Dr. Ed Torrey explains three ways to respond when you notice someone doing something remarkable: praise them publicly, tell them privately, or mention it to someone else. That third option, spreading good gossip, builds the strongest connection and makes people want to keep being excellent.
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Foreign. This is Dr. Torrey. Welcome to the Influence Every Day show, where we make every day better and we influence for good. We have a choice. If we see somebody do something remarkable, we have a choice. If somebody does something exceptional, noteworthy, extraordinary, we have options. Now, some of us might choose to be negative about it. Oh, yeah, she does that thing, you know, you know why she's doing that, right? Blah, blah, blah, Right? Some negative intention is, whatever the reason. Or you could say, you know what? Wow, that was. That was pretty cool. I really appreciate that. That was really nice. That was awesome. And just mentally take a note of it. You could also mentally take a note of it and say, wow, I should probably do that myself and maybe potentially change my behavior. Right? You could make note of that to yourself. The other thing you could do is remark about the remarkables. Somebody does something remarkable, you remark about it. In the last episode, we talked about how if somebody contributes something to your team, either your team, your organization, your community, what have you to give credit to them for their contribution. Credit is infinitely divisible. So to give credit doesn't diminish anyone else's contribution. It doesn't diminish anyone else's work. So that's what we talked about in the last episode. But in there we also talked about you could recognize them publicly or privately. Those are also two options when it comes to somebody doing something remarkable. But there's a third option. But first, let's address these for a moment. You could remark publicly about someone doing something remarkable while they're there. You can say, hey, I want to thank the team. I want to do whatever. And specifically, I want to tell you something. The other day, I was in such and such a meeting, and I saw so and so do something remarkable. And here's what she did. And then you lay it out. You tell people publicly, and then you say, thank you. So you tell people publicly, and then you thank the person who was extraordinary. Now, that's a public way of doing it, by the way. You could also amplify that or level it up by doing something, just taking it to another notch, maybe bringing a gift or maybe making a special slide just for that one episode that might seem like it was a mundane thing or a thing that others would overlook, but that person took the extra time or did the thing that was extraordinary. You could do that as well. To level up the public recognition, there's also private recognition. Pull the person inside aside and say, you know what? I was going through my day. I wasn't having the best day. In the world. And I looked over and I saw you do this thing. I just thought, wow, that's remarkable. And so I just wanted to tell you how much I appreciate it. My entire day pivoted on that thing. So you pull them aside and you make it private. And you can also level that up, too, in multiple other ways by talking about its impact. But the point here is we have options when somebody does something remarkable. Well, there's another option that I think is actually far more magical. And in fact, if you've ever heard me talk about the seven simple rules of influence, this is rule number five. It's to remark about the remarkables. If somebody does something remarkable or extraordinary or noteworthy, remark about it, Go tell someone else. Spread good gossip, tell a third party. Oftentimes in influence, involving a third party, when something good happens is often a way of leveling up in a way that you can't even imagine. Let's say you see somebody do something remarkable, Then you think to yourself, wow, okay, I could recognize them publicly. I could go tell them right now, pull them aside and just say, hey, wow, I really appreciate that. Or I could think about somebody who's important to them, somebody whose opinion really matters to them. And you go and you tell that person, you send them an email, you send them a text, you call them, you go and you find them and you tell them. You tell them that this person did something remarkable. Now, what happens? That person is the third party, right? You're not telling the person directly. Generally, there's some of the magic that comes from the third party compliment or the third party remarking about a remarkable or noting a noteworthy. The some of the magic here is that it's without an agenda. If you've ever heard that somebody said something about you in a good way, it just feels so much better. Sometimes when somebody gives you a compliment, there might be other thoughts that you're entertaining about, like, why are they doing this? And sometimes, in the absence of information and data and evidence, our brain defaults to a negative, and so we assume the worst. Now, given that, this avoids it entirely by remarking about the remarkable to somebody who's important to them. It gets back to them, by the way, even if it doesn't get back to them, so what, you've actually talked about a good behavior. You've complimented them to somebody that's important to them. There will be downstream effects, but let's pretend it does get back to them. Here's what's remarkable about this. When you give a third party compliment, you actually increase rapport with you and the person you're talking to because you're talking to them about something good, about something that they care about, something that is important to them and the person that's important to them. You actually increase rapport between the two of you. Then what happens? That person feels better about the other person you just talked about. Now they go and they talk to that person. And that increases rapport between those two. The one who tells them and, and the one who receives it. And guess what else it does? The person that did the remarkable thing, the rapport between you and them increases. The potential connection increases. It levels up because of that third party compliment. So now there's a, there's another impact that's beyond all three and that is if you spread good gossip, it starts to influence other people's behaviors as well. Think about what they could have done and this might actually inform how you tell the other person. They could have ignored that person in the lobby that looked lost, but they didn't. Instead, they took the time to go over and help them find wherever they were going. They could have walked right by that piece of trash on the floor, but they didn't. They turned around, they got, they picked it up and they put it in the trash. They could have sent a generic birthday text, but they didn't. They went a little further and they wrote a handwritten message. They could have avoided eye contact with the janitor in the hall, but instead they engaged. They could have just liked a social media post, but instead they gave a value comment on it. They could have gone home at the end of the day without a word, but instead they walked around to all the members of the team and gave them a little bit of thank you and appreciation. They could have done this, but instead they did this. They could have done the ordinary thing that everyone else would have done, but instead they. They did the remarkable thing. If somebody does something remarkable, remark about it. And Seth Godin said, remarkable is a choice. Remarkable is a choice. Remember that if somebody chooses to do something remarkable, they choose to be remarkable. We should honor them for that. And one way to honor them is to tell somebody that's important to them. Tell somebody that's important to them. So who did something remarkable recently, your life or in your work, in your home? Go tell somebody that's important to them about it. Remark about their remarkable. I'll see you in the next episode. This is only the end of today's show if you let it be. Who needs to hear what you just heard? Go ahead and share it with them. Right now, the Influence Every Day podcast is free. We don't sell advertising space, so telling others is the best way to pay us back. But more importantly, it's the best way to pay it forward. If you enjoyed today's podcast, take a moment to rate and review the show, then check out the additional links and materials that go along with it. They offer more ways to take your influence, your impact, and your relationships to a whole new level. Now go forth and influence for good every Day.
