Gratitude Infusion with Kerry Wekelo

Kerry Wekelo, author of “Culture Infusion” and “Gratitude Infusion”, and a relatively new acquaintance of mine, had much to say on the powerful effects of infusion of gratitude on leading teams.

I’m the chief operating officer at Actualize Consulting. We are a financial services consulting firm, so we do a lot around strategies for companies. We’re not financial planners; we’re more strategic in different subject matters like capital markets, treasury, mortgages - so, very complex financial functions. And we’ll help with the advisory, system implementations, business process reengineering, and design, as well. I have a finance degree and a marketing degree, and then a minor in psychology. So a little bit of everything. I’ve been in consulting my entire career, in some capacity. I was on the business side, and then when I started at Actualize, more operational. But I have that systems process background, so building out a company was something I was very intrigued with, so that’s why I joined Actualize. And that had just really speared into more on the cultural side as well.

I still have my responsibilities internally, but now really sharing with other organizations how they can create and maintain a thriving organizational culture as well. I’ve been there for 16 years. Where everything stemmed from, with gratitude and culture and focusing on our people, really just came from needing to change our focus on our people. We had really high attrition rates. So, that’s really been my focus for the last 11 years out of that 16 years; it has just been on our people, making it a place where people want to work. It’s been a really fun journey and gratitude has been a really big part of that.

Getting to Gratitude

Pause, Pivot to Positive: The Three P method

You have another book on culture. I always like a good model, and there’s one you developed, a very simple one called the Three P’s. 

Very simple. It’s “Pause to Pivot to a Positive.” So that’s your three P’s: pause, pivot, and positive. And I’ve kept it simple. I’ve added a bit to it. So, in that pause, you’re pausing in a moment of gratitude. And this is when you’re dealing with any type of challenge or something’s in front of you. Maybe it’s a personal challenge, maybe you got in a car accident or it’s something of that nature; or it could be with somebody on your team, or even personally. But in that moment, you’re pausing, you’re finding something to be grateful for about the situation. 

For instance, let’s say you got rear-ended. You could be grateful that everybody’s safe and sound. That's in really simplistic terms. And then you’re pivoting into this positive - what’s my positive resolution? What do I need to do to move forward in this situation that I’m in? In that instance with the car, do you need to call the cops? Do you need to call insurance? How can I move forward? And I give this example, and I’ve thought about it over the years. For whatever reason, I’ve been rear-ended multiple times; I don’t know, maybe I’m the bad driver. I’m trying to take some accountability. But anyways, I just remember the first time it happened, how many people I called on the phone - “guess what happened?!” And then the last time it happened, I didn’t call anybody. It was just like, “Okay, whatever, no big deal.” So you save a lot of time - okay, this is what happened, and then you’re moving, as quickly as you can - sometimes you have to take more time in that pause, it just depends what it is - but the quicker you can get to a resolution, the better you’re going to be and the more time you’re going to save. 

The Amygdala Hijack: Pause

There’s been research on it. Michael Steger, I’ve looked at his research. You can have twins where one twin would be more predisposed to be grateful, and the other one is more negative, having a more negative connotation. It’s just kind of how you’re hardwired. It’s almost like you’re working out, you have to work out that gratitude muscle. And I always say there’s this cumulative impact if you always go to gratitude first, or always go to “How can I move out of this situation in a positive way?” It really does build, because I was not as quick to move or as quick to think about gratitude before I really started focusing on it with my teams and personally. And then I just saw how much easier my life was and how much more time I had, because I wasn’t spinning. I was using my tools much quicker, and gratitude is one of those tools that makes you feel better. It’s like breathing, right? If you breathe and have a moment of gratitude, you’re going to feel pretty good pretty quickly.

Psychological Safety

A quote from your book says, “I’m grateful for the openness of our firm that allows anyone to express an idea or concern freely and know it will be heard.” I want to understand how gratitude can help develop psychological safety. 

Well, there’s a lot to unpack in that statement. The way that we cultivate that at an individual and a team level is the sheer - and I use the word in my book, it’s called Gratitude Infusion - culture infusion. The reason I use the word infusion is because it has to be present all the time, and from a leadership perspective or a team-level perspective, how you’re coaching the entire organization is that our people come first. Your voice matters. Even how we do our performance, setting that up, there’s an aspirational section on what you aspire to do. And then we reward people if they are coming up with ideas to better the firm. They get rewarded with bonuses or star player, awesome team player awards, kudos. So, when people have an idea, even if we don’t do it, we’re usually recognizing that being brought to the table. 

Pivot: Shift to Positivity

Even though we’ve been in business since 2003, we’re still very entrepreneurial, and we believe we have been successful because our people have helped us continuously with ideas to help us grow. I talk about that in the recruiting process. So it’s one of those things. And I have check-ins with people; I still am very focused on having that individual connection with our people, as well. Sometimes people come into the organization and I’ll set up a meeting with them - and now I say “this is our check-in, I do it with everybody.” But at first, people are like, “Am I in trouble?” [laughs] And I’m like, “No,” but I ask them immediately, within two weeks of starting with the organization, “anything that you could have seen enhanced? Do you have any ideas? Be thinking about that.” I think that’s where that comment comes from - it is infused in the organization that we want to hear your voice, you are going to be recognized for contributions, and nothing is a bad idea. The worst we’re going to say is “no.”

People want to be able to feel they can speak truth without fear of retribution or someone holding a grudge. You recognize and reward that, too?

Well, go back to the Three P method of pausing to pivot to a positive. So if you have a criticism, I would like an alternative solution to that. You can criticize all you want; our philosophy is that it’s fine to have things that you don’t agree with, but what’s your resolution? How can we make it better? I don’t want to spend all that time and that negativity. I want to move to, “What’s a better way? What’s the process improvement?” Or maybe, “What’s the team dynamic improvement? How can we get there?” But we have to recognize that it’s okay. What’s the first rule of improv? “Yes, and.” People are going to come to you with ideas, so you want to hear them, but they also have to be positive and “Okay, this is how we’re going to solve this.” If somebody came to me and had just a flat-out criticism, I would say, “Okay, I hear you, yes, all right.” And if they didn’t come with the resolution, I’m like, “Okay, schedule time with me next week and let’s talk about how you would like to see it done better.”

Collaboration and the Positive

Gratitude for their honesty. Don’t come to me with problems, come to me with solutions. Explain the problem so I’ll get what the solution is, but don’t just come to me with your problems. Come to me with answers. That’s what I pay you for. You call that positivity - that’s part of your three P’s. I think that makes a ton of sense. So, for someone managing a team, you want people to come to you with problems, and hold them responsible for the ideas that could fix it, right?

Or even, you could brainstorm it. Let’s think about it together. Like, what ideas do you have? I’ll think about it too. That’s one of the things that I think has kept us fresh as an organization - having those conversations about how we can do it better. I just had one last week, and we had a 30-minute conversation and we found three process efficiencies, just from me asking her, “What’s not working well? Why are you struggling in your role?” There you go. It was asking what was wrong.

I’ve had many cases where someone came with an idea, and maybe we already had that capability within the firm and they just weren’t educated on it. So, “Yeah, that’s a great idea, we actually already have it.” Or, “That’s a great idea, thank you for sharing. We’re going to go down this path instead of this.” But just circling back with people so they feel heard. That goes back to psychological safety. Most times, you really just need to be heard. That it was safe that you said what you said. 

Managing conflict with the Three P Method

You talk about this a bit in your book, and how gratitude can help. Talk about it - how can gratitude help team members in managing conflict, whether it’s with their peers or with their boss?

Definitely use the Three P method, but if you are having that internal conflict in a team - maybe it’s between a couple people - definitely always get people’s approval to use this technique; and I’ll prep them before, so they’ll have homework, and they’ll come to the meeting - some people joke that they’re going to the principal’s office, then they say it’s not too bad once they get out. Everybody’s always laughing afterwards. Let’s say that you’re having a conflict with somebody. Instead of starting with what the conflict is, you start with why you’re grateful for that person. I ask that they find something that has worked really well with the way that they interact as a team, or maybe a contribution that that person’s had on the team. So, why are you grateful for that person, and then what was your role in the challenge? How did you contribute? 

I’ll give you an example. We had a supervisor and employee type of thing, and when he said, “I could have been a bit more gentle,” then she said, “Well, I could have been a bit less emotional.” So they both kind of took accountability. Then, because they owned up to their part, when we got to the actual conflict, I said, “Do you want to talk about the actual conflict?” They were like, “No, actually, I think now we know we just need to be a little bit more mindful of how we’re showing up,” because one person’s a little bit more aggressive, she’s a little bit more shy. So they were already going to the resolution based on the contributions - “Yeah, you know what, I could be a little bit better in this regard.” A lot of times we’ll defuse the conflict if you start with gratitude, state your role, how you contributed - and I know sometimes people are like, “Well, I had nothing to do with it at all, that person is so wrong.” And it’s like, “Okay, take a moment, I’m sure you could have done something a touch differently.” And if you reflect, you go back to any argument, you could have done something better.

Infusing Gratitude

What’s your advice to those who want a simple gratitude practice?

I think it needs to be what works for you. I’ve done many things over the years. Where I’m at right now is, I do a weekly gratitude with my team. We talk about what we’re grateful for for ourselves, internally, because I think we’re sometimes so focused on the external piece. So, what am I grateful for for myself, what I’m grateful for externally, with my team, the food, or even personally what I’m grateful for. And then I also like to focus on, what’s a win that happened today?

I try to focus on those three aspects at least daily. And then if I forget, I actually have a notepad that has those prompts on it, because you forget. You get busy and don’t remember how amazing your life is. I do that, and then my go-to is that when I have a challenge or I’m feeling a little spinny, definitely take a breath, but I always use gratitude to help move me quicker in whatever emotional negativity I’m facing. And let’s face it, it happens. It happens when you’re driving, it happens at the grocery store, maybe somebody just rubs you the wrong way with a comment that they make.

I have an almost 16-year-old daughter. I’m divorced, so she was with her dad, and I said, “You know what, Kerry, you really need to do your own work, and focus on more positivity and gratitude with her as well, because it just feels better. I say that because, even though I teach on this, I write about it, it’s not always easy. I’m not perfect. I’m sure your listeners are like, “Oh, good.” No, it’s okay, I don’t have to be perfect.

Inward Gratitude

I spent a good deal of my life anxious and even depressed. I discovered the simple power of being able to acknowledge the things in my life that I’m grateful for on a daily basis. Just like mindfulness meditation, it alters the way your brain cells work. I think gratitude does the same thing.

And those coupled together, it’s extremely powerful. Do you know Brené Brown? She’s such a good storyteller, but she also is such a researcher. And she said that the number one thing when people are having extreme hardships in their lives - from losing a child to a house burning down to losing a high-figure job - the number one thing, when she did her research, was that the people who moved through it the quickest are the ones that are focused on gratitude. What they were still grateful for. Like, okay, maybe my house burned down, but I’m alive. That simplistic of a thing, that was the number one thing. And she was blown away that it was gratitude.

With my boyfriend, we do weekly gratitude on Sundays. Sunday evening at dinner. We keep it in our phone in Notes and we share that, and I think it’s extremely powerful. We have that negativity bias, right, that we are focused on the negative, but how about we focus on everything positive that happened this week? And sometimes you’re like, “Wow, there’s a lot that happened this week.” Gratitude, personally and professionally, is brilliant.

Grace - the challenge of accepting gratitude

I personally sometimes have a hard time accepting gratitude. I’m like, “Oh, it’s nothing,” or, “it’s okay.” One of my friends told me one time - he’s really big on gratitude - that when somebody gives you a compliment or expresses gratitude, it’s a gift. If somebody brought you flowers, you’re not going to not take them. Just breaking it down in simplistic terms of saying “thank you,” number one. And the other thing, with your teams and expressing it… So, for you receiving it, just simply saying thank you, and catching yourself - I catch myself about to go into “it’s nothing” - and people now will reflect back to me and say, “Kerry, just say thanks.” I’m like, “Okay, sorry, thanks.” You personally, just saying thank you, leaving it super simple. 

Now, with your teams - and this is what I’ve found - being very cognizant of how people need it. I’ll give an example. On my team I have people that I need to be very grateful on every task, and need to really be grateful. I have other people that if I did that, that would really annoy them. They’re like, keep it moving, right? Got it. And then I have other people who like when they get an award or a grand gesture, because that’s how they feel more appreciated. So, really taking the time to, like - how are people reacting? What do they need from an appreciation perspective?

Each person is different, and the ways that they’re going to process gratitude will differ. So, managers - know what each of your team members is like in this regard?
Yes. If you’re going to have a group exercise, just recognize that some people are going to be more excited about receiving gratitude than others. But at the end, if you are doing an exercise in gratitude, they are going to feel better, for sure. Even if they’re really like, “No, I’m not doing this.” And I’ve had that happen, in seminars and internally, where people are like, “I’m just not feeling the gratitude today.” Like, okay, that’s fine. You just have your little adult time-out and you do you, boo. And then everybody else is being grateful and they just look like, you know– and then they’re like, “Okay, I’ll be grateful.” Always. If you’re breathing, you can be grateful for that. It can be that simple. Just focus on that you’re breathing right now. And that’s usually what I kind of joke - like, you’re breathing, you’re good. So I kind of try to make light of it, but I also don’t want to force somebody.

So it sounds like, at your firm and in your life, gratitude is just an essential element of how you operate. And I believe you also share this with your clients.

We do. And going back to being in the financial services industry, the Association of Financial Professionals, the Treasury Cash Management Exchange - even those organizations have had me speak on gratitude. Since the pandemic, I think people are really getting a lot more on board with these easy tools. People are also stretched on budgets right now. Gratitude is absolutely free. 

It’s easy. Everybody always goes away feeling a little bit better about the team and having a bit of connection.

Kerry Wekelo, thank you so much for talking about gratitude and your book, Gratitude Infusion: Workplace Strategies for a Thriving Organizational Culture. There’s so much in here that goes beyond thriving organizational cultures. It’s just about being a happy human.