Leadership and Celebrating Successes

Celebrating one’s successes is a very powerful tool in building strengths and raising productivity. I always encourage anyone I work with to celebrate successes in life, big or small, it doesn’t matter, there is always a reason to celebrate!

Celebrating one’s successes is a great tool for building employee empowerment, leadership development and creating a strong company culture. Celebrating an employee’s achievements will make her feel valued and will increase her level of job satisfaction, raise productivity and decrease overall turnover.

A frequently forgotten “side effect” of celebrating success is the message your acknowledgement of performance sends to the rest of the team/company. So when you choose to celebrate an employee and you publically praise her, ask your self: "does this message support the company vision, mission and culture?" Some of you may say: “of course it does,” but that is not always the case.  

Let’s say that one of your team leaders has put in 240 hours this month (160 being an average workweek). Her dedication may be admirable and you may have all the background information to understand why she worked 80 hours of nights and weekend. However, what will her peers and junior staff read into leadership celebrating a 240 hour workweek? Will they think “apparently I have to work 240+ hours to be a success in this company?”

My advice is to align the rewarding of exceptional employee effort and celebrating their success with your company’s vision, mission and culture. Look for those elements in your business you would like to build, habits you would like to see expanded. Then highlight these elements by celebrating your employees’ successes in those areas. This approach will send a very powerful and constructive message, empower your employees and increase your bottom-line results!