Good job! again...: The experience of compliments of long-tenured employees

Introduction: This qualitative study aims to find what the experience of long-tenured employees is with compliments. More specifically, whether tenure changed the amount and type of compliments they receive, whether they have a need to receive compliments and what is the impact of compliments on long-tenured employees. Method: 15 long-tenured participants are interviewed using the CIT (Critical Incident Technique) in a semi-open interview. Additionally, the study examines whether the interviews worked as an intervention changing the participants and/or their colleagues in their compliment behaviour, by sending additional questions to the participants after the interview. Results: This study found that long-tenured employees have varying levels of receiving compliments or alternatives. However, the need for receiving compliments was not unanimous as the perceptions on receiving compliments differed. When the long-tenured employees do receive compliments there is either no change, or most often, they resulted in positive changes. Lastly, the interviews worked as an intervention for only half of the participants, which means that the impact of the interview was less than previously found. Discussion: This study aims to fill the gap on literature on the relation of long-tenured employees and compliments. Other research mainly focused on education, but long-tenured employees show to have a largely different relation to compliments. Future research should focus on further exploring the experiences of long-tenured employees.