Unemployment in the UK is at a record low, with a record of 29.8 million officially payrolled employees as of October 2022 – this, however, is not necessarily as a result of high worker saturation. Many are simply leaving the workforce altogether, while those gainfully employed are more aware than ever of the strength of their position.
The ‘great resignation’ described a period post-pandemic where workers reckoned with their happiness in their role – and realized they had a strong bargaining power to seek more equitable contracts such as flexible hours and competitive wages.
If you are in such a position yourself, you might be wondering how best to navigate it, or even figure out your feelings towards your role to begin with. Here, you may find some assistance through understanding ‘love languages’.
What Are Love Languages?
The term ‘love language’ entered the mainstream consciousness with the 1992 publication of The Five Love Languages, a book by self-help author Gary Chapman. The book revolutionized popular thinking around the nature of relationships, positing that each of us has a specific love language we speak and understand the most fluently.
According to Chapman, those five love languages can be transcribed as: words of affirmation; quality time; giving and receiving gifts; physical touch; and acts of service.
While the framework was initially designed as a crib for understanding romantic relationships and potential reasons for friction, it has been successfully applied in numerous other instances – including workplace dynamics, as in Chapman’s 2011 entry co-authored with Dr Paul White, The Five Languages of Appreciation in the Workplace.
Love Languages And The Workplace
But how do these love languages present in the workplace? Understanding the theory of love languages is all well and good, but what are the experimental results of testing office relationships and staff comfort? Banner specialists, instantprint sought to find out, with a survey of 2,000 office workers across the UK regarding their own thoughts and experiences regarding workplace love languages.
According to the survey, just over half of UK workers were readily able to identify their own love language. Of the 53% that could identify their love language, a third expressed a preference for quality time. 28% were more susceptible to physical touch, while 18% preferred words of affirmation. Acts of service came close behind with 15% of workers while receiving gifts was by far the rarest language with just 6% of workers.
Translating Love Languages To Actions
But how do these love languages translate into workplace action? Given language is shared through conversation, love languages can be found in both experiences with an office space itself and experiences with co-workers.
For example, the giving of gifts can be interpreted as an incentive bonus or even a pay rise – the latter of which around 48% of workers would reportedly appreciate. Likewise, words of affirmation would present in the form of private praise for a job well done, which was incidentally the single most popular specific example amongst workers.
Consistent and constructive feedback is something that is valued amongst many employees and can be identified as the acts of service element of the theory. Likewise, one on one mentorship from a superior can make employees feel valued and invested in whilst encouraging them to strive and develop aspirations.
As the evidence suggests, translating love languages into daily workplace management can have both a positive effect on the well-being of employees and the quality of their work.
What Does This Mean For You?
Ultimately, understanding the nature of your own love language can help you more readily identify the aspects of your role that work best for you – or, more importantly, the ones that don’t.
How do you like to show respect to your fellow employees? Is it via verbal praise, a pay rise, or taking them under your wing with one on one mentorship?
Having an understanding of how you communicate your love languages within a professional setting can help to provide you with a perspective on how feel about your current status at work.
Do you feel that your efforts are going unrewarded? Or perhaps the ‘catch—up’ that your manager arranged with you could actually translate as something more.
Knowing how you and your fellow colleagues communicate can have a substantial influence on your attitude towards your place of work. Through this lens, you can interrogate your career and come to your own conclusions, bettering your career in the process.
Ella Marcotte
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