Catalyst Strategic Consultants: Secondary Page

Newsletters:

Appreciation

January 7, 2000

It’s that season of the year again. The pause button gets pushed (except for some), and we are released from our constraints. We pop up, as if out of darkness, to have a look around for a moment and are afforded space for aspects of living that just don’t seem to get enough airtime.

Like appreciation. There was a wonderful quote in the paper that, at Christmas there seems a greater recognition that we are all just souls making a common journey through this life. Particularly this New Year, the whole world stopped to do one thing: celebrate the millennium passage.

I’ll get started with mine. I am so grateful for the confidence and support of those whose business lives I am privileged to contribute to. These letters are a return for that, and my hope is that they will be received as an appreciation for time shared on the road together. The holiday season connotes a sheathing of battle knives, an allowance of grace, an extension of courtesy beyond other times.

At the centre of these courtesies extended is the quality of appreciation. No quality is more urgently sought or earnestly desired than this. Money is paid for services rendered or goods produced, and helps us make our way in the everyday world. I talk with people in depth about their business lives, getting to the core of their motivation. The overwhelming majority tell me that what they really want to do is make a difference. If you follow this through to the payoff, the payoff would be appreciation - to be recognized that we did make that difference to someone. This is such a deep-seated yearning - so universal, yet so seldom and responded to. It is a childlike, naked need - when withheld so frustrating, when given, like manna. It is so wanted that it is at times difficult to accept, lest the receiver admits how necessary to life, like breath, it is.

Those souls who manned the tills, engineered the year-end closings and, this New Year, ensured that our essential services survived this landmark calendar change – didn’t enjoy much liberty. But now, as relief from the hegemony of work has been granted for a few days, the rest of us can turn our energies to another focus. I urge you to give some to appreciation.

If we were at war, buried in a depression, or beset by catastrophe, believe me, we would be looking fondly back and saying "Those were the good old days." See with those eyes. When people expect that what they have should only increase, that the world owes them opportunity, when they take for granted the support and accommodation given them by others that smoothes their way - a light goes out somewhere and the world is a little darker.

Couples facing the tortuous demands of simultaneously raising kids, running two careers, advancing their own learning, being a spouse, have it tough these days. With perceived rising corruptive influence and greater autonomy, normal kids are challenges. Merely getting through life with our families intact doesn’t diminish the need for straight-in-your-eyes, from-the-heart, no-returns-expected-or-required heartfelt appreciation. Don’t wait for a funeral or life-threatening event (which somehow brings this quality into immediate focus!). Think about, and do it, now. Don’t worry about the result or any reciprocity. Although they may not wish to show it, even the most sullen adolescent, the most antic kid, will get it and remember it.

Sometimes relationships (business or personal) are intimate and intense, complicated. The feeling may be that any inch given will be parlayed into a mile taken. Take stock. It could be worse; a lot worse. What does extending appreciation cost? A short truce, just extending a simple grace, a thanks for what is enjoyed, like the Germans and allies singing carols across the battle lines of WWI, reminds us that we all are human and can appreciate even an adversary. Who knows? It may be the opening that allows a new path, a little ‘give’ in an intractable situation!

Giving appreciation is not weakness, it is strength - given by a big person, big in the sense of spirit and capacity. It demonstrates we have more than one dimension, that we live our lives at several levels and from several perspectives. And, in the giving of appreciation to others, we become bigger. A person can only be generous who feels she has enough, and we have only to look at the story of Scrooge to remind us of the soul-dimming power of hoarding and miserliness.

We are so problem oriented! In the face of that overwhelming mindset, David Cooperrider developed an organizational effectiveness practice called Appreciative Enquiry. The premise is stunningly simple. What if, rather that talk about what’s wrong (a problem), we concentrated on what is right with our firm! Can we take those good things, extend them, build on them to make what we do well even better? When I work on vision, I am always looking for this material. What seems to be the basis of the success of this outfit to this point? How can we let that develop and grow to reach its fullest power and influence in the market? I have to drag my clients back and show them how great what they do is! They are used to it and have grown to want what someone else does, gifts that some other company has. I’m not saying that looking to others is not worth doing, but what damage is done when what we do well is disregarded, assumed, taken for granted? Don’t be distracted! In the end, appreciating and making the most of that core you are dismissing will be the force that will drive the company on to the next level.

So, if what most want is to be appreciated to make a difference, can you turn to those you work with and give them some straight out credit and gratitude? When we extend that, some dialogue with powers greater than ourselves is opened, enhanced. We then admit outside power and instead of having to generate all this energy ourselves, are lent some from elsewhere, the source. Extending thanks opens that door, and in so doing, serves the giver! And the recipient will be touched. True unconditional appreciation goes right past all those tiresome positionings and defensive postures to touch the essential core of the other. Employees tell me over and over they just want to know how they are doing. When they are given some pure clean generous strokes, they drink that in like pure water in a desert. It happens so rarely that they treasure every single drop of it and will tell others how much it meant to them in close conversation. Their career impact, the difference they make, is seen and mirrored in such a meaningful way.

Hats off the PanCanadian Petroleum. They’ve given staff an easy widespread method to suffuse their workplace with appreciation. The High-Five program means that a goodly supply of cards are distributed everywhere throughout the company. When somebody does something special, something that makes another’s way a little easier – they may receive a personally jotted High-Five card saying so. It’s a side feature, but receivers can cash them for a $5 value. But most want theirs back to put on their wall as a mark of pride. What a gift to the entire company!

To advance its own ends, our society trains us to express interpersonal urges through material goods. But salaries and bonuses, Christmas presents, although intended to reflect appreciation, are a poor substitute for the real thing. I’m not trying to be a Grinch here.

When we practice appreciation, we see and amplify the divine in the other. Through that, the divine aspect of us grows and shines. Then too, we can see the divine in this gorgeous world that sustains us and feeds us, steals our hearts with a majestic full moonrise over the city. The holy exchange that is celebrated at this season, a gift from the Creator to Man, is continued and celebrated in its truth, in the present.

Happy Christmas and a prosperous Millennium to you and yours,

Doug Bouey

[ Top ]