Giving Recognition

Join Rod and Dale as they discuss recognition ways to give recognition, and some of the "dos and don'ts" they've learned. They also share the impact that recognition can have on your team.

Resources Mentioned
Drive by Daniel Pink

Transcript

Dale: 0:02

Welcome to messy but essential. I'm your host, Rod Stillwell. And this is the podcast about the people side of project leadership. It's where we help you improve your soft skills to reduce hard costs. And when we talk about the challenges of leading people to deliver successful projects. In today's episode, we're gonna be talking about a topic we often take for granted, recognizing contributions to the project. And celebrating wins, both big and small.

Rod: 0:31

Joining me in the studio today is my brother Dale, who's my business partner and comes with extensive project experience welcomed Dale.

Dale: 0:37

Thanks Rod.

Rod: 0:39

And without a microphone, but was an integral part of this is our producer and sound engineer, Ela, welcome Ela, we just got our thumbs up from Ela. Let's kick off with safety. kind of strange to be talking about celebrating and recognition, and still kind of bring safety into it. But I think often we focus on from a safety perspective on the things we shouldn't be doing or the things we need to be careful of. But do we give ourselves credit for having another safe day? Many organizations have bulletin boards with X number of days without an incident. In fact, in many cases, it's become an electronic number that's popping up there. And, and those are very important, because they certainly help us to recognize that, you know, we're on our kind of a winning streak. But just that beat, that initial celebration, as part of recognizing, we've had another safe day. We're all going home, to loved ones, to friends, to whomever with all of our fingers and toes And eyes and whatnot intact. It seems like a little thing. And it might be you know, some people might say, Oh, come on. But ultimately, we need to feel good when we've had a safe day, because stuff happens. And so I think if we focus on the positive, and that's part of what we're looking at today, is how do we take focusing on the positive and turn it into a habit. And maybe that begins with gratitude. As we were preparing for this podcast, Ela mentioned the, you know, the importance of gratitude, and being grateful for things. And I actually attended a session the other day where the leader of the group with a team that I was with, started by asking everybody on the then zoom call to go around and talk about one thing that they were grateful for. And I haven't done that for a long time. I mean, it's a tool that we often use in retreats and, and alignment sessions and so on. But in terms of a regular day to day meeting, kicking it off with "what's one thing you're grateful for." And one of the things I found at the end of that and the the lady with that particular group, pointed out all of the things he had learned about us in the group, as a result of the things we said we were thankful for. And oh, I mentioned how I was thankful for six daughters who, you know, are such an important part of my life. And the host said, "Gee, I didn't know you had kids, let alone six daughters," that type of thing. Right. So what that did, though, was it increased the relationship value between the people around the room, just by listening to what they were grateful for. It told us in some cases, what, you know, struggles people had been facing that they hadn't had a winning, that might be a medical struggle, there might be a financial struggle or something within the project that they've been really struggling with. And all of a sudden, it worked out that type of thing. So it had a you know, a secondary impact. It wasn't just about gratitude, but it was also an added to the collateral, or the understanding we had of each other. So let's jump into that. You know, what kind of within that concept of gratitude and, and therefore recognizing individuals, what are some of the, you know, what if some of you experience has been dealt with respect to do people take time to recognize contributions within the project group? Generally, I don't think we do. I think there are exceptions, right? There's people who seemed to, by their very nature, be the people that are always recognizing achievements and recognizing what's going on and you know, where people have gotten to, but I don't know if that's, you know, common. And I think that and we're talking about your informal recognition versus sort of more formal education rather than formal recognition is obviously very important. You know, if you have a reward system in your organization, that that you can nominate projects, once they're completed for special recognition is that's all great and you can get valuable in should be done as well. But this is the informal recognition during the course of a project that we're talking about. And I think that, you know, almost by their very nature, the projects are not about the milestones are completed, they're about the next, we're right, we have a three day bond, and we kind of all, you know, take the stuff off on the list, and then we mark it off. But that's just now it's done nothing but focused on the next one. And so it becomes very easy to forget about the achievements, or assume everyone understands the achievements, everyone feels good about the achievements or all of those types of things.

Dale: 5:40

So I think it is very important for, as the project leader to, if you're not one of those people that this comes naturally to, if you're just doing this by intuition, to be intentional about this, you know, to to specifically recognize achievements recognized, either and sometimes it's not a, you know, something that shows up on a project by as a funny milestone, right. I mean, we have milestones here, but maybe we got to a particularly hard stretch or something, or maybe you ran into a problem. And for a little while everybody was going going, whoo, I don't know how we're going to solve this and someone solves, those are worth recognizing, those are worth celebrating. And I think it's important to do that more, and not just allow them to kind of become part of the past. And I think that you know, how you do that is going to depend an awful lot on the people. And the type of project and all the rest of that. You know, I think we've mentioned, you know, at one point in our conversation earlier, whether it's public recognition, or private recognition, and I think you need to figure out what the right way to do that is on your project, or if you're going to make it public. So you need to make sure that you're making all of the public, you need to make sure that you're spreading it around, that you're not focusing on one or two individuals constantly, etc. That can be easy to do. Now, sometimes on a project as a project manager or project leader, there's a couple of parts of the project that are near and dear to my heart. And so it's easier for me to see the treatments in those areas and unnecessary, some other that doesn't mean they're, they're more important, or I shouldn't be recognizing other ones. So I think there's some nuance that has to get into thinking about how this is going to be impacting people. But I definitely think that it's very important to do and it makes a massive difference, especially on longer projects. You know, there's nothing that's more de-energizing in some ways than just continuing like, the day after day after day. And there's nothing that's more energizing in some ways than that recognition along the way. I wouldn't totally agree, I think we need to, to sometimes stop and ask ourselves, have I taken the time Have I been intentional about recognizing the little things that actually get us through every day? Now, the challenge is always you know, as you point out, I'm spreading it around evenly, etc. And to me at the same time being authentic, we're being sincere. You know, I have expression we used to use and I haven't heard it for quite some time. But you know, the KISS principle keep it simple. And at the time it was people keep it simple, stupid. I used to refer to it more as keep it simple and sincere.

Rod: 8:55

But the point was simply that if you're going to recognize somebody, and you're doing it because it's that checkoff list, and you know, you listen to some guy on a podcast tell you that just really needed to be recognizing people. And you know, the next day you went in and started recognizing people. It's it can backfire on you. So I think recognition is one of those things that to me, is not only about recognizing the contribution, but helping the person understand what it was about the contribution that made a difference for you. So it's not just Hey, you did a great job on X. What was it within? You know, you did a great job on that report this morning. Yeah, which part because I don't know what to reproduce here to keep that recognition coming if you wish. So the other side for me, the other side of recognition is taking the time to reflect on what the behaviors were that you want to see repeated as a leader. Yeah, because it's not just recognition for recognition sake. I mean, everybody loves a pat on the back. There's no question about that, right. And it certainly goes a lot further. But it really is about visibility. It's really about, I am not invisible on this project. I, you know, I worked hard. And I remember many, many years ago, working on a project where we had basically sequestered a small group of managers for almost three weeks, we were literally, you know, held up in a hotel sort of thing, working on this particular project. And partway through, it became obvious that this was quite a contribution for these people, they were all managers, so they weren't getting overtime for it, etc. But they were away from home, and so on. So one of the members of the team suggested quietly to me as the team lead, that we should send a basket of, you know, like a fruit basket, that type of thing, to the spouses of all of the people working on a project, you know, it was a small group, maybe a dozen. And just with a little note that says, Thanks for giving up your spouse for the next couple of weeks, we couldn't do this project without them. And I have to tell you, we did that. And it was absolutely overwhelming. Now, we didn't tell the guys on the project guys and gals on the

Dale: 12:15

Yeah, I think I think that's, you know, there's a lot of little things like that, that can be the things that make things more valuable. So I think, you know, the ones that project that we were doing that we waited until they types of things that I remember, as being, you know, often more communicated with home, and home said you won't believe what you know, the organization sent. And I will tell you that years more impactful than then some others, you know, passing on later, people will still talking about that. So it wasn't appreciation and cotton, and congratulations from someone recognition just for the individuals, but it was making outside the team. it very public, because we were recognizing their spouse and So it's very easy, you know, you may hear from one of the stakeholders and the music manager in another department, family for the contribution they made by giving up, you know, in or you may hear from somebody senior in the organization about awkward letters in the project, sharing that with the this case, their, their partner or whatever, for the duration of individuals, that that was about, right, that that idea his project, or at least this phase of the project. So again, that someone else out there recognize them is very when we talking recognition, I mean, it was sincere, it was impactful. mentioning the specific impact to that person's genuine, it was it was inclusive, everybody's family management, if they don't report to you directly, if they hear got something. But it also demonstrated that they were about it from their manager later, or that's very impacting. demonstrated to the people close to them, that these people were valuable. You know, I remember, you know, in one project that was that was quite difficult than there was a lot of work and people will info on time, similar to the fruit basket thing, this could be the case, but what they said they decided to do was, they approved it, everybody in the project, a bunch of people that were working with specific core party, who would expense dinner with someone else for that. So if you want to have your significant other, you want to take out your friends want to take out whatever it is go out, have dinner on us. Right as recognition. So I think some of those things can be really said can be really impactful and can and I don't want to replace the regular. Hey, I just want to say thanks so much for getting through this. That was such a you know, that's valuable, too. And very important. But I think there are some other things that you can look at and be creative about. And, you know, find ways to make certain things more impactful as you look at the projects, and obviously this depends on the size of the project, it depends on the complexity of life depends on all kinds of things as you go right as to how far you're going to go. I mean, a simple thing can be just a handwritten thank you note. We don't get a lot of those anymore. So you know, in times when you can actually see people physically handwritten, thank, you know, can be, you know, quite impactful, just because it's different. So I think, yeah, I think you're right, I think if you want to look at the impact and want to look at what's going to convey the message that you're trying to convey, and I think the intentional Part two is not to be insincere. It's not to disparage reckless but sometimes for those of us that maybe don't see it as intuitively, it's still good to have a mental checklist. And say have I been recognizing the major contributions? Have I been recognizing team, when we get from certain hurts have I've been doing those things or not? I think that's a that's an important distinction that and I want to maybe circle back to the checklist. I'm in no way suggesting that checklists aren't important. As a guy who used to spend hundreds of hours a year in airplanes, I can tell you, I was pretty happy that every, every flight started out with the pilot and co pilot going through a checklist. So I'm a big fan of checklists.

Rod: 15:36

And recognition can certainly be on the checklist. And I think some of us do need to be reminded, you know, have we paid attention to people enough? I think added to that, from my perspective, is the fact that recognition doesn't have to be a tangible gift all the time, it doesn't have to be an expense to meal or a fruit basket, or it often is just taking the time to meet with somebody. Because time is, you know, a commodity that once it's gone, it's gone. taking that time to to express how you feel, to be really clear about what it is that you liked in the behavior, to express your trust, if you wish that this type of level of performance is going to continue. And really the biggest contribution comes back to that visibility. So Daniel Pink, in his book drive, talks about the three key factors that motivate people. And I remember it is an acronym, ma p for map. And that was mastery. So being really good at something and recognized as being good at it. autonomy, in other words, I am given a task, I get to work on their own, if somebody breathing down my, my back, or my neck all the time, and purpose, what I'm doing is bigger than me. So when what you're doing is bigger than you, and you get recognized for it, by the bigger in that sense, right? By the that has a huge value in our motivation and our psyche. So you know, we're coming back to people are messy, we're coming back to projects, needing people projects, running with people, etc. And how do we keep ourselves and the team motivated? recognition is is a very inexpensive, but highly impactful way of keeping a team motivated. Because it says, I recognize that you're good at what you do the mastery, I trust you to do the job autonomy. And you're helping contribute to something which is greater than just you. That's the purpose. So recognition fills all of those needs that we have in order to get up in the morning and feel good about coming to work or working on a project. Final thoughts as we wrap it up, anything you want to add to that, Dale, I just I guess that the thing that kind of occurred to me is we're you know, if for any project, that's that's significant, there's probably going to be a few days that are going to be tough, you know, you're going to run into some things where things just aren't working, where you're behind where the liaison person doesn't know, whatever it is, there's going to be stressors, and there's going to be the tough parts. And so you need those, those good parts to counteract the tough parts, right? Everybody's going to become aware of the tough parts without anybody doing anything whatsoever, it's just going to be obvious to everybody. So you need to make the good stuff as obvious. And I think that's something that the project, you know, project leadership, that's one of the goals with Project leadership has has to take on.

Dale: 19:08

I think that's really powerful. And something that's pretty easy to overlook. If we're not, you know, if we're not careful.

Rod: 19:18

I would say the you know, I'd like to wrap up with a thought, though, that not everyone is comfortable with being publicly recognized. So we used to say, we used to say to sounds like when we were on the ark. But you know that that kind of concept that said we give constructive feedback in private and we praise or we recognize publicly, but I think it's also part of that recognition is understanding the individual who you're recognizing and understanding where their comfort zone is. The last thing you want to do is recognize somebody in a way that makes them feel uncomfortable. And as a result, the value of the recognition is lost because of their discomfort. And sometimes that's as simple as I don't want a big show made of this. Yes, I'm glad that for you, it was a big thing and a big contribution to the project. But I don't need to be called out for it. or, conversely, there are those who, for whom, like you mentioned earlier, a recognition, letting my boss know, is super important to me, the rest of the team would beside me, they saw what I did, but my boss wasn't here to see that. And so that would be good. The sending the fruit baskets home, it was actually simply saying to the family, this individual is important to us. And I will tell you, this is just a little benefit aside, the next time that manager needed to work late on something, it was a lot easier for him to do that, because his family knew that his employer actually recognized the value he was bringing. So he didn't have to go through because, you know, like it or not, sometimes we we have to sell our you know, whether that's significant others spouses, best friends, whatever, on why we're going to miss out on something, we're gonna miss that ballet recital, and we're gonna All right. And it's an awful lot easier to do. If those people feel that we are recognized that we're not just giving up all sorts of things for this ungrateful employer, ungrateful project lead, that in fact, the project lead recognizes the value we bring, and has demonstrated that. So, to end from our perspective, make recognition an intentional part of your project leadership. Be sincere. Take the time to know what type of recognition is going to resonate with individuals. And have fun doing it. Because there's a lot of joy and fun that can come from acknowledging, making people visible, and helping them to see how their behavior is a contribution to the bigger the bigger picture. They all thanks so much for being with us today. Ela, thanks for helping to engineer this and to our listeners. Enjoy recognizing the people around you and the contributions that they're making.