The Power of a Smile: A Secret Ingredient to Employee Engagement

Today, I was asked to sit in on an employee relations situation with a team leader and her employee. When arrived, the angst was high, many emotions and concerns were thrown out at once that I cannot even hear clearly. (thinking to myself, how am I going to be able to help, yikes!) So they took turns to talk and hear the other one with respect (they vowed me with this). My job was to listen, not to "listen to understand" or "listen to solve" BUT LISTEN WITH PRESENCE, trusting the Spirit will show me the next step.

We distilled it down to this very quickly: we needed the employee to stay because production is busy and have high demands to meet in order to serve the customers, not because the team leader was being difficult (she herself has sacrificed much of her family time to serve) so we asked kindly: will you please help out the company, and he said absolutely. Then next up, he has been dealing with a lot in his personal life and therefore admitted he has been daydreaming a bit while he's on the line and could not catch everything. The team leader is extraordinarily accountable and always points out to make sure he is doing his job well. Still, she cares very much about him and admits that he usually does a good job; only recently, there have been more errors. So, we explained that accountability is the form of love; she corrects him because she wants him to succeed, BUT while we are overworked and under pressure, we could still have some fun and lightheartedness, so I challenged the team leader to catch him doing something great every day. Finally, I challenged them to high-five each other every day, and they immediately fist-bumped each other on the spot and smiled. I am so amazed at their receptiveness.

We crave to understand and be understood, and we yearn to care about each other. Humanity is created to love. I don't ever underestimate the power of a touch or the power of a smile. People can hear your smile over the phone, and people can feel your smile down the road and around the corner before they even see you. KEEP SMILING! Lift other's spirits. Sometimes it is not as hard as we make it out to be! :)

-an average gal who gets to work with incredible souls