End the Year Right — Thank Your Employees!

Thank your employees as you usher in 2016! If your company had a great year in 2015, your employees deserve your appreciation for their part in building that success.
Even if 2015 wasn’t your company’s best year, you should still thank your employees! Reflecting on the year’s challenges with gratitude will help your team feel recognized for their perseverance and build the confidence they need to move forward into the New Year with resilience and hope.
The weeks around New Year’s can be stressful. The holidays are winding down, and the pressure’s on to make and keep resolutions for the New Year. It’s the perfect time to recap your company’s year with your whole staff and let them know how much they’re appreciated.

Gratitude Helps You Make Better Resolutions

What do many New Year’s resolutions have in common? They come from a place of shame.
Dan Bowling, Duke Law School professor and expert on the science of wellbeing at work, explains why so many resolutions are forgotten by February:

At the heart of most resolutions is a desire to live a happier life and enjoy more workplace success, but for some reason, resolutions focus on removing the negative things from our life rather than filling our New Year with positive things.
This is a fool’s errand; it doesn’t work. Instead of making the usual glum commitments about taming bad habits, sure to be discarded before the Doritos are passed around the Super Bowl Party, why not focus on what will really make you happy at work and in life?

In his Talent Management Psychology at Work blog post, “10 New Year’s Resolutions for Workplace Happiness,” Bowling suggests antidotes to negative-focused resolutions.

• Be mindful
• Use your strengths
• Learn optimism
• Keep perspective
• Be nice
• Make your job a calling

Know what Bowling’s positive-focused resolutions all have in common? Gratitude. They’re the kind of resolutions that stick because they come from a place of appreciation, forgiveness and openness.
The amazing part of it? When you and your coworkers are learning optimism, practicing mindfulness and trying to be nicer, it’s suddenly a lot easier to quit “bad habits.” Your energy is actively focused on the positive instead of fixated on blocking the negative.
That’s why it’s so vital to look back at 2015 and forward to 2016 with gratitude. When you thank your employees, you’re building the foundation for growth.

Thank your employees: Review Your ‘Nice’ List

Santa is amazing at gift-giving because he pays attention to who’s good and puts them on his “nice” list.
Are incidents of everyday and extraordinary excellence noted at your company? Is your management team reviewing these notes as an end-of-year recap?
Forbes contributors David Sturt and Todd Nordstorm say companies would do well to adopt Santa’s list method. In the article “Why You Need A Workplace ‘Nice’ List,” they make that case that carefully observed and recorded accomplishments are essential to effective employee recognition.
“The result of your efforts will not go unnoticed. In fact, it may transform your team. That’s because (as parents everywhere know), the best part of Santa’s list-making strategy is that it reinforces good behavior,” Sturt and Nordstrom write.
Your “nice” list is only as good as what you do with it. Thank your employees as soon as you notice achievements and thank them again at the end of the year. It will give context to the bigger picture of what the company has accomplished and where it’s going  — thanks to the employees.
“Keeping a list is the simplest way to remember to reach out and say thank you,” Sturt and Nordstrom write. “During the holiday season, we particularly focus on gratitude, but this tip rings true year-round. So make it a resolution to keep a ‘nice’ list throughout all of 2016.”
Learn more about harnessing the power of workplace gratitude in our popular (and free!) eBook, “Transform Your Workplace with Gratitude.” Click the image below and start transforming your workplace today! 

About gThankYou, LLC
Turkey Gift Certificates and Turkey Or Ham Gift Certificates by gThankYou! are two of America’s favorite employee gifts and can be redeemed for any Brand (Turkey or Turkey Or Ham), at virtually any Grocery Store in the U.S.
gThankYou, LLC provides company leaders with a variety of easy, meaningful and affordable ways to recognize and reward employees, holiday time or anytime. gThankYou! Certificates of Gratitude and our free Enclosure Cards are customizable including incorporating your company logo. And, nearly all orders ship same day.
gThankYou, LLC (www.gthankyou.com) is based in Madison, Wisconsin. Contact: Rick Kiley, Chief ThankYou! Officer, gThankYou, LLC at info@gthankyou.com or 888-970-6773.
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