Praise Team Members Publicly

How important is it to praise the performance of your team members? If you want to turn a mediocre team into a magnificent one, it is essential!

 

Everyone wants recognition for their hard work. From the moment we are born we are striving for recognition from our parents, a friend, a teacher, and eventually our employer and colleagues. To receive recognition means we have value as a person, and this makes us feel good about ourselves, which re-enforces our continued efforts of achievement.

 

The web is full of “I hate my boss” web sites, where frustrated employees spend countless hours complaining about their bosses, and offering suggestions about how they would handle issues. Interestingly, most people are looking for appreciation of their work, recognition of a job well done, followed closely by communication, and job security in third place, while money or compensation is relatively low on the list.

 

The interesting part is that all three of the top issues that employees want are intricately related. Public recognition in its self communicates to the individual was well as the whole team that they have value, and you appreciate them. This in tern gives the person being recognized as well as the whole team, the feeling that their job is secure.

 

Even the most troublesome team member will respond well to public praise, and in many cases can cause the team member to continue to improve, becoming a valuable team member.

 

Using a term barrowed from marketing called perception-preceding-reality, I have seen team members that otherwise would have been terminated, make a complete behavioral turn around. While the roots of this concept are primarily from marketing, it is an excellent term to describe a method for altering a team member’s behavior who is not always a team player.

 

By taking the time to seek out actions and behaviors of border line team members, that you can praise publicly you will effectively re-enforce positive behavior in that employee. This re-enforcement will play to the employees self esteem, and with time positive behavior will dominate his actions.

 

The idea is that the positive feedback will re-enforce positive behavior, as well as the team member’s transition to being a team player, which will ultimately catch up with the perception.

 

Mary Kay ash, the founder of Mary Kay Cosmetics once said, “There are two things people want more than sex and money, and they are recognition and praise.”

 

Before you run out and start praising your team for every little thing they do, take care in what you praise and how often. Praise works best in moderation, so use it sparingly. If you start praising every little thing, eventually your praise becomes nothing more than an annoyance, as your team will quickly see that the praise is not sincere.

 

Employees need praise, like plants need sunlight. Just like a tree spreads its branches to absorb more sunlight, without praise, your employees will leave in search of praise.

The Fear of Success

Once again we find ourselves at the beginning of a new year. Some of you may have made a New Year resolution, others may still be deciding. You may be planning to give up smoking, r lose weight, or start that new business you’ve been planning.

Unfortunately, ninety percent of New Years resolutions are never realized. Not because you didn’t make a plan, but because of “fear of success” of those plans.

Home many times have you planned to lose weight, find a new job, or possibly start your own business? You begin making bigger than life plans taking into consideration every known detail. You may go so far as to draft a winning business plan, research the numerous available diet plans, or check the various online job posting boards.

Once you have completed your plans, you revise them, refine them and constantly improve on them. You do this over and over thinking just one more draft and it will be perfect, and you can get started on achieving your goal.

Before long it’s been a year, then two years and before you know it your well and meticulously planned goals have not yet begun the execution phase. You started with the best intentions and your path was clear but you lacked the focus.

You’re not afraid of failure or rejection, and you have a foolproof plan that consists of many interesting challenges, but the truth of the matter is you are unable to turn your plans into reality. This often happens with long-term goals that require long term calls to action, like losing weight or transitioning to start a new business.

This is one area of planning that people never take into consideration while drafting their plans. What will happen if you succeed? Forget about what you hope will happen or what you fear may happen, and consider what may happen once you have achieved your goal and your plans are now a reality.

It is rare that a goal is perfect and has no downside. Success requires change, and with it comes both positive and negative consequences. Often people claim they want to succeed at something, but the reality is that the negative aspects of the execution outweigh the positives experienced from achieving the goal.

To overcome this problem you need to examine the negatives and systematically resolve them, or at least come to terms with them by accepting them.

It may be fun and exciting to focus on the positive aspects of your goal, but don’t forget to take a survey of the darker aspects and accept that you will have to deal with them as well. Sometimes just knowing in advance that you have a plan to handle any negative issues can make all the difference.

Unlike fear of failure or fear of rejection, fear of success can be far more insidious because it is almost always unconscious. However it’s not fear of success itself that is the issue but fear of the side effects of success, many of which may be unwanted.

Fears that are never evaluated have a tendency to grow with age. When you avoid something you fear, even subconsciously, you reinforce the avoidance behavior. As a result of your hidden fear of success, you reinforce the habit of procrastination. As time goes by it becomes harder and harder to stay focused on making your plans a reality.

The interesting thing about these types of fear is that they have a tendency to shrink under direct examination, making it easier to take action. An added benefit of examining your fear of success is that you can deal with the issues you can identify.

One major issue many people have with making their plan a reality is the fact that they may have to leave the security of their current job. The comfort of getting that paycheck on a regular basis can be a very difficult hurdle to overcome and can sabotage their efforts.

Left unchallenged, the simplest problem can be enough to subconsciously sabotage your goals. By examining the situation consciously and planning ahead to deal with obstacles, you can provide your subconscious the comfort needed to make your goals a reality.

Your subconscious is one of your closest allies. It keeps you grounded and attempts to keep you from making mistakes. But you need to question it from time to time to determine why you are not reaching your goals. Treat it as the not-so-silent partner it is by answering its questions and make it comfortable with your goals.

The Decline of the Authority Figure

In the early days of television authority figures were shown in a positive manner. Parental figures like Ward Clever in Leave it to Beaver, or Robert Young in Father Knows Best, always had a wise word for any situation. Parents were portrayed as respected authority figures, even “The Fonz” on Happy Days had respect for Mr. Cunningham, and was quick to enforce respect for others.

 

This portrayal of respect was reflected in the home life in the fifties and sixties as well. I clearly remember making sure my toys where put away and I was bathed and dressed appropriately before my father returned home from work.

 

I grew up with clearly defined rules that governed my behavior when dealing with adults. To me, the rules were obvious and, in turn, demonstrated that I had respect for those I was speaking to. Simple rules like “Never address an adult by their first name” or “Always hold the door open for a lady” are common courtesies that to this day are engrained in me to the point that I find it difficult to address any authority figure by their first name, even when they instruct me to do so.

 

But something happened along the way. Television started to make authority figures the brunt of jokes. Kelsy Grammer as Frasier is portrayed as a respected psychologist, yet is continually ridiculed and continues to make a fool of himself; even Ray Ramano in Everyone Loves Raymond, is the brunt of nearly every joke.

 

It gets even worse. Shows such as the Simpson’s mock every authority figure possible, and disguise their disrespect for authority figures as harmless cartoons. But the message these shows send are far from harmless.

 

If authority figure bashing on television isn’t enough, there is still Gangsta Rap for today’s impressionable minds to absorb, as they glorify prostitution, rape, and encourage the killing of police officers.

 

If you still have not had your fill of showing your disrespect for authority, you can play any number of video games where you can experience a high speed chase as you show your disrespect for the police, or use your arsenal of virtual weapons to kill as many authority figures as possible, not to mention the extra points for committing other various acts of violence.

 

I find it amazing and tragic to see how society has de-evolved to the level that it has. There is hope, but it will take some drastic measures. We can turn our society around and set it on a course of prosperity once again, but we all have to do our part.

 

When you examine the games, music and videos that our society has created for entertainment, it’s not that unusual that real life events are mimicking our entertainment.

 

In the fifties, children watched westerns like Wild Bill Hickok, or Roy Rogers and Dale Evans for entertainment, and then went outside to emulate these heroes. In the sixties there was Zorro, Spiderman, and Batman and Robin, and again children emulated these superheroes in their play.

 

It isn’t unusual that today’s children who play violent video games, listen to music which glorifies rape and murder, and watch television shows that demonstrate a total lack of respect for authority figures, will emulate these action in their real life, just as children have done in the past.

 

Parents must take responsibility for their children’s actions and take back control of the household from over indulged children that have rarely heard the word “NO”. Parents must place limits on the amount of television and video games children play, and understand that children do not have the cognitive abilities to differentiate fantasy from reality, especially when they have been immersed in a world of violence from television and video games.

 

A great place to start is by monitoring and limiting the amount of time children spend on-line “socializing” with their friends. I’m sorry but chatting on-line with a friend from school, or worse an unknown child predator, is not socializing and is not a skill that will build confidence and self-respect.

 

If you want your children to be successful in school, in work and in life, you need to understand the habits that contribute to that success. Self-respect and self-discipline are the keys to that success, and they can not simply be turned on when required. In fact the longer you take to develop these skills in your children the longer and harder it will be for them to develop them.

 

There are countless ways of attaining greatness, but to live a quality life filled with success requires a solid foundation based on respect.

Spelling and the Florida FCAT

When I was a child in school we paid attention, learned our lessons and took tests. Those test counted towards our grade. In the middle of the year we took mid term tests and the end of the year we took finals. The scores of these test along with the scores on our class work, and home work resulted in our final grade which determined if we passed or failed the class.

If we passed, we moved on to the next grade, if we failed, we had to option of summer school to make up the grade and achieve a passing grade.

Today’s FCAT in my opinion is noting more that a government method of providing an excuse to school leaders and teachers to shrug off the blame for failure on the student rather than the teacher.

Schools today have shifted from teaching students how to read, write and spell to how to pass the FCAT. This reality has never been more evident to me than in a recent conversation I recently had with an education counselor, and the school principal.

During this conversation I asked a simple question, “Why doesn’t my fifth grade child have any vocabulary or spelling words to memorize?” The answer left me speechless. I was told, “Today most everyone uses computers that have spell checkers, and since the FCAT does not contain a spelling section, we don’t feel it is of any importance.”

I hope you are as shocked as I was. I have one simple thing to say to those that believe a computer spell checker negates the need to learn how to spell.

Due knot trussed yore spell chequer two fined awl you’re mistakes. Dewing sew could result inn making u look UN Intel agent, be cause this hear sentence passes the spill chequer and the grammar chequer to. Make know miss take about it. Knot teaching spelling will effect hour children for count less years. The fax R simple, with out learning two spell, wee are making they’re futures Moore difficult. Butt at least they will pass the FCAT.

Therefore if spelling is not needed because we have spell checkers, why stop there. My sons computer also has Excel and a calculator, lets drop math. American history, I have cable and we can tune into the History channel any time we want. Hey, that should cover ancient history as well, so now we can drop history. Social studies and American government, CSPAN. Music class, why? I have MTV, VH1 and CMT that should count for something. Science, we watch Myth busters and the Discovery channel. Well that about covers it. Send my child a high school diploma when he’s 18 and we will call it even.

I know! You say I’m over reacting. Am I? I bet you are thinking of every reason to defend math, or history, or social studies, but why not spelling?

I think it is time to change the role of the FCAT, not to determine which student advances to the next grade, but to determine which teachers and schools are doing their jobs. If a student fails the FCAT, then replace the teacher because they are not doing their jobs.