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Working for the elusive pat on the back |
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Written by Sheila Norman-Culp, asap
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Tuesday, 01 May 2007 |
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Is it just me or is the modern workplace largely devoid of praise?
You certainly hear about it when someone thinks you’ve screwed up, or thinks you are not working hard enough, or thinks you are not talented enough.
Every time you come in late, have to leave early, make a personal phone call — that appears to stick in your employer’s mind like egg to a car windshield. Do a great job day in and day out, well, that’s just part of the landscape, letting him or her put out the wildfire someplace else.
The paucity of pats on the back can certainly be galling. But perhaps we are not thinking about positive comments in the right way. Here are some pointers for getting a healthy grasp on praise.
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TOO DEPENDENT ON WHAT OTHERS THINK
From a gold star in first grade to A’s in high school to college GPAs that run into the hundredths, we have been conditioned for years to seek outside approval. This works pretty well if you are the smartest, the most talented, the most athletic — constant praise for a decade or so does wonders for the ego.
For the rest of us, outside praise comes much more sparingly. If we are going to develop a healthy feeling of self-worth we need to be loved by our own families and be able to tote up our own achievements, even if they don’t make the local news.
So what if you aren’t an Olympic athlete and are not on track to become a Supreme Court justice? The vast majority of the world isn’t either. Those super-achievers will have their own trials to come, trying not to become basket cases when their rivers of admiration dry up. You need to concentrate on creating your own river of self-praise that will support you in the long run.
Some experts feel we need to stop being so emotionally dependent on praise from others.
“Humans have a need for recognition from others, but it becomes unhealthy when you rely too much on what YOU THINK others think about you,” Dr. Patrick J. Cohn, founder of Peak Performance Sports of Orlando, Fla., tells athletes trying to toughen up their mental outlook.
It’s time to stop defining ourselves by our job or how outwardly successful we are, he says. We need to know in our own hearts that we are doing a fine job and take satisfaction from that.
“(You must) define yourself as a person first,” Cohn explains. Only then can you find unconditional self-respect, which frees you of the burden of feeling you must live up to everyone else’s expectations.
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PRAISE IS NOT FOR MAKING FRIENDS
Supervisors need to understand that praise is a tool with a specific goal — to increase morale and productivity, according to Gary Vikesland at Employer-Employee.com.
“The purpose is not to get employees to like you, or to make the employee with a bad haircut feel better. Praise is not the same as a compliment,” he writes.
It goes without saying you need to be specific and sincere. Who can’t smell phoney praise a mile away? And praise that is too vague makes you wonder if the boss really did read your report.
Give too much praise and you sound as vapid as Paula Abdul on “American Idol.” (Do we really think any contestant is waiting to hear what she has to say?) Too little praise and employees are already bitter before they finally do hear something positive.
New employees and younger workers need more praise than others because they need more overall guidance anyway, Vikesland notes.
Younger employees who have been raised in the “self-esteem era” where every normal accomplishment was praised to the high heavens might be in for a shock when it comes to the realities of a competitive workplace.
In a recent study, Jean Twenge, an associate psychology professor at San Diego State University, found that 30 percent more college students in 2006 showed “elevated narcissism” compared with students in 1982. Twenge, who also wrote the book “Generation Me,” suggests that those who are narcissistic in their youth are more likely to have problems as adults with relationships at work and at home.
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TOOT THAT HORN AND PRAISE YOURSELF
Okay, so you have freed yourself of being so dependent on other’s comments — but that does not mean you should be content with NO praise coming your way. Maybe your boss is just clueless, distracted or too stressed to know what to praise about you.
Time to slip them a cheat sheet.
“Sometimes being the best employee isn’t enough to get you noticed. It’s time to take matters into your own hands and let your managers know what they are missing,” advises Melissa Dylan at workplaceculture.suite101.com.
The best way to do that, she says, is to make sure your bosses know how happy clients/customers are with you.
“Next time one of them drops an e-mail or note thanking you for your extra effort, make sure a copy goes to your manager,” Dylan writes.
Absent a cache of fan mail, workers need to spell it out for the boss. Maybe your project was finished ahead of time, needed less funding than predicted, solved more issues than the original problem, was cited in industry trade magazines. It certainly furthered the company’s main goal of XYZ this year, didn’t it?
Make sure while you are doing this to praise all colleagues who helped to get this near-impossible task done so that you don’t overstate your input (Remember Al Gore and the Internet claim?). Sharing credit also shows what a team player you are.
And if that pat on the back comes with a raise, so be it. There still will be plenty of other times when your sterling efforts are overlooked.
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asap contributor Sheila Norman-Culp is not a new worker or a young one but she still wants some praise sometimes. Her “new mail” folder is looking pretty bare. | Only registered users can write comments.
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