
Gratitude increases engagement, but only if you’re doing it right
It’s well-known that displaying gratitude for your team members’ hard work is a powerful way to increase engagement, but there’s a lot more to gratitude than just saying ‘thanks’.
Engagement is an issue that’s shown up in the last few programmes I’ve facilitated with leaders, who have shared how they’re struggling with a lack of engagement with their teams. So we started to define what engagement meant, and look at the various elements of engagement.
One of the elements we focused on was gratitude with one leader sharing how she made the effort to thank her team daily but wasn’t noticing any change in motivation or engagement. She, therefore, struggled to see how gratitude played a part in improving relationships or engaging with her team.
Saying “thanks” isn’t enough
As a coach, the best way I can help is to encourage a leader to reflect on their own behaviour and leadership practice, so we dug a little deeper and acted out the scene of how my client expressed her gratitude.
We started with a ‘team member’ walking past the leader and making a comment similar to ‘bye’ or ‘enjoy your evening’. This prompted the leader to say, “thanks for today, really appreciate it”.
As a group, we shared our thoughts on how the team member may have felt, and whether we felt it would change their motivation or engagement at all.
I could certainly relate to this interaction; I remember being in a job where I didn’t have any contact with my Head of Service all day. I went into work, delivered what was expected, interacted positively with people, and on my way home, I’d walk past her office, and await her first words of the day: ‘Thanks Andrea!’
As I walked away, I would utter sarcastically in my mind, “Thanks for what? You have no idea what I’ve done today, how I engaged with people, or how I added value.”
This might seem like a negative attitude to have, but I felt it was in response to a meaningless thanks.
The group explored what this meant for both the leaders and team members, which led to a realisation that a surface level thanks was merely that; a surface level thanks with no meaning or depth.
What are you thanking them for?
To encourage the leader to start thinking about how to turn things around, we explored how she might express her gratitude in a heartfelt and authentic way.
Rather than offering a surface level, “Thanks for today,” we looked at how a leader can share what they are specifically grateful for; for example, the effort a team member put into a task, how they interacted with someone, how they resolved an issue, how they helped someone, how they contributed to a project, or how their work impacted on the leader, customers or other members of the team.
We then looked at the benefits of being specific with an authentic thanks, and how this was more important than how often you showed gratitude.
We explored how adapting your gratitude was essential, and how showing a thought-out, authentic thanks was more important than a habitual surface-level thanks every day.
So showing gratitude is important, but it will only increase engagement if you take care to acknowledge what a team member is doing well. However, when you switch from a generalised thanks to considered, authentic gratitude, you’ll find it helps to build trust and appreciation and leads to a stronger, more engaged team.
How do you show your gratitude to your team?
Being grateful is an essential part of being a leader because it helps you focus on the positives in stressful times. For this and 9 more ideas for how to be a more effective leader by taking care of yourself, download my free guide today.
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