The power of words...

One of my friends wrote about this topic in his blog. Words. We use words as a basis of communication with one another. Words exist in speech or sign language. Words express meanings that we want to transmit to another. We have been told that words are powerful tools. They are stronger than the almighty sword. Indeed they are.

I remember the many instances in my last job with a big multi-national company. Despite it being a multinational company, the local management was still very much Singaporean Chinese. Profit is the focus definitely. But like most Chinese management, they did not see the inter-relation between employee morale and profits.

And so, the typical daily work environment includes harsh remarks, authoritative instructions and hypocritical behaviour. One hardly is able to find the space to explore possible business and work opportunities. One could only do what is told.

Of course, you can easily guess the turnover rate there. Every other week at the minimum, you would hear someone has tendered their resignation. I did.

I believe that deep down inside each of us, we want to do a decent day's job and go home. We all want to be respected and we want to learn and develop while on the job. We appreciate it when our fellow colleagues help us and guide us along the way. But when the work environment does not provide these conditions, we face obstacles and feel discouraged. The vicious cycle starts, we feel de-moralised, we do not perform at our best and soon, we just tell ourselves that things are not working out and perhaps, we need a change of environment because, we cannot bring the best out of us.

Just a simple sentence or remark can do wonders. A simple "Thank You" spoken with sincerity can do a long way. But few people ever think of it. Most of us simple take things for granted, most of the time.

But, to think of it, what we say reflects what we feel. So it shows a lot simply just thinking about the words that come out of a person's mouth.