One-Minute Communications Tips Archive
April 2008

Giving Effective Compliments

When a coworker does a good job, it's natural to give him or her a pat on the back. If you're too lavish or frequent in your praise, you risk diluting its effect or sounding insincere. Delivered right, a compliment recognizes achievement, conveys your appreciation and motivates the recipient to repeat the behavior.

An effective way to compliment someone is to say two or three sentences about the person's action, effort or accomplishment. Be specific and sincere. Such compliments are more meaningful than exclamations like "That was a great presentation" or "You really know your contracts."

Add an emotional component to your praise by describing your feelings about the performance: appreciative, glad, relieved, pleasantly surprised, and so on.

Then add a rational element: mention the results of the person's work, and how they helped the company, team or project.

And whenever possible, praise in public.
 

© Arun Sinha, Access Communications. Access Communications is a marketing communications and technical writing firm based in Stamford, Connecticut, USA. Sign up for Access Communications's One-Minute Communication Tip at http://www.AccessConsultingInc.com. Once a month, you'll receive an actionable idea or technique on an aspect of business communications, distilled into about 150 words.

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