In Praise of Praise

Posted on Wednesday, January 21, 2009 by Frank Roche

When you’re young you get lots of praise. First word gets weeks worth of gushing. Potty training? As far as your parents go, you get the Nobel Prize for Domestic Peace. You get praise by the bucket loads when you first start working. You get promoted. More praise. You complete a project. Even more praise.

Then one day the praise fountain turns off.

I don’t remember what age I was when I noticed that people no longer told me that I was doing a great job. It’s not like I stopped doing good work — it’s that people think that once you get to a certain age or certain place in life that you don’t need praise anymore. It’s funny how that works.

Now, I’m not saying that I want praise. (Yeah, I’m talking to you, Mark.) At least not here. But what I do realize is that people need praise throughout their careers. Senior managers like to hear that they’re doing well as much as they did when they were junior functionaries. It applies to everyone — the price of praise is free. Tell someone today.

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User Comments

  1. Mark Walsh

    Jan 21st, 2009

    Praise is nice. A worlds without praise or blame is even better:
    http://www.alfiekohn.org/books/pbr.htm

    I wont say “good article” (praise), I will say is I appreciated your article. Thank you.
    Mark

  2. Wally Bock

    Jan 21st, 2009

    Congratulations! Here's a bit of praise for you. This post was selected as one of the five best business blog posts of the week in my Three Star Leadership Midweek Review of the Business Blogs.

    http://blog.threestarleadership.com/2009/01/21/...

    Wally Bock

  3. Frank

    Jan 21st, 2009

    Wally…that is the best praise of all. I'm honored. Thank you very much.

  4. Legal Process Outsourcing

    Jan 23rd, 2009

    Legal Process Outsourcing relates to obtaining legal support services (legal research, document review, intellectual property and corporate transactional The U.K. Law Society Gazette and National Law Journal articles include contributions from senior counsel at major corporations and international law firms as well as senior executives from the legal outsourcing space.

  5. mszypko

    Jan 23rd, 2009

    Frank what a wonderful post. You are so smart, so talented, such an out of the box thinker! (digging the PRAISE?)

    Let me know when you hit that “age” as I am right behind you my friend!

  6. Derek Irvine, Globoforce

    Oct 23rd, 2009

    This is a terrific post, Frank. Saw it in the CEB Review — nicely done. Now there’s some high praise indeed.

  7. Frank Roche

    Oct 23rd, 2009

    @Derek Thanks so much…that made me very happy.

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  1. [...] of fear of being viewed as currying favor. But those in leadership need recognition, too. In his KnowHr blog (and reprinted in Fall 2009 issue of the Conference Board Review), Frank Roche spoke succinctly and [...]