Monday, May 22, 2017
APPRECITIVE
ACTION
It is easy to ridicule other people. It is easy to
kill dreams of people with mere words. Words are more powerful for they can
tear hope into threads, turn optimism into despondency and completely alter the
path of our dreams. No matter the circumstances, nothing rises people up and
moves them up the ladder than appreciative action. This is the ability to look
at small small achievements in people, praise those achievements to inspire
them to take on bigger challenges responsibly.
More than often, people least appreciate others.
When people have failed, that is broadcasted through all media and becomes talk
of town. Our minds have become so negative such that we are happy with negative
stories than positives. Media headlines attract attention when they are
portraying negatives. It is as if in life we have nothing positive to share
Appreciating even a slight achievement in somebody
is a great catalyst for igniting passion in the appreciated person to work hard
and achieve more. It is imperative therefore that we become builders and not
breakers. It is counterproductive to be undermining others than to recognise
their strengths and spur them to move on. Chances of success are higher in a
family or institution that has a culture of appreciation.
It is a human instinct to cherish praise or
appreciation. A Gallup Organisation survey shows that the number one reason
employees leave an organization is that they do not feel appreciated by their
supervisors. Yet, most managers give away neither praise nor appreciation
because they think it makes them look inferior.
Here is the thing, as teaches leadership guru Robin
Sharma, giving praise to all those around you, when they most deserve it, makes
you look like more. It elevates you. It makes you look like a hero. It makes
you look like a giant within the workplace. To everyone around you. So do not
withhold what your teammates most crave. We all want to feel special.
As leaders in any capacity, we have to embrace and
foster a supportive, engaging and uplifting culture. Appreciation leads to hope
and people need hope. Napoleon well explains that leaders are dealers in hope.
Tony Dovale adds: ‘build hope. Build a space where people can be happy. Build a
vision of possibility.’
Encouragement takes
people beyond unimaginable challenges. At one point an experiment was conducted
to measure people’s capacity to endure pain. The test was to see how long a
barefooted person could stand in a bucket of ice water. It was discovered that
when there was someone else present offering encouragement and support, the
person standing in
the ice water could tolerate pain twice as long as when no one was present. Again, encouragement keeps us going, no matter the adversity that faces us.
the ice water could tolerate pain twice as long as when no one was present. Again, encouragement keeps us going, no matter the adversity that faces us.
Be Ronald Regan. Reagan radiated hope. It was the
mainspring of his life, and in 1980 he shared that hope with a nation that had
been battered by the Vietnam war and the Iranian hostage affair, as well as
economic malaise. He pointed out America’s virtues and made people feel good
about those virtues and about themselves. The early years of his presidency
were not that successful; the economy did not begin to rebound until 1982, and
its effect was not immediately apparent. He also radiated that sense of hope to
other nations, in particular to Eastern Europe.
Extraordinary
motivational speaker John Maxwell lectures, ‘psychologists say that, deep down,
all people have certain desires in common. If you want to encourage people,
help them fulfill these most basic, heartfelt desires. People want to: do the
right thing. Stand with them. find better ways of doing things.
Empower them. achieve things they can be proud of. Motivate
them. belong to a group that achieves the extraordinary .Invite
them. earn recognition for who they are and what they achieve. Honor
them.
Be the instrument of building strong characters for success in people.
