{"id":2219,"date":"2013-03-27T07:10:48","date_gmt":"2013-03-27T07:10:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.chaordicsolutions.co.uk\/blog\/?p=2219"},"modified":"2013-03-27T07:10:48","modified_gmt":"2013-03-27T07:10:48","slug":"hidden-power-of-gratitude","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.chaordicsolutions.co.uk\/blog\/from-our-change-management-consultants\/hidden-power-of-gratitude\/","title":{"rendered":"Hidden power of gratitude"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Change<\/a>Hidden power of gratitude: relatively cost-free opportunities to motivate through heightened sense of self-worth.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Extract from Harvard Gazette – Chuck Leddy:<\/strong><\/p>\n

In \u201cSidetracked: Why Our Decisions Get Derailed, and How We Can Stick to the Plan,\u201d<\/a> Francesca Gino<\/a>, an associate professor at Harvard Business School<\/a>, explores a range of fascinating subjects, including how emotions influence decisions and the often-thorny matter of understanding the perspectives of others. Blending social science and real-world examples, Gino\u2019s book also highlights the science of gratitude.<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cThe message of \u2018Sidetracked,\u2019\u201d Gino said in an interview, \u201cis that a lot of these forces happen even though we are unaware of them. People might just not realize how powerful expressions of gratitude are.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

In two of the gratitude experiments, Gino worked with Professor Adam Grant<\/a> of the Wharton School<\/a>. They first asked 57 students to give feedback to a fictitious student, Eric, regarding his sloppy cover letter for a job. Half were emailed a terse confirmation: \u201cI received your feedback on my cover letter.\u201d The other half received gratitude: \u201cI received your feedback on my cover letter. Thank you so much! I am really grateful.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

When Gino and Grant measured the students\u2019 sense of self-worth afterward, 25 percent of the group that received just an acknowledgment felt higher levels of self-worth, compared with 55 percent of the group that received thanks.<\/em><\/p>\n

In a follow-up experiment, participants received a message from another fictitious student, Steven, asking for feedback on his cover letter. Would participants who had received thanks from Eric be more likely to help Steven? Indeed. More than double the percentage of students in the gratitude group (66 percent) helped Steven, versus just 32 percent of those in the no-gratitude contingent.<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cReceiving expressions of gratitude makes us feel a heightened sense of self-worth, and that in turn triggers other helpful behaviors toward both the person we are helping and other people, too,\u201d Gino said. She described the scope of the \u201cgratitude effect\u201d as \u201cthe most surprising part\u201d of her research.<\/em><\/p>\n

Gino built on the research in a field study that looked at 41 fundraisers at a university, all receiving a fixed salary. The director visited half of the fundraisers in person, telling them, \u201cI am very grateful for your hard work. We sincerely appreciate your contributions to the university.\u201d The second group received no such expressions of gratitude.\u00a0 What was the impact of the director\u2019s thanks? Gino said that \u201cthe expression of gratitude increased the number of calls by more than 50 percent\u201d for the week, while fundraisers who received no thanks made about the same number of calls as the previous week.<\/em><\/p>\n

By missing chances to express gratitude, organizations and leaders lose relatively cost-free opportunities to motivate, Gino said.<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cI spend a lot of time working inside organizations and see teams working together to accomplish a task, usually with a deadline,\u201d she said. \u201cOftentimes, you don\u2019t see the leaders going back and actually thanking the team members. Those are situations where expressions of gratitude from leaders could have wonderful effects.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

Gino has seen those effects up-close, in both her own behavior and that of those close to her.<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cMy husband is now working for a start-up. I received flowers and a note from his company\u2019s CEO thanking me for my understanding because my husband had been up all night working on a big project.\u201d The gesture was a motivator for her husband, Gino said.<\/em><\/p>\n

The work behind her book, she said, \u201creally makes me think more carefully every time I am the one expressing gratitude to others. I don\u2019t want to miss opportunities. \u2026 I learned from my own research and now try to say \u2018thank you\u2019 much more often.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

More …<\/strong> http:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/gazette\/story\/2013\/03\/the-power-of-thanks\/?<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Hidden power of gratitude: relatively cost-free opportunities to motivate through heightened sense of self-worth.  <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":38,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[9],"tags":[40,43,41,42,94,95,35,11,10,12,98,100],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.chaordicsolutions.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2219"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.chaordicsolutions.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.chaordicsolutions.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.chaordicsolutions.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.chaordicsolutions.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2219"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/www.chaordicsolutions.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2219\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2227,"href":"https:\/\/www.chaordicsolutions.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2219\/revisions\/2227"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.chaordicsolutions.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/38"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.chaordicsolutions.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2219"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.chaordicsolutions.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2219"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.chaordicsolutions.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2219"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}