Relearn How To Give Feedback And Praise

Isn’t is easy to give someone praise? Turns out, no. Most of us are doing more harm than good on our employees self-esteem, not to mention the short-term and long-term productivity for the individual and the company when we tell Joe, “Great work,” or Martha “Congratulations,” or Sam, “Thanks – I appreciate what you did”.

This is important because both the individual’s success and the organization’s success is largely determined by how productive, creative and loyal employees are. Productivity and creativity usually mean more market relevance, fewer mistakes and happier customers and higher sales while more loyal employees usually mean lower hiring, lower retraining costs and less lost opportunity.

It’s supposed to be easy and motivating to shower our employees or our coworkers with praise. But it seems many of us are managing to do feedback and praise at work all wrong with potentially terrible impact on self-esteem, not to mention the short-term and long-term productivity for the individual and the company.

This is important because an organization’s success is largely determined by how driven, productive and creative employees are. This is strongly associated with how proud employees feel about their contribution (effort + talent), and the impact their work has. And, a person’s pride is largely impacted by how they receive feedback and praise.

The first thing to know about how feedback and praise are used in the workplace is there are two important channels to deliver praise:

1. Effort-based versus Person-based
2. Specific-based versus General-based

While this also impacts how we share feedback and praise with our children, I’m only going to focus on how feedback and praise are used in the workplace and let you translate how you help your friends and family become smart, resilient people.

Effort-Based Praise versus Person-Based Praise

Effort-based praise reinforces self-awareness and feelings of self-worth and pride in how we work. When we use effort-based praise we help people learn there is great value in how hard they work, or in other words, their dedication and persistence. Effort-based praise may sound something like, “Thank you Bruce, you did lots of research and one-on-one interviews to understand the unique goals and needs of this prospect.” In this case, even if Bruce didn’t land a new client, he can take pride and the joy in the work he did. In addition, using this example Bruce has the opportunity to reflect on what he learned and how he might use this knowledge in the future. He can even look positively on the relationships he built during the project.

Effort-based praise is especially important for people learning new skills because it inspires them to learn from their mistakes and move on – to not give up. Individuals learn to believe in a Growth-mindset, which means they realize their ability can increase with effort and practice.

In contrast, person-based praise reinforces an individual’s natural or existing skills, talents or abilities over effort. This is harmful to short-term and long-term success because peopleare more likely to give up when they experience a challenge. They are also more likely to see setback as a failure versus individuals whose effort is praised. Person-based praise may sound something like, “You have a way with words and are a natural public speaker.” Person-based praise tends to train people to believe their intelligence and/or natural ability is fixed (Fixed-mindset). The old saying ‘if at first you don’t succeed, try try again’ may only frustrate them because trying again would be a waste of time.

Unfortunately, most of us have learned to praise people for their natural ability, not their effort.

Other examples of less-effective Person-based praise and language a leader might use versus Effort-based praise are:

• “You are our smartest lawyer.” versus the better “You spend a lot of time researching cases and exploring options.”
• “You are our top salesperson.” versus the better “You work well with the team and to find creative solutions.”

Specific-Based Praise versus General-Based Praise

Specific-based praise builds greater commitment by pointing out and reinforcing the exact behaviour or actions an employee or team is doing that you want repeated. Specific-based praise creates sustainable results. Specific-based praise may sound something like, "You shared important suggestions about how to streamline proposal writing in the sales meeting." How can you get into the habit of giving Specific-based praise? First, identify the behaviours you want to encourage. Your corporate values and mission statement are good places to start. Then, when you see those behaviours be sure you point them out. Side suggestion: Are your corporate values and mission listed in your offices and/or meeting rooms as reminders?

General-base praise is often better than nothing, unfortunately it leaves space for interpretation and therefore potentially miscommunication and even instances where you may inadvertently reward behavior you don’t want. Furthermore, your employee may interpret this general comment as insincere and feel demotivated by it (Yikes). General-based praise may sound something like, “Good Job!” or “Thank You!”. While thesemay seem like appropriate ways to be supportive, unfortunately, this general language doesn’t clearly define the exact behaviour or actions. Instead of saying “Good job!”consider:

• “I respect how you kept trying without giving up.”
• "You kept cool and stayed focused during that difficult conversation.”

Conclusion:

How leaders provide feedback and praise plays an important role in determining if a person and/or a team embrace a growth mindset or a fixed mindset and the honour they show in their work. In the end, both Effort-based praise and Specific-based praise help create a more positive and productive workplace where employees are proud of their work. When people feel proud of their work their natural motivation flourishes. Once leaders learn how to use these two ways to give praise and feedback, they will also learn they take the least amount of effort (and expense) withthe greatest possible impact.

We hope you enjoyed this post.

 Conclusion

Why does this all work?

Because employees who are engaged (involved in the goals, timing and decisions surrounding their work) are far more motivated to push toward their success and the success of the organization. Successful organizations give their employees the opportunity to feel what it’s like to have their voices heard and to know they contribute to the corporate strategy and success.