Praise where it's due - a new scheme from APA

APA has created a scheme to say ‘thank you’ to people it interacts with who go above and beyond what might be expected of them. If we receive an especially courteous and friendly reception when we call someone, receive a prompt response to a request or find someone who is especially keen to help, then we make it our responsibility to say ‘thank you’. If possible these thanks should be communicated to a Director or Manager so that they can bask in the reflected success and pass on our thanks in the form of a one minute praising (see below). We also tell them why they made us feel good; you made me smile, you left me feeling confident the job will be done or it was nice to be treated professionally.

It really is good to be appreciated – join us in our campaign to say ‘thanks’.

Gareth

One Minute Praising – from the ‘One Minute Manager’ by Dr. Ken Blanchard

The second secret of the ‘One Minute Manager’ is one-minute praising and this is the key to improved performance and increased productivity. Instead of catching people out for doing something wrong, the opposite is recommended: ‘The key to developing people is to catch them doing something right’. There are three steps in a one-minute praising:
1. Praise someone as close in time to the good behaviour as possible. If you can’t find some to praise everyday, then you should wonder why.
2. Be specific – Make it clear what it was that was performed well.
3. Share feelings – tell them how you feel about what they did, not what you think about what they did.