Could a simple five-minute interaction with another person dramatically increase your weekly productivity?
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employees who know how their work has a meaningful, positive impact on others are not just happier than those who don’t; they are vastly more productive, too. … “Even minimal, brief contact with beneficiaries can enable employees to maintain their motivation,” the researchers write in their paper, titled Impact and the Art of Motivation Maintenance: The Effects of Contact with Beneficiaries on Persistence Behavior, published in the journal Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes.
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the one-two punch of knowing the beneficiary’s needs and meeting him in person generated the largest impact on motivation.
—The Art of Motivating Employees
Knowledge@Wharton
See also, on this blog, step-by-step conversation instructions with video here:
The Conversation Contract.
Wonderful piece and very true! People need interaction. This is especially so in customer service where a good, face-to-face encounter can earn a customer for life. As this piece (http://www.upyourservice.com/learning-library/customer-service-contact/make-it-person-to-person) suggests, personalizing business earns real gains.