Back when I was doing MBA, one of the first courses we took was called MOC (Managerial Oral Communication). The idea of the course is simple. Each of the 60 students in class would give a 12 minute presentation on any topic of their choice to everyone. Then everyone has 8 minutes to provide suggestions, remarks to the presenter so that he/she can improve. It seemed like a great idea then. But most of the time we would criticize each other, in our eagerness to become almost perfect.
Back to yesterday. In a coincident I met one my earlier bosses at our apartment complex. We had a very good chat about the time when I was working for him. All of a sudden I have realized that he is probably one of the best bosses I have seen. And I work with a lot of people as I am a consultant. But this one stood out from tons of others. And I knew the reason, “he knows how to appreciate people and mean it”
I think truly recognizing people for what they are good at is a remarkable life skill. And when you actually say something really wonderful about other person and mean it you are just making him / her so happy that sometimes they remember it for rest of their life. Don’t confuse appreciation with sucking up or merely saying “wow, this is nice”, they don’t really mean anything most of the time.
I want to practice appreciation in my life, master this skill, it is important if I want to have better relationship with people in my life.
Whose day you are going to make today?
[Image from Quadrupede]
2 Responses
This is very true 🙂
I always take care to appreciate one or two classmates everyday, you know, they really like compliments 😉
Hmm. buddy wassup? Appreciates ones those who deserve!