The Power of Acknowledgment

Here’s an interesting (well, at least to me) story which I hope you will find interesting as well. My best friend, Susan Spar, has a cousin, Loretta McCarthy,  who was in Albany in the New York State Governor’s office some months back. She happened to pick up a publication called “The Legislative Gazette” while waiting, and saw an article that asked various legislators this question: “What book would you recommend your colleagues in the [NewYork State] Legislature read?” The answer from one legislator, Assemblywoman Annie Rabbitt, was “The Power of Acknowledgment by Judith Umlas. This book reminds us of the importance of a simple, sincere, thank you.” My best friend’s cousin called Susan, who called me, and of course I called the Assemblywoman to thank and acknowledge her for helping to spread the word and for helping me get closer to my personal mission:  ”repairing the world, one person at a time, using the power of acknowledgment.” So Assemblywoman Annie Rabbitt then invited me to come to the New York State Assembly to be acknowledged and recognized for writing such an important book. So last week, I went up to Albany, made my son miss a lacrosse junior varsity game to accompany his mom, and brought my husband as well for the event. Wow! It was awesome. Since Assemblywoman Rabbit represents just a small part of the county I live in, Rockland County, she made sure to make my Assemblywoman Ellen Jaffee aware of this. Assemblywoman Jaffee had heard me speak to a university women’s organization conference, so she was familiar with the premises of the book. So they both acknowledged The Power of Acknowledgment in front of the entire Assembly on May 7, 2008. I will post a picture of this shortly. The most important aspect of this was helping to get the word out. Other legislators asked me about the book and the sessions I lead, etc. and it looks like I will probably be going back there. So in life, we just never know what amazing circumstances can occur and conspire to help us in our missions, when they are right. So don’t be afraid to speak yours — to anyone who will listen, including me!

I find life to be utterly amazing in the way it unfolds when we acknowledge people. I led an online class for The University of Maryland University College, which adopted The Power of Acknowledgment for one of its classes. A student in the class is a US Airforce Captain stationed in Iraq, who felt the material important enough to tune in for at 3:00 am her time. I was deeply honored by her presence. During my presentation I recounted how I had asked my husband to write me a love letter when I was feeling down, and he wrote one that was so full of acknowledgments I had no idea where they were coming from. He stated that he always thought those kinds of things, but never bothered to get them “from his brain to his mouth. I then requested a love letter “about twice a week,” and he agreed! I recounted how I have been receiving this communications every Monday and Thursday for the past three years!  At the end of the class, Shana sent me this email (which I am reprinting with her permission):

“I really enjoyed the webinar.  I wasn’t sure what to expect since I have never had the opportunity to participate like that before.  Thank you for taking time to speak with us today.  I really enjoyed your book and have been incorporating your suggestions into my daily interactions.  I believe everyone has good qualities (sometimes they are just harder to find in some people).  Once you find those qualities and highlight them you get people to respond better.  Maybe now I can get love letters from my husband too!  Thanks again!

Shana”

So I volunteered to help her get her husband to write her love letters, and she gave me his email address. But apparently, just her request of him was enough to have him write her a love letter — I was so moved to hear what had transpired. Shana wrote this to me:

 ”My husband Ed (Eduardo) recently left Active duty and is a USAF Reservist (Logistics Readiness Officer like me); he is now a deputy sheriff in Cumberland Co. N.C.  I did tell him I wanted love letters and he sent me a very sweet one last night!  I’m working on my response.  He’s been having a hard time with me gone and our 2 1/2 year old still at grandma and grandpas.  She comes home at the end of the month and we are all meeting in Europe for a 2 week vacation. ”

I then wrote to her husband anyway, whose email address Shana had given me when she thought she might need a little help in getting him to write her such a letter. I wrote:

“Dear Ed,

I have had the great honor of meeting your wonderful wife Shana through a web seminar I led for the University of Maryland University College on the topic of the book I wrote, The Power of Acknowledgment. After the webinar, she kind of wistfully wrote to me that she wished I could help her get you to write her love letters. .. But you obviously rose to the challenge, Ed and honored Shana’s request — without any outside prompting. When I first asked my husband, an Excel Developer, to write me a love letter to me, he went dead silent. Now, when asked what it means for him to write them twice a week, he says the following:

“ I like that I get to spend dedicated time to think about us during the work day. It takes me away from here and over to you. It gives me the opportunity to air anything that’s not 100% in sync. It gives me the opportunity to thank you for being who you are in my life, for reminding myself how lucky I am, for reminding me that there’s nobody else who would love me as you do, appreciate me, laugh with me…, make me feel at home, at peace, at one, as you do. It gives me the opportunity to reflect on what we’ve created together – family, relationship, laughter, sadness, growth, encouragement, warmth, being, love. It allows for a committed communication – one which might go missing unknowingly. So it keeps us in contact; connected in spirit.”

        from  Bob Umlas

I hope you get hooked the way Bob did, Ed. And in the meantime, I acknowledge you totally for stepping out and letting Shana know how much she means to you through your love letter of acknowledgment. There is incredible power in this exchange. It takes a secure and self-aware person to be able to do this on request. Many people would so “no” just because they have been asked. I’m so pleased for the two of you to have this kind of communication, especially under these most challenging circumstances you live with. Now Bob’s days for writing his “Hi!” to me are Monday and Thursday. You can feel free to choose your own schedule…”

And lastly, here is what Shana sent to me the other day:

 Judy, Thank you for thinking of me.  Today has been a tough one and a friendly “voice” is always reassuring!  We lost 2 Marines the other day and today was their memorial service.  I only knew them in passing from seeing them at the gym but losing anyone over here is not easy!  Please pray for their families as well.  I’ve included a couple pictures of Ed and Olga so you can see them!  The first one is Ed and Olga at his academy graduation and the second is at Olga’s daycare in Puerto Rico.Shana 

I was in an elevator on Friday with two elderly but spry looking gentlemen. We were all coming from the 4th floor, where I had seen a doctor and assumed they were coming from the Veterans’ Administration office on that same floor. As we went down to the first floor I asked, “Are you both veterans?” They nodded their heads vigorously and said “Yes!” with pride. I then said to them, “Thank you for your service to our country.” They replied in unison, “You’re welcome!” When we got to the first floor, we went our separate ways, but I could hear them from way down the hall. One said to the other, “Isn’t it nice when someone thanks us for serving our country!?” And the other one said, “It sure is!”

So that’s all it takes to make the day of three people brighter — especially mine, when I realized that what I said had been  important to them.  I know some of you do things like this all the time, while others could learn to do them better and more frequently. Please share your stories with us.

This real life experience gives me the chills! It is amazing to see what a simple acknowledgment can do in the workplace, with someone who is challenging to us! Thank you, Trudy, for submitting this great story to me:

 I’m always excited at a project kickoff - the hopefulness and the initial enthusiam about the project always puts me in a good mood. But on this day, my kickoff happiness was tempered when I realized a certain person was assigned to my team: Jim was my technical lead, and I was grouchy about it. I walked away from the kickoff mumbling to myself about how I would have to put up with this guy’s negative comments - he never had a positive thing to say about anything. At every meeting, he would interject with statements like, “No, that won’t work,” or “You will never complete that on time,” and to be honest, he just irritated me. I decided to sit down and have a good talk with myself - this guy was on my team, and no amount of whining or wrangling was going to get me a new technical lead, so I had to just deal with it.

About that time, I remembered some of the concepts I read in Judy’s book: I remembered that acknowledging someone could change their attitude, and I thought that doing something different might change the dynamics of the situation. In our next team meeting, Jim did his usual - he shot down every idea, and ridiculed every deadline we set, and as usual everyone ignored him and kept talking about our project. But, this time, I stopped and took a breath, and said, “Jim, can you tell us more about why you don’t think we can do this?” He looked shocked. The whole team stopped talking and turned to him - I said, “Go ahead, Jim, we’re interested…” He was taken aback - he redded in the face a bit, but actually put his thoughts together and made a very logical argument about a point we had missed. I said, “Wow, I’m glad you pointed that out, Jim, I totally missed it. Could I ask you to take that one step further and help us understand what we should do to resolve the issue?” He said he would have to think about it, which, by the way, was fine with me, because he didn’t speak for the rest of the meeting!

Later, I stopped by his desk to discuss the issue more - I needed a risk mitigation plan for the issue he uncovered. I started the conversation by thanking him for discovering this issue - after all, had we not addressed it, the project could have been in trouble. He was so disoriented by now, he didn’t know how to respond, but I expected that - Judy reminds us in her book that some people cannot accept the acknowledgement we give, so I wasn’t put off by his confusion. Some time later, he came up with some ideas about handling the issue, and actually experimented with some of the solutions to understand what might work - he did excellent work, but no one ever knew it because of his negative approach.

Over the course of the project, I kept quizzing him about possible problems and solutions and praised him privately for being my “failure analyst.” I pointed out to him that it is a great and essential skill to see the weaknesses in a plan - I have a tendency to leap first and look later, so his skepticism kept me out of trouble more than once. After that, he took an active role in project meetings, even to the point of leading some meetings to analyze issues. At the end of the project, I made a special trip over to his desk to say thanks again for his overall efforts, and he told me something so interesting - he said, “You are the only person who listened to me - everyone always ignored me, but now I know I have something important to say.” That statement knocked my socks off…I’m not a great people person, but I think in this case, a simple acknowledgement formed a good and productive relationship with someone who provided a key need to the team! Thanks Judy!!!

 Trudy Patterson, Computer Associates

A lot of people ask me for the Seven Principles from the book The Power of Acknowledgment. I thought I would share them with all of my readers and visitors, in order to spread the word and allow people to start experiencing the power of this tool. I really do believe that Acknowledgment has the power to repair the world, one person at a time. So here are the Seven Principles, which I hope will have meaning for you.

The 7 Principles of Acknowledgment are an excerpt from The Power of Acknowledgment, by Judith W. Umlas. ©2006 IIL Publishing, New York.

1. The world is full of people who deserve to be acknowledged. It will be easier to acknowledge those you care most about if you start by practicing your acknowledgment skills on people you don’t know very well, or even know at all. Then you will begin making the world a happier place.
2. Acknowledgment builds intimacy and creates powerful interactions. Acknowledge the people around you directly and fully, especially those with whom you are in an intimate relationship. What is it about your spouse, your daughter, your uncle, your oldest colleague or subordinate that you want to acknowledge? Look for ways to say how much you value them, and then be prepared for miracles!
3. Acknowledgment neutralizes, defuses, deactivates and reduces the effect of jealousy and envy! Acknowledge those you are jealous of, for the very attributes you envy. Watch the envy diminish and the relationship grow stronger as you grow to accept valuable input from the person you were envying.
4. Recognizing good work leads to high energy, great feelings, high-quality performance and terrific results. Not acknowledging good work causes lethargy, resentment, sorrow and withdrawal. Recognize and acknowledge good work, wherever you find it. It’s not true that people only work hard if they worry whether you value them. Quite the opposite!
5. Truthful, heartfelt and deserved acknowledgment always makes a difference, sometimes a profound one, in a person’s life and work. Rarely given acknowledgments have no more value than frequent ones. Sincere praise should not be withheld due to fear of diminishing returns, of appearing inappropriate or out of embarrassment. These obstacles can and should be overcome in order for you and your recipients to reap the tremendous rewards.
6. It is likely that acknowledgment can improve the emotional and physical health of both the giver and the receiver. There is already substantial scientific evidence that gratitude and forgiveness help well-being, alertness and energy, diminish stress and feelings of negativity, actually boosting the immune system. It is reported that they can even reduce the risk of stroke and heart failure. This research leads us to believe that acknowledging others has similar effects.
7. Practice different ways of getting through to the people you want to acknowledge. Develop an acknowledgment repertoire that will give you the tools to reach out to the people in your life in the different ways that will be the most meaningful to each situation and each person.

Here’s a very dramatic and poignantly written account of how this works. Thank you so much, Sheryl, for sharing this and allowing others to benefit from your incredible experience. You are an inspiration!

Dear Judy,

Sheryl Janssen

I received this wonderful communication from a person who attended a webinar (web seminar) I led a while back and who subsequently read The Power of Acknowledgment:

Dear Judy,

– Trudy Patterson

Dear Trudy,

That is great! A “drive by” acknowledgment (and I LOVE that phrase, which I have already received Trudy’s permission to borrow) is wonderful, so long as it has two characteristics: that it is heartfelt and authentic. An acknowledgment does not have to be long, or eloquent or grandiose. It simply has to move us emotionally, even in a small way, when we deliver it. It has to come from the heart. It makes us feel good, and makes us feel even better when we see the person we deliver it to just “light up.” So use the opportunity, as you seem to be ready to do, to deliver those drive by acknowledgments whenever you see the opportunity. Just make sure they are real, or they won’t land properly and you will be disappointed. I can see the positive feelings rippling out from you to those with whom you come in contact. Aren’t they lucky! Great job!

Here is a wonderful story I received from a reader that I am honored to share with you, with his permission.

December 20, 2007

Russ Lloyd -

Many people are surprised by Principle #3 in The Power of Acknowledgment, which states: “Acknowledgment neutralizes, defuses, deactivates, and reduces the effect of jealousy and envy!” It takes a little while, but most people “get it” and want to test it out in their own professional and personal lives. They tell me that it works, which makes me very happy.

 But now I may be on to something else, which even surprises me. When you write a book like mine, you are fair game for anyone who finds your real life behavior the least bit contrary to what the book espouses. The other night I was with dear friends, and spoke of my sick, elderly parents and the guilt I feel about not doing more for them. My Dad is in assisted living and my Mom, unfortunately, had to be placed in a nursing home due to medical needs she has.  So after 63 years of marriage, they are now living separately, which breaks my heart. And although I do a great deal for them, it never feels like I am doing enough. I also have a very stressful and exciting job, a typically challenging teenage son, an adult daughter who is just finding her place in society and more (e.g. my 17 year old dog is blind, slightly deaf and has dementia).  My wise friend Jerry reminded me that I had written a book about acknowledgment, and that guilt was simply a distraction — a way of avoiding the need to acknowledge myself for all that I am doing. In fact, he said, I could make changes in my life in order to get rid of the guilt, such as changing my work situation, etc. But that as long as I was going to keep things going as they are, then the guilt is useless and purposeless. Guilt only has any value, he said, when it steers us to make new choices. Since I really love the life I have, the work I do, I decided that he is right. Because I don’t want to make any serious changes in my life situation, there is no need for guilt. I have a colleague who is very well known and well respected in our field, and in a similar situation with her parents,  she took a year off from work to get them situated as best she could. I do not choose to do this, even though the luxury of time to handle everything for them and to be with them as much as I want to, is attractive. Without committing to making changes in my basic situation,  the guilt is indeed purposeless. So I have been acknowledging myself for what I AM doing for my parents (a lot), rather than feeling guilty for what I am NOT doing, since then (although I do slip occasionally). Isn’t this an interesting connection between acknowledgment and guilt? It is very curious. I thank my friend Jerry for that insight — it may become another chapter in the next edition of my book.

I hear so many wonderful stories about the results people have when using the 7 Principles of Acknowledgment. From time to time I will publish one of these in my blog, with the permision of the contributor, of course. And I look forward to hearing your stories as well. A colleague of mine, Frank P. Saladis, PMP, has suggested that I write a followup book or a chapter in the next edition of the current book, entitled “The Power of Acknowledgment Unleashed.” Thanks for this idea, Frank. I just may do it!