A penny for your thoughts

Even before you rip off the wrapping, you already know what it is. Your wife reads your mind and quietly whispers:

“It is the thought that counts.”

With the ugliest tie ever, staring you in the face, you really find it difficult to hide your disappointment. You force a smile. It is only your children’s innocence that keeps them from noticing your over exaggerated gratitude for their ‘thoughtful’ gift. Deep inside though, you know you will not be seen dead in it. That tie should count itself lucky if it makes it to the school drop-off in the morning, after which it will be ripped off and parked under the driver's seat, from where it will be recovered for the grand entrance, when you arrive back home that evening.

Now, how does an ugly looking tie relate to anything in business, you may ask.

Glad you did.

Quite a lot actually. In our professional lives, we have been conditioned to gracefully accept mediocre increases and watered down rewards. The gap between those who perform extremely well, and those who hardly lift a finger, is often less than 3%.

It is the thought that counts, yes?

Actually not.

For you to make someone else feel really appreciated, you often need to go the extra mile. A single rose, on Valentine’s Day, says I thought of you. Forty roses, on any day, says I adore you.

We all need those moments in our lives, when we are offered the corner office in exchange for our cubicle; When we leave the office in the evening with our name on a badge on our uniform, only to arrive in the morning with it on the wall in the company foyer; When, from one month to the other, another zero gets added to the end of our salary.

You do not get people excited by giving them a 1% above average increase. There is a reason why people play the lottery, and it most definitely is not to double the money they spent on a ticket. Even with odds as low as 40 million to one, tickets are being bought, week after failing week, in anticipation of a life changing moment.

On a Tuesday morning in 2007, Nando's closed all its stores, and with twenty-two flights and 247 busses, ferried thousands of Nandocas (the name a Nando's employee goes by) from all over the world to The Dome in Northgate, Johannesburg, for its 20th birthday celebrations. Prior to that day, some of the staff had never left their hometowns, not to even mention, been on an aeroplane. ?For months, if not years after the event, you could not wipe the smiles off the faces of the Nando's staff, who served you in their stores. Just mentioning the day, was enough to bring a sparkle to their eyes, and put a jump in their steps.

On that day, Nando's could have opted for a tie, but somehow they knew:

To make it meaningful, you sometimes have to put a serious value to the thought.