Growth Spurt: Give Credit Away

[upbeat music] Harry Truman said, "It's amazing what you can accomplish if you don't really care who gets the credit." And I think what is he talking about with leaders, and it's so easy to, as a leader, uh, in trying to maybe prove your own value, to take credit for, for everything.

Whether it's your idea, whether it's your strategy, whether it's your solution, it's so easy to use the pronoun, "Look what I've done," or, "Look what I've accomplished." I love how Jim Collins talks about there's level four and level five leaders.

A level four leader is always looking in the mirror and, and saying, "Look what I did.

Look how clever I am.

Look how brilliant I am." But a level five leader, really what separates good companies from great companies, looks out and says, "Look what our team accomplished." And I don't think you need me to tell you that it's important to give others recognition.

It's, uh, important to give others credit.

But what I've noticed and what we observe, it's, it's a failed art.

It's maybe there's a great idea, but there's a lack of implementation.

And it's just human nature sometimes to maybe think, "Hey, how can I share this information that I-- that my heart really feels like I wanna tell that person good job.

I wanna reward their effort." But sometimes maybe it's, it's an expectation they're supposed to work hard, and we, we take for granted the effort they're putting forth or we, we're so busy we don't have empathy in terms of what it takes to accomplish what they're trying to accomplish.

But imagine if you really knew what was on that person's heart, if you really got to know what motivates them, that they appreciated recognition, uh, that sometimes that's more powerful than an incentive compensation plan.

You know, we get so tied up, I think, in corporate America about how can we give somebody a bonus? How can we motivate them through money? And the research is pretty profound, especially for the younger generation, that they wanna feel like they're in a place where they are valued, where they're doing meaningful work, where they feel like they belong to something greater than themselves.

And the power of a manager, the power of a leader, the power of a person to lift someone up through their words.

I think Napoleon Hill famously said, "Be careful because your words can sow seeds of confidence or seeds of doubt and disappointment in the minds of another." So what are your methods for giving credit? How are you using words of affirmation? Are they building people up, or are they breaking them down? So next time, think about what's really important in your work.

Think about what you're trying to accomplish and how do you show your appreciation for the effort of others and their comp-contribution to your life and to your work.