How Does Leadership Gratitude Impact the Team?

Jun 11
Angela entered my office for her exit interview. This was probably going to end in a few tears and a hug. Angela had been with us for a couple years and she was absolutely phenomenal with her accounts. They all loved her and we loved having her on the team. But, she had an amazing career opportunity come up, which meant she would be leaving us. As much as we didn’t want to see her go, I encouraged her to take it. I wouldn’t let her pass this up.

When she entered my office and closed the door I noticed she was carrying a manila folder with her. After a great conversation full of smiles, she stood up to leave and finally lifted the mysterious folder. She said, “I want to show you something before I go.” She opened the folder and a stack of folded notes came falling out of her folder onto my desk.

Each note was written by me or another team member. Each note started with a two-word heading printed in bold at the top. It said, “I appreciate…” We had our printing vendor make up pads of paper with this heading for all of our employees. We simply asked them to leave notes for each other with specific examples of appreciation to express their gratitude.

As our eyes met again Angela said, “I want you to know I will never throw these away. All of these notes have lifted my spirits more than you will ever know. Thank you for everything!” Then, of course… as expected… the waterworks and the hug.

The Impact of Leadership Gratitude

I want to share something I’ve learned about gratitude in my career. Some leaders withhold thanks because they think gratitude effectiveness gets diluted by frequency. That’s not correct. It gets diluted when it’s not authentic.
"Leadership gratitude gets diluted from lack of authenticity, not increases in frequency."
-Russ Peterson Jr.
Erika Andersen points out in her article on gratitude that it can positively affect our mental, emotional, and your ability to achieve in life. Gratitude can keep us all focused on the positive aspects of our life when it’s way too easy to get drawn down into the negative pit of misery.

What Makes Gratitude Authentic?

Over the years of my career I’ve found you can deliver authentic gratitude in one simple word… specificity. Anyone can say “Thank you.” but it takes true empathy and authentic communication to give the specific reason why you are thankful. Here’s the interesting part, when I take the time to describe the specific reason why I’m grateful for someone, I am blessed with the feeling of gratitude.

Here are the three levels of gratitude I’ve seen expressed ranging from the least impact to the greatest. All three levels of gratitude show impact. Leaders should feel comfortable using all of them.

Level One Gratitude – Tell them!
This is where the leader expresses thanks with a few simple words. Just two simple words like “Thank you!” to someone can go a long way. This is something that never gets old if you’re receiving it. This is not only appreciated by the person receiving the thanks, but it makes them feel better knowing that you’ve noticed. They appreciate the gesture.
"Be grateful for what you have and stop complaining–it bores everybody else, does you no good, and doesn’t solve any problems."
-Zig Zigler
Level Two Gratitude – Tell them what you noticed
If you want to take your gratitude to the next level, tell them what they did to prompt your thanks. The more specific your recollection of their actions, the more impact it will have on them. From a follower’s perspective, this shows the leader cares. The leader is engaged with the team and is noticing what the team members do.
"As we express our gratitude, we must never forget that the highest appreciation is not to utter words, but to live by them."
-John F. Kennedy
Level Three Gratitude – Tell them the effect it had on you
The highest level of gratitude I've seen from a leader is when they take it one step further and describe the impact.  This could be a business impact, like a resulting higher customer satisfaction rating or a higher sales number for the quarter.  But, it can also be expressed in personal terms of emotion.  I've seen some of the best leaders in my career tap into this level of gratitude by sharing the personal impact of someone's actions.  When a leader expresses thanks by telling you how they were personally affected by watching you handle a situation... you feel appreciated!

What can we do?

This week, take a moment to think about the people in your life who deserve gratitude.Then, after you've made a list of these people, write down a specific example of what they did for you including the impact it had on you.

I encourage you to hand write these specific examples in a note and send them to each individual. If you want to truly have an impact on someone'e life, take the time to hand write a specific note to someone on your team or someone in your life.  It can truly change their direction and momentum! 

Thank you for being a part of this small leadership community.  I'm grateful for you!

Russ