Quality Time: Show Your Support In
The best way to show you are a team player is to show up! Organizations that emphasize collaboration and being visible to one another realize how face-to-face time indicates appreciation and membership at work.
If you want to show your colleagues that you care about them and the organization you’re working for, it never hurts to think of creative approaches to or spend time with them at work or outside of work. This could mean collaborating on a project, organizing the summer golf tournament, or even a company sports team. You may also express your gratitude to someone by taking someone out for a meal, dropping by their workspace to see how they’re doing, or going for a walk during lunch break.
Some workers feel valued by being offered one-on-one meetings and check-ins. Bottom line, when appreciation is delivered to an employee whose primary language is quality time, it needs to be personal. A simple pat on the back or good job email may not resonate or hold the same weight.
For some people, nothing beats good old-fashioned professional facetime. Notably, this is generally the case with new members who want to establish trust in a connection before acting in collaboration.
Toxic Workplaces: A Guide To Navigating A Problematic Relationship With Your Job
Ive been fortunate to have had some great managers in my time, but often, as a hard worker or someone who just wants to get the job done to the best of my abilities, I have had bosses who have taken that for granted, explains Mia*, a 26-year-old marketer from London.
For a long time, I didnt know whether I should feel incentivised and valued when it came to work. I always talk about love languages with friends in relation to relationships both platonic and romantic but why isnt that conversation ever about another significant relationship that many people have to live with: the one with their boss? I get that in fast-paced environments, encouragement and gratitude can be lost, but they do go a long way, especially in the age of continual burnout.
Tips For Working With People Who Value Tangible Gifts
Here are three rules of thumb on getting it right for the Tangible Gift-speakers in your life:
Identify the people who need gifts to feel appreciated. Observation is key. When a team member shows off the presents they get from loved ones, that may mean they are gift-driven.
Choose gifts that the receiver will genuinely value. Pay close attention to individuals interests and reflect those in the present you choose. And thats the point of the Tangible Gift: making the person feel seen, not just for what they do, but who they are.
Communicate the meaning behind the gift. Tell the person why youre giving them the present. It will help drive home the sense of appreciation that youre trying to express.
As a manager with an employee who value Tangible Gifts:
Keep an ongoing wish list of material things or experiences the gift-driven person expresses a desire for.
Make gifting random, personal, and unconditional.
As a team member with a manager who values Tangible Gifts:
Choose gift-giving times carefully. You dont want a gift to come off as a bribe to curry favor for an upcoming performance review or promotion.
Don’t Miss: How.to.change Language On Amazon App
Universities And Colleges Using The5 Languages Of Appreciation In The Workplace
Over 725 of colleges and universities are utilizing The5 Languages of Appreciation in the Workplace, the Motivating By Appreciation Inventory, and the Appreciation at Work training resources. The following schools have utilized one or more of our resources either as a text for a course, in training with their staff, in seminars given, or in research activities:*
- Arizona State University
- University of South Carolina Medical School
- University of Texas
Love Languages Help Maintain Intimacy
Regularly talking about what keeps your love tanks full can build more understandingâand ultimately, intimacyâin your relationship. You’ll not only learn more about one another, but you’ll also connect in deeper, more significant ways. When this happens, your relationship feels more intimate.
A 2016 review published in the Global Journal of Health Science concluded that improving communication skills can aid intimacy in a marriage.
Read Also: Easiest Programming Languages To Learn
Love Language : Receiving Gifts
Ask yourself, how do you feel when your partner gets you thoughtful or extravagant gifts?
Examples: You get a gift or a small treat from your partner that tells you he/she was thinking about you.
If these things make you feel the most loved and happy, receiving gifts may be your primary love language.
What’s Your Workplace Love Language
You’ve heard of love languages in romantic relationships, but does love language have a role in the workplace? We’re here to identify our love languages at work to work better together.
The Five Love Languages: How to Express Heartfelt Commitment to Your Mate
- Words of Affirmation
- Receiving Gifts
You May Like: Can You Learn Sign Language On Duolingo
Tips For Working With People Who Need Quality Time
Quality Time, like Tangible Gifts, should be offered randomly and not always directly connected to ones work obligations. The delight of giving someone your time is in letting them know you want to spend time with them, not that you have to spend time with them.
As a manager with an employee who values Quality Time:
Make a point of inviting them to lunch so you can get to know them as a person.
Set up regular one-on-one meetings to touch base.
Invite them to collaborative meetings or work sessions to show you value their contribution.
Devote time to building team cohesion. Set up virtual co-working sessions, board game or trivia nights, and other fun group activities.
As a team member with a manager who values Quality Time:
Offer to have conversations face to face, either via live conferencing or in person.
Invite them to brainstorming sessions to show you value their guidance.
Include them in off-hours events .
They Don’t Fix Other Relationship Problems
The five love languages won’t fix all of your relationship issues they are simply one tool of many you can use to improve communication with your partner.
Research shows that couples who use each other’s love languages feel the happiest within their relationships when they also use self-regulation tools to handle their own emotions. While the love languages were a tool, the couples’ accountability for their emotions and behavioral changes contributed the most to their overall happiness.
Don’t Miss: Merida Mexico Spanish Language Schools
Findings About The 5 Love Languages At Work
Words matter. There are 2 winners when it comes to the top love language for receiving appreciation: Gifts and Words of Affirmation . It seems obvious that people would be interested in physical gifts from their employers, but it turns out that praise is equally important.
On top of that, almost everyone uses Words of Affirmation to show their appreciation to colleagues.
And theres another interesting factor: Words may actually play into tangible rewards 68% think that public recognition and praise has at least some impact on their ability to get a raise or promotion.
Theres a place for Physical Touch in the workplace after all. Next, lets address that with the thing youre probably wondering about mosttouch. Chapman defined physical touch in the workplace as handshakes, high fives, and maybe even a literal pat on the back. 20% of people use physical touch to show appreciation at work, and 3% considered it their primary love language.
Women care about Acts of Service, men like team bonding. Women were much more likely to crave and show appreciation through Acts of Service at workthink getting coffee for a colleague, taking notes for someone who is out. A full 59% of women list it among their top love languages vs. only 41% of men. Men, on the other hand, lean much more heavily toward Quality Time and team bonding .
Translating The Five Love Languages At Work
Ah, its the time of year when love is in the air. Some may argue that you dont need a specific holiday, a dozen roses and a box of chocolates to prove your loyalty to a significant other. But theres a lot to be said for showing appreciation to strengthen your relationship.
Appreciation has many formsroses are nice for some. For others, doing the washing will have them catching feelings. It all comes down to your Love Language. In 1992, Dr. Gary Chapman wrote a book, outlining the Five Love Languages® the different ways people express and receive love. Understanding your partners expectations and needs will do more for a relationship than Cupid can.
The Five Love Languages applies to all kinds of relationships amongst friends, family and yes, even colleagues. In fact, Dr. Chapman made his concept more workplace appropriate with the book The Five Languages of Appreciation in the Workplace.
In a recent McKinsey & Company survey, the top 3 factors employees cited for breaking up with their employers included: not feeling valued by the organization , by managers , or dont feel like they have a sense of belonging . Some employers assume feeling valued translates to more cash in hand. But thats not always the case. It comes down to what Language of Appreciation speaks to you.
You May Like: Mgh Institute Of Health Professions Speech Pathology
Love Language : Quality Time
Ask yourself, how do you feel when your partner gives you their undivided attention and you engage in meaningful conversation or activities?
Examples: You and your partner have a date night, go on a trip together, or have a deep conversation?
If these things make you feel the most loved and happy, quality time may be your primary love language.
Incorporating The 5 Love Languages In The Workplace
If someone strives to start up a business or an organization, they have to take into account the livelihood of each person that they have working for them if they want their business to succeed . We dont often think about all of the other factors that make a business tick, other than just plain hard work. However, in order to empower an organization, you have to empower its people. To empower people, leaders have to demonstrate appreciation in ways that maximize the impact for each individual . In addition, studies have shown that if a boss, manager, or employer can adequately foster and cultivate a positive, healthy, and happy work environment, team members will seamlessly work together, be more productive, and more engaged, therefore helping the business or company as a whole . The fact of the matter is that employees and people who happen to be volunteers do a better job and perform at a higher level if they feel valued and appreciated . In addition, staff can learn to motivate and inspire each other as well. In addition, when peers, teams, and colleagues support one anothereveryone feels valued and appreciated, and people are able to perform at peak levelscreating a positive snowball in regards to changing the culture of the workplace . Next, I will talk about how the five love languages can be incorporated in the workplace.
Don’t Miss: Languages Of The World Most Spoken
Does A Language Count As A Skill 5e
Image credit: https://5echaractersheet.com
While a language itself is not a skill, it is certainly a useful tool that can be used in many situations. A character with a good grasp of a language can use it to communicate with others, gather information, and even influence events. In some cases, a character might even be able to use a language to create an advantage for themselves or others.
What Is Your Professional Love Language
Youre a star I appreciate you Heres a token of my affection
Expressing love and appreciation for a significant other, family member, or friend can be as easy as sending a thoughtful text or gifting something special. But when it comes to the workplace, how can you appropriately relay your appreciation and yes, love, for your colleagues and team?
The concept of love languages is an oft-discussed topic in popular culture around how one expresses their affection towards their partner. They are broken into 5 behaviors:
First popularized by a book published in 1992 by Gary Chapman, The Five Love Languages are interpreted as the ways in which an individual would like their partner to express their love for them.
Not sure what that looks or sounds like? Observe how your partner displays affection to you. Its common for people to display their affection in the manner in which they prefer to receive it, as that is the language they understand.
However, the purpose of love languages is actually to identify your partners preferred language, which may be different than yours. By understanding how your partner prefers to receive affection, you can then affirm them in the language they understand, and vice versa.
You may need to dial back on the candy-grams, but understanding the professional love language of your coworkers can do wonders for your work relationships.
Read Also: Linguistic Justice Black Language Literacy Identity And Pedagogy
Actions Speak Louder Than Words: Acts Of Service
Another way appreciation can be shown to coworkers or supervisors is through acts of service. Even if you genuinely mean well when complimenting someone or giving them a gift, all a coworker may need to feel appreciated is assistance with finishing or participating in a project/task. To summarize, some individuals feel more loved and acknowledged if another person volunteers to help them or offers to “lend a hand.â
For some, there’s nothing better than when a partner goes out of their way to help around the house, wash the car or make dinner even after a hard day. Similarly, small gestures show your professional pals whose primary language are acts of service they are valued. A few service-based acts can go a long way, like assisting with demanding assignments, troubleshooting technical issues, picking up the afternoon coffeeâbasically any tiny favor to help make their day more enjoyable.
The Crucial Role Of Appreciation In The Workplace
Writing a business appreciation article with the theme of Valentines Day is seasonal and gimmicky, but dont be fooled. This article about work appreciation isnt a fluff, warm-fuzzy piece.
Gallup describes the current struggle to attract and keep their job-hopping millennial employees as a war. What does this have to do with appreciation in the workplace? Well as companies battle for recruiting and keeping the best and brightest, all of their clever new ideas and approaches are overlooking the most easily executed strategies: employee recognition.
So do your employees feel appreciated?
Only one in three workers in the U.S. strongly agree that they received recognition or praise for doing good work in the past seven days.
This shows that statistically, quite a few of your current employees dont feel appreciated. Either youre not appreciative of your employees, or your expressions of appreciation arent being felt.
So lets discuss effective ways to show employee appreciation in the workplace.
You May Like: Love Language The Card Game
The 5 Love Languages In The Workplace
Do you know the 5 love languages? The 5 Love Languages is a book written by Gary Chapman. The book dates back to 1992 but is still relevant today. In essence, we can express and experience love in 5 general and universally recognized ways. Everyone expresses love in a different way, but it can be reduced to one of the 5 general love languages. The 5 love languages are: words of affirmation, quality time, receiving gifts, acts of service and physical touch. What often goes wrong is that we give love in the way we want to receive it ourselves. When you want to express love to another, you have to do it in his or her love language. In short: you have to treat the other person the way they want to be treated. We can also apply these love languages in the work environment. Not in a romantic way, of course, but in order to achieve better communication and cooperation, which can only benefit well-being at work. In this blog post, we discuss the 5 love languages applied in the workplace.
What The Heck Is A Love Language Is This Office
It might sound strange to suggest using love languages to improve your professional relationships. Sorry to disappoint, but you wonât find any hot tips on how to woo your work crush, and generally, most tend to discourage romance in the office. But if you want to discover new ways to communicate, appreciate and understand your colleaguesâyouâre in the right place!
So, what does love have to do with the workplace?
Well, think of it like thisâ¦
Your work is comparable to a marriage, whether you like it or not. Your colleagues and customers get to see you at your best and you’ve made a vow to spend nearly everyday with themâat least for a few years. And just like marriages, business relationships need work to keep them alive and thriving.
The 5 Love Languages, is a concept that was first introduced in 1992, by Philosophy Ph.D Gary Chapman and itâs rapidly gained popularity in recent times. The theory focuses on identifying specific communication preferences to improve connections with romantic partners and provides advice on maintaining mutually rewarding relationships with others around you based on the five language categories.
Not everyone expresses or experiences love in the same way, and likewise, people are diverse in the ways they prefer to receive affection. The Five Love Languages are distinct ways to communicate and receive affection:
- words of affirmation
- acts of service
Don’t Miss: Best Text To Speech Apps