‘Save that…’cos the bastards never remember the praise they gave you!’

As clear as day I recall the tone and delivery of this particular piece of advice, wearily passed as a colleague made her way back to her desk having spotted over my shoulder an e-mail expressing approval for a job well done.

Approaching the half-way mark of the business year and the mid-year review period I reflect with a chuckle. Because, despite coming round with inevitable regularity, it still manages to creep onto the current page of the calendar and leave many people scrabbling round their papers thinking ‘I must have done something of note in the last six months?!’.

Enter the kudos folder. Perhaps a little grandiose in name, it really need not be anything other than a space in your inbox into which you save the emails that recognise a job well done, the thank yous and praise from colleagues – all preserved in an easy-to-reference folder that makes finding those gems that you’ve delivered as hassle free as possible.

This collection of emails isn’t only useful at review time, of course…

Struggling to find some motivation at work? Take a look through the folder and remind yourself that you’ve done some damn good stuff for people recently. Wondering how to best approach a new task? Rifle through the feedback to see what people thought worked well (and perhaps what they didn’t!). Realised you haven’t updated your résumé or LinkedIn profile for a while? Scan your kudos for common themes that you may have overlooked as being a strong personal skill.

So, do you keep your kudos? If you do, have you found it useful? If not, do you think it’s time you started?