职场致谢指南

    “如果一个人获得的感谢和赞赏所使用的语言一直不是他最喜欢的方式，随着时间推移，人们就会觉得空虚，”怀特解释说。雇主应当避免用礼品和言语堆砌起来的员工感谢计划，全然忘了其他三种语言。这也适用于身体接触，当然得符合工作场所的规范。

    喜欢效劳式赞赏的人如果总是获得口头夸奖，工作重担无人分担的话，就会感到愤怒。比方说，怀特就听到过这样一个故事。一位女性正在忙于做账等文书工作，有位同事主动利用自己的午餐时间来帮她回电话。他回忆说：“那位女士说：‘这不是什么大事，但我很高兴知道有人关心我，看出我很忙。’”

    但选对感谢“语言”并不意味着方式就可以一成不变。看重时间的人或许喜欢跟上级一起看球赛，但也有可能视之如瘟疫。致谢之举仍然需视具体个人或团队而定。

    怀特指出，图书管理员或行政助理团队不一定喜欢在一大堆人面前接受公开表彰，销售团队则更有可能享受成为众人的焦点。

经常化

    感谢员工，光靠举办一场夏季野餐会或假日聚会是不够的。每周、每月都应当定期有相应的行动来感谢员工、下属和上级。

    凯利曾经在商务社交网站LinkedIn领导一个新成立的呼叫中心。那时，她就曾经从日程表中挤出时间来感谢员工。她给年轻员工发短信，给岁数大的员工手写的卡片。她会在深夜留下个人语音留言，感谢员工对整个团队的贡献，这样员工们第二天一上班就能听到这些感谢。她说：“我知道，他们第二天第一件事就是登陆语音信箱。”

具体化

    尽可能地将感谢与个人所做的具体事情以及产生的积极效果联系起来。

    怀特说：“好样的，或者‘干得好’达不到效果。必须谈谈他们具体做了什么，这对你个人、组织或客户产生什么影响。”

    不是感谢员工每天按时到公司，而是要将这些行为与它展现的品质和价值观联系起来。怀特建议：“比方说，‘你是靠得住的人。我真的很欣赏你这一点；我知道你会一直在这里。’”

    随着时间推移，注重如何感谢以及经常感谢，甚至可以改变不良的企业文化。怀特说：“人们感觉不受重视，不被欣赏，这种现象非常普遍。”

    译者：杨智

    "If you got thanks and appreciation in all the ways but the ones you prefer, over time you'd still feel a little bit hollow," White explains. Employers should avoid loading up their employee appreciation programs with gifts and words, while forgetting the other three languages. That even applies to physical touch, kept within appropriate workplace bounds, of course.

    Someone who prefers to be appreciated through acts of service would simply get angry if she received praise but no help with a heavy workload. For instance, White heard a story from a woman in billing who was buried with paperwork. A colleague spent her lunch hour helping return phone calls. "The gal that was the recipient said, 'It wasn't that big a deal, but it was nice to know somebody cared and saw that I was stressed,' " he recalls.

    But just because appreciation is in the right "language" doesn't mean a gift should be generic. Someone who values time may enjoy watching sports with a supervisor -- or dread it like the plague. You still need to tailor the gesture to the individual or team in question.

    A team of librarians or administrative assistants may not necessarily enjoy receiving public recognition in front of a large group of people, while a sales force is more likely to relish the spotlight, White notes.

Make it regular

    It's not enough to have a summer picnic and holiday party and consider your employees thanked. You should build into the weekly and monthly routine some regular methods of appreciating colleagues, subordinates, and supervisors.

    When Kelly was leading a new call center for LinkedIn (LNKD), she carved time out of her schedule to thank her staff. She sent text messages to the younger workers and handwritten cards to older employees. And she stayed late many evenings leaving personalized voice mails acknowledging how individual people contributed to the team, so the thanks would be the first thing they heard the next morning. "I knew the first thing they would do the next day was log into their voice mails," she says.

Be specific

    Whenever possible, connect the appreciation with something specific the individual did and how it contributed to a positive outcome.

    "A global attaboy or 'good job' doesn't cut it. You have to talk about what they've done specifically and how it impacts you or the organization or the customer," White says.

    Instead of thanking someone for showing up on time every day, connect the actions to the character and values that the action demonstrates. "Say, 'I really value that you are dependable; I know you're going to be here,' " White suggests.

    Over time, careful attention to how and how often thanks are delivered can turn around even a poisonous corporate culture. "It's rampant, the amount that people don't feel valued and appreciated," White says.