職場雙語:工作做得好不好,愛聽表揚怎麼辦

How do you know if you're doing a good job at work? Do you rely on praise and constant feedback from your manager as a barometer of your performance?

你怎麼知道自己工作做得好不好？你是不是依賴老闆的表揚和頻繁的反饋來衡量自己的工作表現？

If so, you might be one of your boss' pet peeves. Supervisors are already stretched thin, often working two or three people's jobs when a few years ago they were just doing one.

如果真是這樣，你可能是老闆的煩心事。管理者非常忙，現在的工作量常常是過去兩、三個人的量。

"It's exhausting for your boss," says Peggy Klaus, an executive coach and author of The Hard Truth About Soft Skills. "They don't have the time ... to have to constantly reassure you."

《軟技能的硬道理》（The Hard Truth About Soft Skills）一書作者兼高管教練佩吉•克勞斯說：“這種事讓老闆非常勞神，他們沒時間......不斷地來安慰你。”

Millennial generation workers, those born in the last two decades of the last millennium, are notorious for having been raised in a praise-heavy environment where every soccer player gets a medal and every child is special. Indeed, a 2010 research paper by psychology professors Jean M. Twenge and Joshua D. Foster found that 30% of today's college students scored as narcissistic on the Narcissistic Personality Inventory vs. just 19% in the early 1980s.

千禧員工是在表揚聲中長大的，這些80後和90後的年輕人每個人都會得獎，每個孩子都與衆不同。事實上，心理學教授簡•M•特溫格和約書亞•D•福斯特在2010年進行的一項研究發現，當今30%的大學生在自戀人格表（Narcissistic Personality Inventory）中被歸爲自戀者，遠高於上世紀80年代中期的比例。

But young workers are hardly the only guilty parties when it comes to craving kind words. "Everyone likes to get praised," Klaus says. "Eventually, you need to feel good from the inside. You have to build up your own reserves of self-esteem."

但是愛聽好話的人羣並不只有年輕員工這一個羣體。“每個人都喜歡得表揚，”克勞斯說。“歸根結底，要從內心感覺良好，你必須建立起自尊。”

Casey Cowden, 22, describes herself as a puppy asking to have her head rubbed when she brings her latest accomplishment to the assistant manager in her department at the Charleston County (S.C.) Parks and Recreation Commission. "I really love hearing when I'm doing a good job," says Cowden, who doesn't feel that school prepared her for how to behave in the workplace. "It's affirmation that I'm actually a decent person and I'm doing okay."

22歲的凱西•考登講述她向查爾斯頓公園與休閒委員會（Parks and Recreation Commission）的部門副經理彙報工作成就的情形時，她覺得自己就像一條小狗，渴望主人來輕輕拍她的頭。“我真的很喜歡聽別人說，我做得很棒，”考登說，她並不認爲，學校教授了她在工作場合應該怎麼做。“這些表揚證明我是一個很不錯的人，工作也合格。“

For praise junkies like Cowden, career experts suggest a few steps to break the habit.

對於像考登這樣要表揚上癮的人, 職業專家建議採取以下步驟改掉這個壞習慣。

Praise yourself, privately. Instead of waiting for another person to pat you on the back, keep your own file of accomplishments and kudos, says Kathryn Ullrich, a Silicon Valley-based recruiter and author of Getting to the Top. That may be an email from a satisfied customer or a colleague's recommendation on LinkedIn, but even better is your own record of meeting specific goals you set for yourself. You may want to set up a time log, calendar, or checklist to keep track of your accomplishments. When you need a boost, look over your file to refresh your memory.

私下表揚自己。不要等其他人拍着你的後背鼓勵你，硅谷獵頭、《職場登頂》（Getting to the Top）作者凱瑟琳•烏爾裏克桌，自己可以記錄好個人成就和出色表現。 這些記錄可以是來自一名滿意顧客的郵件，或是同事在商務社交網站LinkedIn上的推薦，但達到自己設定目標的記錄更好。你可以保存一個時間文件、日曆或項目清單來記錄自己取得的成就。當你需要振作一下的時候，看看自己記錄的這個文件，重溫一遍成功的記憶。

"Like an infant learning how to pacify himself, you should learn to give yourself credit instead of looking to others to give you the confidence, the self-esteem, the self-respect," Klaus says.

克勞斯說：“就像嬰兒學習如何讓自己平靜下來，人們應當學會如何相信自己，而不是等他人給你信心和自尊。”

Learn to bite your tongue. The first step is admitting you have a problem. The second is setting up behavioral cues and reminders to stop you from seeking praise. Maybe that's a post-it note on your desk or a stop sign drawn on the margin of your notebook before you go into your weekly one-on-one with your boss. Do whatever it takes to make you think twice.

學會在適當的時候閉上嘴巴。第一步是承認自己有問題。第二步是設定行爲信號和提示，防止自己尋求表揚。比如，在自己的桌子上貼上即時貼，或者是在你和你老闆進行一對一週度會談前在筆記本上畫上禁止符號。儘可能三思而後行。

Replace praise with regular contact. Perhaps you don't have a regular meeting with your supervisor. Now is a good time to request one. If you have a consistent opportunity to report your progress on projects, you may have less of a hankering for praise, says Bruce Tulgan, a New Haven, Conn.-based consultant and author of Not Everyone Gets a Trophy.

用定期聯繫代替表揚。或許，你和老闆沒有安排定期的會面。現在是提出要求的好時機。如果你定期有機會彙報項目進展，或許就不會那麼渴望獲得表揚，康涅狄格州紐海文諮詢師《不是人人都能奪冠》（Not Everyone Gets a Trophy）的作者布魯斯•塔爾幹表示。

"We call it self-reporting rather than bragging," says Tulgan, who tested a number of solutions to the praise problem and found that regular meetings -- along with clear goals and benchmarks -- can work wonders. "You'd be amazed at how self-sufficient the young praise junkies become."

“我們將這稱爲主動彙報，而不是自誇，”塔爾幹表示，他測試過很多解決表揚問題的方案，發現定期會面、同時結合明確的目標與標準，可以取得很好的效果。“你肯定吃驚，這些年輕的表揚迷們可以變得多麼自立。”

Celebrate someone else's success. Another surprising remedy: giving praise to a colleague or group of peers. "It has a lot of positive effect," Tulgan says. Not only does sharing your appreciation improve your coworkers' mood and self-esteem, it may encourage them to pay more close attention to your performance and return the favor in the future.

祝賀他人的成功。另外一個出人意料的處方是，表揚某個同事或某一些同事。“這樣做有很多正面效果，”塔爾幹說。說出你的讚賞，不僅能讓同事心情大好，更加自信，還能鼓勵他們更緊密地關注你的表現，同時在未來做出相應的回報。

If you're still unconvinced that praise addiction is a problem you need to solve, consider the effect that your neediness has on the people around you at work.

如果你仍然不相信表揚癮是一個需要解決的問題，不妨想一想在工作中，你的這項需求對周圍的人產生了什麼樣的影響。

"Instead of making people like you and ingratiating yourself, you're doing the exact opposite," Klaus says. "No one wants to manage you. No one wants to be on a team with you because you're such an energy suck ... It makes you seem very young and very immature."

“這樣做不會讓人們喜歡你，迎合你，結果正好相反，”克勞斯說。“沒人想管你。沒人想和你在一個團隊裏，因爲你是負能量...這種行爲讓你看起來很幼稚，很不成熟。”