Gratitude in Technical Leadership

Recently I've been reading The Happiness Advantage and it's been very interesting. I've always believed our brains our powerful and that happiness is good for us, but this book is really illuminating on just how powerful our minds can be and just how impactful happiness can be in our lives. In the book, the author references a wide number of studies that show just how important our perception is and just how large of an impact happiness can have not only on our perception of the world, but also on our actual performance in whatever task we undertake.

In this article, I'd like to briefly discuss one quality that can help give us small moments of positivity or happiness throughout our day: Gratitude. Now, I know what you're thinking. This is just a Thanksgiving post. And you're definitely right. Even still, I do think gratitude is important any time of the year and in just about any circumstance and isn't just exclusive to the end of November.

So, why be grateful? Why express gratitude? To borrow a little from The Happiness Advantage, they can be small moments of positivity in your day. If you take a moment to say, "thank you," or think of something that you appreciate either in your job or in one of your coworkers, that will be a small moment in your day where you have a positive mindset. Even those small moments of positivity can have a noticeable impact on your work helping you make better decisions.

In addition to that, if you're any sort of leader, taking time to express gratitude for even the small things the people around you do will not only help you, but it will help your coworkers. By spreading that moment of positivity to others, your coworkers will also receive the benefit of positivity in their day helping them make better decisions, do smarter work, and work better together.

While it may seem like a small or trite thing, gratitude can go a long way to improve your day and to improve the performance of those around you. Sometimes we forgo expressing gratitude out of pride or under the assumption that the person must already know it. A better approach is to not leave room for misinterpretation and just be open and honest. So, when someone does something you think is cool or they take time to answer your questions no matter how big or small, take two seconds to say, "thank you," or to make a simple expression of gratitude.

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