Engage Your Team with (this kind of) Appreciation

Are you a team leader?

If your team feels somewhat disengaged, read on for a practical tip.

GALLUP′s Employee Engagement Report found that around 64% of employees are not engaged. That comes with a high cost. ??

People feel demotivated and less productive at work. ??

Remember that engagement is an emotion!

If you want your people to feel engaged, you want them to feel a specific emotion that leads to high performance.

In order to create an emotion or behavior, first, you need to understand the human needs that triggered that emotion or behavior.

To help you with this I created a simple, but research and evidence-based approach... the GAAP? model.

To spark employee engagement at work you need to attend to four main needs in your interactions with each team member.

Today we focus on one of the most important:

? APPRECIATION

According to O.C. Tanner, 79% of employees who quit their jobs cite a lack of appreciation as a key reason for leaving.

In a global study of more than 200,000 workers by the Boston Consulting Group, the most important factor in feeling good at work was...

1?? Feeling APPRECIATED!

You might have guessed it would be... an attractive fixed salary.

But guess what... a good salary was only number eight on that list!

Millions of employees all around the world say or think: "I don′t feel valued at work."

This is a silent engagement killer.

So what can YOU do as a Leader to spark engagement through Appreciation inside your team?

Don′t just say "thank you" ?? or "good job!".

Shallow praise or recognition doesn't really work, sometimes it can even make things worse because people might think that you don′t mean it or you just say it to everyone.

Really go deeper on the way you appreciate them. Communicate not just what they have done right, but also the positive impact of their effort and talent on the team and company results.

For example:

"Hey Anna, I really appreciated that you helped John with his project, even though you didn′t have to. He was struggling to deliver it on time, and together you made it work. Those are the crucial details that make our team be amazing! I also felt relieved because I had a lot of pressure on me also."

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Can you make this appreciation statement better?

Post in the comments, an example of how would you say it, to improve it.

This way you can add value to this conversation and help others.

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Appreciation is more than just recognition, sincere appreciation goes deeper into human connection.

When done right, communicating sincere appreciation creates empathy, connection, and engagement inside your team.

The results are higher staff retention, productivity, and profitability.??

...and of course, higher wellbeing. :)

Saying thank you is important, next time, try to communicate appreciation on a deeper level.

What do YOU think about this topic?

? Share in the comments if you agree that Appreciation is really important in the workplace.