The belief where management feels that the paycheck is the thanks for the work done still sadly exists in some companies. A paycheck is not a thank you, but rather the other half of a contract completed. We know that pay is number 5 or 6 on the list of what motivates employees, so if it comes down to money, then your company must not be creating many other positive reasons to work there. Consider a low cost alternative: Praising a job well done.

Why We Don’t Offer More Praise

Human nature works against praise and thanks in the work place. We tend to take the good for granted and complain about the bad. A reporter once wrote an article on modern day dreams. He interviewed many local people with some status in the community but when it had a happy ending the editor failed to print it. When the reporter asked why, he said, “I didn’t think you’d come up with a happy story. By our nature reporters are ambulance chasers. I thought it would be a negative story about nobody fulfilling their dreams.” That’s what’s of interest to their readers?

If we believe the expression, “You get what you send,” then it’s no wonder managers fail to praise employees. Often managers themselves hear praise far too rarely. Praising people for doing something right starts at the top of the management team. Even a common courtesy such as thanking people for doing a good job seems beyond us some days.

If you think that offering praise will make people soft and perform at a lower level, or that praise will not generate a significant savings in time, ask yourself which is easier: praising people when things are going well so they continue to do well, or confronting them when things aren’t going well? You’ll find that the time and energy required to confront problems is multiplied 100 fold. The stress associated with dealing with problems is much less attractive than the good feelings generated by positive reinforcement.

Praising people simply for doing what they’re being paid to do then, is like a salmon swimming up stream: It’s difficult to do and especially difficult to continue doing. It’s like we need to go to a leadership seminar regularly to remind ourselves to continue praising employees. But even that strategy wouldn’t work in the long term. What we have to do is to build praising our employees into our nature.

Building the Habit of Praise

• Recognize that changing your perspective to see positive performance may go against your past habits. Changing this may not be as difficult as quitting smoking, but it is still a significant challenge.

• Incorporate praise and recognition into your life at home and at work. In other words, start finding things about your friends and family where you can compliment, praise and thank them for who they are and what they do.

• Play a game. For every one complaint or fault you discover, force yourself to find three positive things.

• Build a desire for human connectedness in your life and this will manifest as a caring persona your employees will recognize as a caring human being. They’ll work harder for you. The old adage, you catch more flies with honey is true in this instance.

• Comment on positive things, not sparingly, but excessively.

• Show appreciation in tangible ways: buy lunch, give company tickets to games. Remember to give them things they need to hear, see or touch. Create a pin program for people who do something right.

• Be conscious of the change you want to have.

• Praise your boss when he gets something right. If you don’t like the boss waffling when making decisions, compliment him when he does make a decision quickly. This will encourage him to do more of the same so he can hear more compliments.

• Encourage your team to praise the people they supervise.

• Remember to praise and thank in a genuine manner. One sarcastic comment can poison the entire process.