Career Managment Best Practice: Say Thank You

It’s been a rough world for the last 2 years.  Many of us have been working from home. Isolated from our teams and missing good take out lunches.

Some of our leaders have been able to manage well – they offer praise and support.  They understand when the dog is barking at the Amazon driver and they make sure to let you know about vacancies and stretch assignments.  Others not so much.

You have probably heard about The Great Resignation.  And if you spend any time on LinkedIn, it looks like the whole world is “honored” or “humbled” to be accepting a new role with the greatest company ever.

You may have been thinking about exploring opportunities yourself. Maybe you want to start something entirely new or maybe you just want to work in a different area of the company.  But how do you find the time and the energy to even start?

It would take way more than this blog post to take you through a full on job search strategy but here is a good place to start:  the thank you.

It is amazing with these two words can do.

Especially when they are unexpected.

When we go to an Awards banquet, we know people will speeches and thank everyone including their mother.  We expect it.

But when someone stops you on the street to thank you for shoveling their driveway, that really means something.  It puts a real spring in your step.

The same holds true in the business world and by extension, in the journey to improve your career.

Let me give you some examples.

Say you sign up for a webinar. You put it in your calendar and you actually log in on time.  And it turns out to be totally worth it.  The speakers are great and the presentation is engaging.  The time flies by and you come away with a couple of gems. Before you sign off, you take a screen shot of the presenters name.

Later that day when those ideas are still rolling around in your brain, look  up the speaker on LinkedIn, compose a short note thanking him or her for such a high value presentation and hit send. 

Say you are running behind because you forgot to put bathroom breaks in your calendar and your colleague not only covers for you but makes it seem like they were going to do it all along.  No one is the wiser and your anxiety goes way down.

After the meeting, call them or better yet, hop on Teams and thank them for doing that.  It was more than what was required and it meant a lot to you.  Take the opportunity to let them know how much you appreciated it.

Say the President of your company hosts a Town Hall.  New plans are announced that sound pretty exciting.  People ask some tough questions during the session and she does a great job of answering a constructive fashion.  You could send a note thanking her for a) the new plan and b) doing such a good job of stick handling the Q and A.

Say you are cruising LinkedIn and you see a neat post by someone you know.  You appreciate the thought they put into sharing the content.  Perhaps it was creative or brave or funny.  Share it to your network with a big thank you mentioning that person.  No one has to put stuff on LinkedIn, They do it to be a good community person. 

I cannot guarantee that any of these people will acknowledge your notes but you can bet they will read them.

Everyone likes a little recognition and they remember it and where it came from.

The President of your company might take note of your positive attitude and nudge your manager to promote you.

The webinar speaker might work at a company you admire and might be open to making an introduction to the right hiring manager.

Your colleague might be the one your ask to be a reference when you are interviewing for your dream job.

And it all started with a thank you.

Two simple words.

Use them often.