Should we praise publicly?

Jul 10

Subscribe to The Thoughtful Leader newsletter to discover leadership insights to elevate your team's performance.

The oft said phrase, “Praise publicly and criticize privately,” tells us we should.

However, science disagrees.

Published by the University of Chicago, Chan and Sengupta’s paper argues that we should think twice about doing so.

Here’s why:

We typically think of praise as a two-party transaction: the praiser and the recipient.
However, public praise involves a third-party: the observer. In the workplace, it’d be the recipient’s colleagues.
A colleague who observes the praise will get jealous. Chan and Sengupta’s scientific data show that a person observing public praise (for someone else) increases their envy by 15% vs. the control.
It also increases resentment between the observer and the praiser. The resentment goes up by 23% vs. the control.

So think twice before praising someone in public. The recipient might feel good, but the onlookers will not.

My Employee is Watching Movies at Work: What Should I Do and Say?