At this time of the year we are all very good at wishing everybody the compliments of the season as I am doing now in wishing all those who are kind enough to read my posts a happy Christmas and great New Year.
However I suggest that especially in the UK we should be consciously better at greeting one another throughout the year and not just during the festive season. In France in offices everybody makes a point of saying hallo in the morning or rather “bonjour” and shaking hands with fellow office workers. They may even do so again during the day. In America everybody is very open and welcomes you to a new working day.
In England we tend to crawl into the office after a difficult commute and may greet our fellow workers with a muttered slightly self conscious hallo to which they, may, mumble something incoherent in return. I am exaggerating to prove the point but this is a distinct characteristic we understated British have.
And this does not go down well. I recall a professor at the Harvard Business School saying how important it was for bosses to acknowledge subordinates. If a boss walks past a fellow worker in the corridor and does not say hallo or at least acknowledge their existence in some way then his or her colleague will think “Oh dear, why was my boss ignoring me? What have I done wrong? Am I going to get fired?” and even “I had better brush up my CV and think about moving on.”
In fact mostly the boss isn’t thinking anything denigrating about the employee at all. He or she is most likely just worrying about their next customer meeting.
But it doesn’t matter. The impression is what is important and taking a few seconds to acknowledge someone or even maybe talk to them will go down much better and perhaps in the long term prevent losing a valued colleague.
The same principle applies to colleagues greeting each other. Here's a simple example of how to engage with a colleague taken from of all places A.A. Milne's Winnie-the-Pooh:
“And how are you?" said Winnie-the-Pooh.
Eeyore shook his head from side to side.
"Not very how," he said. "I don't seem to have felt at all how for a long time."
"Dear, dear," said Pooh, "I'm sorry about that. Let's have a look at you.”
With clients or customers a warm and pleasant greeting when they first arrive is essential. At one law firm I was a partner in we lost a potential new client because they were (wrongly) sent by a temporary receptionist to another office down the road, and then got sent back again.
So let one of your new year’s resolutions be to improve the way you greet subordinates and colleagues on a daily basis throughout the year.
However I suggest that especially in the UK we should be consciously better at greeting one another throughout the year and not just during the festive season. In France in offices everybody makes a point of saying hallo in the morning or rather “bonjour” and shaking hands with fellow office workers. They may even do so again during the day. In America everybody is very open and welcomes you to a new working day.
In England we tend to crawl into the office after a difficult commute and may greet our fellow workers with a muttered slightly self conscious hallo to which they, may, mumble something incoherent in return. I am exaggerating to prove the point but this is a distinct characteristic we understated British have.
And this does not go down well. I recall a professor at the Harvard Business School saying how important it was for bosses to acknowledge subordinates. If a boss walks past a fellow worker in the corridor and does not say hallo or at least acknowledge their existence in some way then his or her colleague will think “Oh dear, why was my boss ignoring me? What have I done wrong? Am I going to get fired?” and even “I had better brush up my CV and think about moving on.”
In fact mostly the boss isn’t thinking anything denigrating about the employee at all. He or she is most likely just worrying about their next customer meeting.
But it doesn’t matter. The impression is what is important and taking a few seconds to acknowledge someone or even maybe talk to them will go down much better and perhaps in the long term prevent losing a valued colleague.
The same principle applies to colleagues greeting each other. Here's a simple example of how to engage with a colleague taken from of all places A.A. Milne's Winnie-the-Pooh:
“And how are you?" said Winnie-the-Pooh.
Eeyore shook his head from side to side.
"Not very how," he said. "I don't seem to have felt at all how for a long time."
"Dear, dear," said Pooh, "I'm sorry about that. Let's have a look at you.”
With clients or customers a warm and pleasant greeting when they first arrive is essential. At one law firm I was a partner in we lost a potential new client because they were (wrongly) sent by a temporary receptionist to another office down the road, and then got sent back again.
So let one of your new year’s resolutions be to improve the way you greet subordinates and colleagues on a daily basis throughout the year.
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