4 Easy Ways to Recognize and Celebrate Success

With the million and one things that keep us busy every day, it is far too easy to forget to take the time to celebrate our many successes along the way. George Burns said it best: “I get up every morning and read the obituary column. If my name’s not there, I eat breakfast.”  Every day we wake up and find our names are NOT in the obituary pages, we should celebrate another day. Life is short, at best. It is over in the cessation of one heart beat. If you are a leader, you are alive and that is reason alone to celebrate.

A lack of recognition and celebration of success in the workplace is an issue we encounter in many organizations. When we interview managers and supervisors and ask them why they don’t spend more time recognizing and celebrating successes on their team, the following three reasons are most often cited:

1. Too busy. These days, most of us find ourselves doing a lot more with a lot less team members. When you are too busy getting your most basic day-to-day functions completed, it isn’t shocking that taking time to recognize and celebrate success is sacrificed in order to get the job done.
2. Putting Out Fires and Solving Problems. When customers are unhappy, the number one priority tends to be putting out the most immediate fires to solve a problem.
3. Not satisfied. Managers and supervisors who tend to have Type-A personalities are driven to accomplish tasks and tend to put off celebrating and recognizing success. A line we often hear from these managers is, “I will be happy when…” followed by a significant accomplishment they hope to see in the future. Unfortunately, these managers tend to always put off their success and happiness to a future date.

It is challenging to celebrate and recognize success when you are too busy putting out fires, or you are unhappy with your current level of accomplishment. But, now is the time to prioritize recognizing and celebrating your daily successes. Here are some ways to celebrate success in the workplace.

Commit to your vision: When you know what your target is, it’s much easier to recognize and celebrate your results. Leaders need a clear, positive vision of how success is defined for their team, department or organization. Will your success be defined by outstanding internal and external customer service? Great teamwork? Record sales and profits? All the above?
Be grateful: When you are genuinely grateful for the honor of leading a group of people who made the conscious decision to follow you, it’s easier to find and acknowledge successes on your team. Even on bad days when everything is going wrong, grateful leaders will find something positive to acknowledge.

Make it a habit: Habits are created by the repetition of thoughts turned into actions. If you are in the habit of finding someone’s success to recognize and/or celebrate every day, you will eventually be a leader who easily and naturally takes the time to recognize others and celebrate their success.

Start off positive: Start every team meeting by asking, “Since the last time we met, what has/is going well or right?” This is a great opportunity for you as a leader to learn from others on your team what they feel is worthy of recognition or celebration. This will also raise team spirit and set the mood for a positive and productive meeting, even if you have to address tough topics.

There are two side benefits of adopting these four keys to celebrating success. The first benefit is that when people feel recognized because you honored or celebrated their success, they are much more willing to support you as the leader in your work to make the organization even more successful.  The second benefit has to with the law of attraction. The more you honor others by recognizing and celebrating their successes, the more others will find reasons to honor you and do the same.