“Stop giving meaningless praise and start giving meaningful action.”
― Steve Maraboli, Life, the Truth, and Being Free
Do you know it is very possible for people to commend your great efforts, praise you but never appreciate you?
Confusing right? Let me break it down…
According to Quora.com, Praise means to laud or compliment something
whereas appreciate means to recognize full worth of something and show your confidence in it, support it because you liked it.
According to ,
Praise comes directly from the heart. It is pure love. It does not require any other person to be involved – you can do it to self and others. There needs to be no evidence supporting the praise as the heart needs no logic. Praise can be done both for strengthening existing beliefs and to form new beliefs. In other words, praise is given not only for a quality that we already observe in someone, it is also useful to give praise to bring out in the other a quality we would like to see. There is no comparison explicitly intended with others, but it is quite common for a loving heart to talk in superlatives while giving praise.
Appreciation comes from a happy mind in a state of gratitude. Both mind and heart are involved in giving appreciation. Usually appreciation requires something or someone else to appreciate, as it is usually not used in the context of self. There needs to be evidence supporting the act of appreciation (and hence the mind gets involved) Usually, there is no comparison made with others.
Often times, we get to mix these two words up. We should never be contented with getting praised and never appreciated especially in a work environment. Imagine a cleaner being praised for been effective, reliable and trustworthy. Everyone has heard about his works but his employers refused to increase his pay nor grant him that leave he has been asking for for months.
They commend his works and praise him quite alright but they do not see the need to appreciate him by increasing his pay or allow him some time off work to rest and attend to his own personal affairs.
Praises ends with words of mouth. Praise can be empty. Praise can uplift us, but not always fortify us. “You’re so amazing.” “You’re so talented.” “You are such a nice person.” “You are such a good worker.” “You are doing a great job!!!” Praise has no specific reflection of value, worth, impact or guidelines attached to it. It can seem insincere.
While I agree that it could earn you recognition with time, I have come to realize that appreciation boost morale. When an employer feels under appreciated, it demoralizes such and their work begins to suffer.
Appreciation however is an active expression of gratitude. When it is done openly, it goes to say such talent is recognized. Appreciation goes hand-in-hand with encouragement: “Your results surpassed my expectations and made all our jobs easier today. Keep it up.” Appreciation can also be expressed in gifts, raises, promotions and special privileges. It is an essential element of partnership and teamwork.
No matter how new this employee could be in the firm or a lower subordinate, if they have made an impact we should endeavor to appreciate them in whatever form we can as an employer. This also helps to keep other staffs up on their toes.
What are your thoughts on this? Have you ever felt less appreciated at work or even at home but praised every now and then? Do you sometimes feel you need more than just praises?
If you love this article, you may also like Perseverance: Major Key to Success and Do you love your Job?
Nice word, pure fact thank you so much debswrites for throwing more light on it when a worker is being praised and not appreciated its brings down morale it has happened to me before so I know how one feels when he/she is being praised and not appreciated. I pray employers change o
Author
Thanks for reading and sharing your thought Maria. We can only hope and pray and wish we can change this orientation when we get to that position?
Nice article…… i Appreciate You….. Welldone and keep up the good work
Author
Thanks for reading and leaving a comment
Your intelligence and wisdom is indeed amazing. Read this post and each statement was an eye opener for real. The first line got me like how? But now I’m really enlightened.
Author
Awww, thanks for reading dear and leaving a comment? Still rolling my eyes tho??
who are the ninjas kidnapping my comments?
I love how you weave yourself through the two sometimes synonymous but different word which is praise and appreciation. you clearly did great
Author
I’m beginning to wonder why they are doing this to you??
Thanks for reading Emmanuel and sharing your thought
they had better be kiaful tho! ahn ahn
Author
??? They had better be