Timeout for Leadership-your one-minute leadership idea

30 second time-out #4

Gratitude-What about it?

What does gratitude really look like?

I might as well use Teacher Appreciation Week to ask you to think about gratitude. As an educator (former teacher, coach, principal and superintendent), of course I appreciate teachers.  I know and I have lived the difficult job that each one faces each day.  And I know the lack of appreciation that most feel.  However, I have a personal problem with some of these contrived weeks and days that we are asked to show our appreciation.

Perhaps, I feel this way, because I have a hard time showing my gratitude. If you do not believe me on that one, please ask my wife and children about that.  Better still go ask the teachers and educators that worked with me for almost forty years.  I am willing to bet that these folks would say that I am not the soft and mushy type but I would also bet that these same folks would tell you that they knew that I appreciated their hard work and accomplishments.

I think gratitude is something that you just feel.  You just know it when you see it. It is not some fake little token email or gift.  It is much more than getting free coffee and donuts one morning.  It is more than getting some sort of relief of professional responsibility.  Gratitude is something that you can’t put your finger on.  Something that you can’t hold in your hand.  Yet true gratitude, I will argue, is something that one can cognitively recognize, but more importunately emotionally feel.

Gratitude must be real and authentic.  I think you show it by:

• supporting people.
• being there for people.  Yes, being there physically and emotionally. 
• empowering people and giving them a voice. 
• caring for a person 24/7. 
• understanding the challenges that each person faces each day. 
• challenging people to be his or her best every day.
• holding high expectations for each person and helping each person reach these expectations by perhaps taking different roads to get there.
• encouraging people to take risks and by being there with support if he or she should fail.

I could probably go on and on but I think you get my point.

At the end of the day, keep your trinkets.  Keep your fake emails and notes. Keep the platitudes that you save for one week of the year.

Show your gratitude by developing a sense of trust with each person.  Show gratitude by being honest with each person.  Show your gratitude by personally and legitimately communicating with a person.  Show it by being yourself.  For when you are able to do all of the positive things that I mention, then you are on your way to being the best leader that you can be.