Last month I was at a conference where Gary Chapman was speaking. He wrote a book a few years ago called 'The 5 Love Languages' which went on to sell 6 million copies in English alone and has also been translated into 40 languages around the world. It has become quite an important book in terms of relationships of knowing the different love languages that we all use and to be able to know and use those particular languages as we deal with our families.
Gary Chapman went a step further and wrote a book in association with Paul White called 'The 5 Languages of Appreciation in the Work Place: Empowering Organizations by Encouraging People'. He was speaking on this book in this particular conference and one of the things he said was this: "The #1 factor in job satisfaction is not the amount of pay or salary, but whether or not the individual feels appreciated and valued for the work that they do". Then he went on to give the statistics according to research conducted by the US Department of Labor. 64% of the Americans who leave their jobs say they do so because they don't feel appreciated.
I thought that was so interesting. Gary Chapman's book is making its way to companies and in fact, he has a website called appreciationatwork.com where he allows you to go and take a test to find out what your love language is. What is it that you respond to? The point that he makes is that we often give appreciation to people around us and that appreciation is not really appreciated. It's because the language we have is not appreciative: all of us have different languages.
The 5 appreciative languages that he talks about are:
But as I reflected upon that, I thought that there seems to be such a shift going on in the market place, in the corporate world in getting things done. There seems to be more and more emphasis on looking around at people, on making the environment a better place for work.
Just consider this particular situation. Dan Bobinski says in his article 'Answers for the Workplace: Giving Encouragement', quoted in Leadership Development. He says, "According to a company listed among the 100 best companies to work for, 6 factors contribute to a high performance workplace. They are:
I read another article in Bloomberg Business Week written quite a few years ago but still relevant today, entitled 'Smashing the Clock'. No schedules, no mandatory meetings. Inside Best Buy's radical reshaping of the workplace. He says, "One afternoon last year, Chap Achen, who oversees online orders at Best Buy Company, shut down his computer, stood up from his desk and announced that he was leaving for the day. It was around 2 pm and most of Achen's staff were slumped over their keyboards, deep in a post-lunch LCD-lit trance. 'See you tomorrow,' said Achen, 'I'm going to a matinee'."
"Under normal circumstances, an early afternoon departure would have been totally un-Achen. After all, this was a 37 year old corporate up-comer whose wife laughs in his face when he utters the words 'work-life balance'. But at Best Buy's Minneapolis headquarters, similar incidents of strangeness were breaking out all over the ultramodern campus. In employee relations, Steve Hance had suddenly started going hunting on workdays, a Remington 12-gauge in one hand and a Verizon LG in the other. In the retail training department, e-learning specialist Mark Wells was spending his days bombing around the country following rocker Dave Matthews. Single mother Kelly McDevitt, an online promotions manager, started leaving at 2:30 pm to pick up her 11-year old son Calvin from school. Scott Jauman, s six-Sigma black belt, began spending a third of his time at his Northwood's cabin."
"This was a new kind of company policy that was emerging at Best Buy and it was called ROWE (Results Only Work Environment). It went further than the easy time-slotting that was allowed in offices – come in early, go late or a little bit of freedom on checking in. this was working wherever you could, as long as the work got done. A lot of people looked at it and said that it wouldn't work. Yet over the years, Best Buy has become the No.1 retailer of electronic goods in the US. It's saved $400 million over six years in real estate costs."
It makes you think that more and more, people are beginning to realize that people matter. It's not only about the work; work begins to be the bottom line. It's also about creating an environment where people who work are able to do that work in the best way they can.
To me this says that the 'it's not about me' mentality is slowly shifting. Previously it was one person; 'I've got to be able to stamp over everybody to get to the place that I am going'. Yet, if you don't have a team pulling with you, then work doesn't get done. It seems to me that there's a sense in corporate thinking today that we need to do something about helping each other, of not just thinking about ourselves, about me, but of what I can do to help people around me to be the best they can. because together then we can make the work that we do the best that we can, which will then make the company that we belong to the best that there is.
It's not about me; it's about us together.
Languages of appreciation, ROWE (Results Only Work Environment) – all of these are just contributors that say one thing – that we need to make a worker-friendly environment. We need to have workers who are emotionally stable, who aren't thinking about a whole lot of other things at work. They are comfortable; workers looking out for each other, caring for each other, able to help one another. "Encourage, words of affirmation, tangible gifts, quality time, acts of service, appropriate physical touch" as Gary Chapman said.
I thought that I needed to throw this out to all of you; just a question for you all. Whether you are able to look at other people around you and able to help motivate, create a wonderful workplace environment where not only is work being done, but an atmosphere of harmony is also cultivated; where we are thinking of the other person as well?
The Bible says, "Do unto others as you would have others do unto you". And Jesus Himself said, "Love your neighbor as yourself."
Good words for us! To be able to inculcate that in our work environment will make for a better workplace, for better work output. After all that's what we want. Think about it!
God Bless Us All.
Gary Chapman went a step further and wrote a book in association with Paul White called 'The 5 Languages of Appreciation in the Work Place: Empowering Organizations by Encouraging People'. He was speaking on this book in this particular conference and one of the things he said was this: "The #1 factor in job satisfaction is not the amount of pay or salary, but whether or not the individual feels appreciated and valued for the work that they do". Then he went on to give the statistics according to research conducted by the US Department of Labor. 64% of the Americans who leave their jobs say they do so because they don't feel appreciated.
I thought that was so interesting. Gary Chapman's book is making its way to companies and in fact, he has a website called appreciationatwork.com where he allows you to go and take a test to find out what your love language is. What is it that you respond to? The point that he makes is that we often give appreciation to people around us and that appreciation is not really appreciated. It's because the language we have is not appreciative: all of us have different languages.
The 5 appreciative languages that he talks about are:
- Words of affirmation
- Tangible gifts
- Quality time
- Acts of service
- Appropriate physical touch; giving a hug or a high-five.
But as I reflected upon that, I thought that there seems to be such a shift going on in the market place, in the corporate world in getting things done. There seems to be more and more emphasis on looking around at people, on making the environment a better place for work.
Just consider this particular situation. Dan Bobinski says in his article 'Answers for the Workplace: Giving Encouragement', quoted in Leadership Development. He says, "According to a company listed among the 100 best companies to work for, 6 factors contribute to a high performance workplace. They are:
- Communication
- Responsibility
- Employees who think like owners
- Teamwork
- Low cost
- Motivation
I read another article in Bloomberg Business Week written quite a few years ago but still relevant today, entitled 'Smashing the Clock'. No schedules, no mandatory meetings. Inside Best Buy's radical reshaping of the workplace. He says, "One afternoon last year, Chap Achen, who oversees online orders at Best Buy Company, shut down his computer, stood up from his desk and announced that he was leaving for the day. It was around 2 pm and most of Achen's staff were slumped over their keyboards, deep in a post-lunch LCD-lit trance. 'See you tomorrow,' said Achen, 'I'm going to a matinee'."
"Under normal circumstances, an early afternoon departure would have been totally un-Achen. After all, this was a 37 year old corporate up-comer whose wife laughs in his face when he utters the words 'work-life balance'. But at Best Buy's Minneapolis headquarters, similar incidents of strangeness were breaking out all over the ultramodern campus. In employee relations, Steve Hance had suddenly started going hunting on workdays, a Remington 12-gauge in one hand and a Verizon LG in the other. In the retail training department, e-learning specialist Mark Wells was spending his days bombing around the country following rocker Dave Matthews. Single mother Kelly McDevitt, an online promotions manager, started leaving at 2:30 pm to pick up her 11-year old son Calvin from school. Scott Jauman, s six-Sigma black belt, began spending a third of his time at his Northwood's cabin."
"This was a new kind of company policy that was emerging at Best Buy and it was called ROWE (Results Only Work Environment). It went further than the easy time-slotting that was allowed in offices – come in early, go late or a little bit of freedom on checking in. this was working wherever you could, as long as the work got done. A lot of people looked at it and said that it wouldn't work. Yet over the years, Best Buy has become the No.1 retailer of electronic goods in the US. It's saved $400 million over six years in real estate costs."
It makes you think that more and more, people are beginning to realize that people matter. It's not only about the work; work begins to be the bottom line. It's also about creating an environment where people who work are able to do that work in the best way they can.
To me this says that the 'it's not about me' mentality is slowly shifting. Previously it was one person; 'I've got to be able to stamp over everybody to get to the place that I am going'. Yet, if you don't have a team pulling with you, then work doesn't get done. It seems to me that there's a sense in corporate thinking today that we need to do something about helping each other, of not just thinking about ourselves, about me, but of what I can do to help people around me to be the best they can. because together then we can make the work that we do the best that we can, which will then make the company that we belong to the best that there is.
It's not about me; it's about us together.
Languages of appreciation, ROWE (Results Only Work Environment) – all of these are just contributors that say one thing – that we need to make a worker-friendly environment. We need to have workers who are emotionally stable, who aren't thinking about a whole lot of other things at work. They are comfortable; workers looking out for each other, caring for each other, able to help one another. "Encourage, words of affirmation, tangible gifts, quality time, acts of service, appropriate physical touch" as Gary Chapman said.
I thought that I needed to throw this out to all of you; just a question for you all. Whether you are able to look at other people around you and able to help motivate, create a wonderful workplace environment where not only is work being done, but an atmosphere of harmony is also cultivated; where we are thinking of the other person as well?
The Bible says, "Do unto others as you would have others do unto you". And Jesus Himself said, "Love your neighbor as yourself."
Good words for us! To be able to inculcate that in our work environment will make for a better workplace, for better work output. After all that's what we want. Think about it!
God Bless Us All.
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