thanksgiving Day. Kick thankfulness up a notch. Watch the difference in reaction between the typical thank you and the full-circle gratitude.
Now think about this for yourself. What do you experience inside when you imagine someone going full-circle on you?
Greater motivation, right? Boost in confidence, yes?
The more you express gratitude for who people are, the more you will have to be thankful for in the future.
