November 25, 2019
How to be thankful for your team this Thanksgiving
When it comes to Thanksgiving, our thoughts tend to reach fondly to our family and friends. However, with the majority of our working days being spent with our colleagues, taking the time to appreciate those you work with can be a great way to boost morale in the office over the holiday season.
With Thanksgiving just around the corner, the holiday season is nearly upon us. The kitchen will be filled with the smells of homemade dishes and pumpkin pie cooking in the oven as you gather with your family to celebrate and enjoy the festivities.
Thanksgiving is a time to spend with our family and loved ones. So, when thinking about the people we are thankful to have in our lives, how often do you think about your colleagues? With many of us working full-time jobs, it’s common for us to spend more time with our teammates in any given week than we do our family and friends. Therefore, taking the time to be thankful for your colleagues can help to not only boost team morale, but it can also improve your productivity.
Our ‘work families’ are not just the people who you come together with to drive your business forward but those people who keep us smiling and uplifted. Appreciating your colleagues on a job well done and for going the extra mile can do wonders for team morale and motivation.
Building a positive culture
Research by Deloitte found that there is a strong correlation between happy employees and those who say their company has a strong culture. Maintaining a positive company culture helps to provide employees with a sense of purpose and well-being at work. Think about the roles you’ve been the happiest in; the chances are, a high percentage of this happiness stemmed from working alongside like-minded colleagues and working in an environment which encouraged your growth, whilst allowing your team to pull together on projects.
You can have the best job in the world – but if your company culture struggles to fan the flames of positivity and growth, your love for the job and the company itself is likely to burn out. As such, a strong company culture helps improve employee loyalty. When people feel valued and appreciated by not only their managers but their team as well, it’s likely that they’ll experience a stronger sense of well-being at work – making them enjoy coming into the office each day, and ready to take on their tasks to the best of their ability.
Positivity fuels positivity. Building a contented working culture will have a powerful ripple effect across your whole company, keeping everyone engaged and motivated to achieve success.
Thanksgiving tip: Take extra time this week to offer support to your teammates. It may sound trivial and something you do already, but when we have our heads down, working through our to-do list before we break for the holiday, it can be easy to get lost in your own world. Making the time to simply offer that support to your colleagues where possible will help to encourage teamwork and unity across your team.
Appreciating your team
Your team works hard all year round. Feeling like the work you’re producing is being appreciated is what keeps us motivated and inspired to keep pushing towards our goals and go the extra mile. Showing appreciation for your team doesn’t always have to be done with material gifts – however, Thanksgiving is the perfect opportunity to do that little extra for your team, especially when they’ve done the same with the work they’ve produced.
Perhaps this could be in the form of a thank you card, or by even arranging a small team get-together to celebrate the holidays. Small gestures such as these don’t have to be difficult to organize but can provide your team with a huge boost to their morale.
Thanksgiving tip: If you’re a manager, gestures such as praising your team on a job well done and offering meaningful career and training opportunities to highlight their value to the company are invaluable benefits to employees. Recognizing your team in this way is appreciated all year round and will go a long way in improving employee morale and commitment to work.
The power of friendship
If you’re lucky enough to work with a great bunch of colleagues, fostering friendships between your teammates can have a powerful effect on your motivation – and, of course, your daily well-being in the office. However, the power of friendship amongst colleagues radiates much further than just water-cooler bonding during coffee breaks.
Strong teamwork and friendship go hand-in-hand. Research has shown that when people build friendships amongst their colleagues, it can result in a big boost to team performance. A close-knit team is more likely to have a stronger sense of each other’s strengths and weaknesses, and are therefore able to coordinate tasks more effectively. This efficiency in working cohesively together on projects helps to improve team communication, ultimately resulting in higher levels of productivity.
Working with friends tends to improve your mood – and being able to maintain this positive mindset when coming into the office every day can do wonders for your motivation to pull together and produce great results alongside your colleagues.
Thanksgiving tip: Showing gratitude for your team can strengthen the bond between them and spur them to achieve more together. Before heading home for the holidays, offer a small gesture of thanks to your team for the way they have helped you. If you’re fortunate enough to have fostered fruitful friendships with your teammates, suggest getting together for pre-Thanksgiving celebration after work, or even make time to get together during your lunch break.
Carving out this time to bond with your team after a busy week will not only strengthen the bond between you, but keep you motivated and inspired to work together productively again after the Thanksgiving break is over.
Giving thanks to your team this holiday season doesn’t require a lot of effort, but can do wonders for your team’s morale; and your own, too. Ayoa makes teamwork and collaboration a seamless part of your working day. Discover more here or sign up for free today.