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818: 5 Ways to Speak Appreciation at Work: Unlocking the Languages of Gratitude – Michelle Wakeman

Sometimes, saying thank you just isn't enough. But gifts aren't always what people want either! So, how do you show gratitude and appreciation to your team? In this episode, Kirk Behrendt brings back Michelle Wakeman, one of ACT’s amazing coaches, to reveal the five languages of appreciation to help you make your team feel valued at work. To learn the easiest way to improve your culture, increase productivity, and enjoy coming to work, listen to Episode 818 of The Best Practices Show!

Learn More About Michelle:

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Episode Resources:

Main Takeaways:

  • How you like to be shown appreciation is not the same for others.
  • Learn the five languages of appreciation and how to express them.
  • Most people like gifts. But it’s not the primary language of appreciation.
  • Speak or write words of affirmation to show your appreciation for others.
  • Perform acts of service. Even small gestures will mean a lot to your team.
  • Quality time in the form of check-ins and team meetings will show you care.
  • Appropriate physical touch can positively change the culture of your practice.
  • Be genuine when showing appreciation. People can tell when it’s disingenuous.
  • Do a team appreciation survey so that everyone knows one another’s language.

Quotes:

“One of the number-one issues or pain points that we tend to hear from our clients and the coaching community is the struggle to either hire, find, or maintain really awesome talent. Ever since COVID-19, I think that this has been a pretty common pain point across most industries — but we really feel the pinch in dentistry. So, when we're talking about employee retention, I think one of the first things we have to look at is, what is keeping our team attached to our office? We talk about differentiation a lot in terms of patients and what we do that's different from the guy down the street. But what do you do for your team that's different from the guy down the street?” (2:10—2:54) -Michelle

“It's so hard as a practice owner because you think like, ‘Oh my gosh, I do so much for my team, and my job is really hard. I'm a business owner, I'm an entrepreneur, I'm a manager, I’m the assembly line, I'm doing clinical dentistry. Oh my gosh, these people are so thankless.’ But maybe it's just because you're not thanking them in the right way — in the way that they want to be thanked.” (3:52—4:16) -Michelle

“I'm a words of affirmation gal myself. And to be fair, we're in good company. About 46% of the population actually falls into words of affirmation being their language of appreciation. When we're talking about words of affirmation, they don't always have to be verbal. The written word, I think, is a really, really great way to show people how much you appreciate them. I worked with a practice owner who — I'm dating myself here. We got paper pay stubs. Every time he gave us out our pay stubs at the end of our two-week cycle, he would actually write a little note on there about each individual and how he was grateful for you. To make that even a little more fun, his handwriting was atrocious, so we would actually get together and try to decipher what he had written for us in our thank-yous each week. That's something that always stuck with me because that is my language of appreciation. It meant a lot to me when I actually picked up that pay stub. I looked forward to it.” (6:14—7:14) -Michelle

“[Quality time] can be a little bit more ambiguous, but it is the second most common language of appreciation. And this is a really interesting statistic. Did you know that if we're talking about our younger population — so, probably younger millennials and lower — about 35% of them identify quality time as being their language of appreciation. Only 20% of older team members, though, identify that as being their language of appreciation. I thought that was a really interesting statistic. I'm not sure what the sociology is behind that, but it is interesting to note that for younger team members, they really crave that one-on-one quality time with their leaders.” (8:01—8:45) -Michelle

“Acts of service [is] doing something for someone. If we take it into the home, my husband is an acts of service guy. Like, if I unload the dishwasher, he's like, ‘She loves me.’ So, in the dental office, think of it as helping out with things that need help. So, again, I worked with a great business owner. I would be in the middle of perio charting and he would see, because I would call the numbers out loud to my patient. He would pop over if he was in between patients and start typing for me, just start recording those numbers. That always meant a lot to me. Like, ‘Oh, that's great. He's coming over and popping in those numbers.’ I felt appreciated. He'd go in and clean a room if he saw that our assistants were behind, or would say, ‘Hey, you go grab lunch while I take care of this.’ So, it's seeing what needs to be done to help that person out in the moment and taking care of it. It doesn't have to be a grandiose gesture. For those people that acts of service are something that means a lot to them, pop in and do what needs to be done.” (10:22—11:24) -Michelle

“It's funny, I hear a lot of doctors — and I think that they really think that [gifts are] the primary appreciation language for most of their team members. They think, ‘If I'm showing appreciation, I need to give them something.’ And the reality is that only seven percent of the population identify gifts as being their primary language of appreciation. So, it might not be that your team members really want to receive gifts. I mean, everybody loves a gift — don't get me wrong. But it might not be what they need to feel appreciated. And if it is their language of appreciation, it doesn't have to be something that costs a ton of money. Really, it should be something that's thoughtful. If you know that that team member really loves a certain coffee shop that's not a national chain, maybe make an effort to grab a coffee for them in the morning and bring it in, and have it sitting at their desk. Or maybe you know what their favorite candy is. They walk in in the morning, and you've popped a couple Reese's on top of their keyboard, so they're surprised with that in the morning. Again, it doesn't have to be anything huge. It's more of a specific, ‘I'm thinking of you, so I got this specific thing that I know you enjoy.’” (11:47—12:55) -Michelle

“Now, let's remember that this is SFW — safe for work — physical touch. Let's not get HR involved. So, physical touch in the workplace is going to be fist bumps and high-fives. It might be a hug. Some teammates really love a good hug. Some would really rather you not. So, this one is a really important one to identify. Is this this person's language of appreciation? But again, you can't go wrong with a, ‘Hey, great job. High-five,’ or a quick little fist bump, a little pat on the back, even.” (14:26—14:57) -Michelle

“When you show appreciation or gratitude, make it genuine. You can't just check the box like, ‘Oh, I showed my gratitude. I said thank you.’ Say thank you for something that's really specific. Make sure that it's something that matters and that you genuinely feel gratitude for. Otherwise, people know. People can tell when you're being disingenuous.” (16:20—16:42) -Michelle

“The best way to make sure that this is something that really becomes part of your culture is to systematize it. So, what's the first step? The first step is figuring out what is your team's language of appreciation. There are a ton of free resources. You can literally Google “five languages of appreciation in the workplace free quiz”. You could have team members self-identify which one they feel like they are. And then, let's write it down. Let's have them fill out a survey on what they appreciate. Do they prefer to receive recognition as part of a group? Guilty. I love a good core values medal in front of the entire team. But someone else might like to receive that kind of information privately. They don't like to be in front of a group. So, identifying how they like to receive that appreciation, and when, and where.” (17:12—18:05) -Michelle

“At the end of the day, don't make it hard. Just get in there and do it. Tell people that you appreciate them, show them that you appreciate them, and try to do it in their language.” (21:11—21:20) -Michelle

Snippets:

0:00 Introduction.

1:53 Why this is an important topic.

4:22 The five languages: Words of affirmation.

7:55 The five languages: Quality time.

10:16 The five languages: Acts of service.

11:33 The five languages: Gifts.

14:21 The five languages: Physical touch.

16:11 Be genuine.

16:58 How to systematize this in your practice.

19:20 Have scheduled downtime.

21:05 Final takeaways.

Michelle Wakeman, BSDH, Bio:

Michelle Wakeman, BSDH, brings nearly 20 years of clinical dental hygiene, administrative, managerial, and sales experience to the table. She has a passion for people and a natural aptitude for communication that has led her to develop meaningful relationships throughout her career in dentistry. As a coach, she seeks to help dental practices develop systems that enable them to enhance their patient experience, leading to better relationships among owners, team members, and patients, along with profitable outcomes.

In her off time, Michelle can usually be found at the ice rink supporting her son, Hunter, in hockey, the ball field cheering on her son, Carter, or the gym, reliving her days as a gymnast with her daughter, Leighton.
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