There is a substantial psychological association between telling someone they did something well and their repeating that behavior in the future.  In the book “How to Win Friends and Influence People” By the famous author Dale Carnegie, it’s shown how delivering appropriate praise to employees may be an exceptionally effective means of modifying undesirable behaviors and encouraging the behaviors that you want to see more of.

In addition to this, praise is essential for cultivating a positive work atmosphere and happy, confident staff. Giving praise, on the other hand, does not always come so easy to us. So here are a few ideas for rewarding your employees:

Making the compliments specific

Do not just shower an employee with praise and compliments and expect it to encourage them. Relate it explicitly to something they did well, preferably shortly after they did it. Praise for the sake of praising will not come across as sincere - they need to know what they’ve done well. It doesn’t have to be a huge statement: simply saying “I’m extremely impressed with how you just handled that conversation, well done,” is sufficient.

Don’t only compliment the obvious folks

Job done by more talkative and outgoing personnel is easier to recognize since they frequently, publicly share their outstanding work. However, it is probable that there are employees in your firm that excel at performing more behind-the-scenes jobs that go undetected. So even if you have to make a deliberate effort to notice it, it is critical that these employees do not feel their efforts are being overlooked.

Give some outward acknowledgement

We all like receiving praise from people, but sometimes making it public may go a long way. Praise for a team member during a group meeting, in a company newsletter, or even on LinkedIn may be quite effective.

Persuade them to share their expertise

There are several approaches to this. If you’re unsure how to proceed, consult with a member of your team. Without realizing it, you are praising someone by demonstrating respect for their expertise or experience and indicating that you trust their judgment on a task. Also, if you spot a team member doing something exceptionally well, chat to them about it and give them the opportunity to share their knowledge with the rest of the team. This is a win-win situation since it informs other employees while also increasing the morale of the person sharing their expertise.

This article is part of our Business Coaching blog series. At Dataczar we talk to a lot of small businesses. We’ve found a few books that we keep recommending time and again. To better help our customers, we’ve added a Reading List for Small Businesses to our website. We encourage every small business owner to read and keep these timeless business books on their office shelf.

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