Welcome Baywalk readers to the November edition of Creating Success Viewpoint on Baywalk.com. This month we reflect on the concept behind Thanksgiving. I hope you enjoy: "The Art of Giving Thanks"

Greetings. For those of you thinking that you can abandon this article because it will contain stories of Pilgrims, Indians, Pumpkin Pie, and Turkey, stick around. There may be something you need to hear in this month's article. And I promise -- no Pilgrims.

You will read a lot of "thanks" stuff in this month's article. You see, "thanks" or thanking someone for doing something is becoming a lost art. Why should you care? Because your ability to reach your goals may be seriously undermined if you are not equipped with "thanks."

Call me old fashioned, but I still say thank you. I use different forms such as thank you sir and thank you ma'am. And perhaps that is what this article is about, different forms of thank you.

Conceptually, the early settlers had the right idea (notice I didn't say Pilgrims). After surviving a tough winter and getting a little help from their Indian friends, they decided to give thanks to GOD for taking care of them, and to express "thanks" to those that helped make their harvest possible. This was a lesson well learned in the early days of our country, and a lesson employed by successful businesses for many decades in America.

But today, thanking those that help us along the way, including our customers, is too often overlooked due to the pace of business and the need to grow revenue and be more successful. All too often, in our striving to attain lofty goals, we forget to use the most powerful and least expensive tool that expresses what we used to feel before we became numb and lost all sense of business feelings. Yes you guessed it, the old thank you, or thanks stuff.

When you do something for someone else, and they say thank you, don't you feel good? When a client/customer places an order and you deliver on time and with a quality product/service, we get our "welcome" and not a "thank you," by getting paid.

You did the thanking by delivering the product and service on time and meeting quality expectations. Thank you(s) are not only expressed in words, but in actions.

Now that you have the concept, get to it. There are many different ways to say thank you to associates, leaders, customers, financiers, and family. The fact that you are reading this articles is proof that you have the intellectual capacity to delineate all the different ways in which you can say thank you, and all the different scenarios where a "thank you" would be appropriate.

So, when the Thanksgiving meal is finished, and you are relaxing with family and friends, take a moment to reflect on the "thank you(s)" that went unsaid this past year. Make a commitment to finding opportunities to use that magical old tool of interpersonal and business etiquette that can express more powerfully a sentiment that creates a geometric return with only minimal investment.

Thank you friends for your business this past year. Thank you to my friends at Baywalk.com for providing this forum, even though we don't get to see each other as often as we like. Thank you family for your love, patience, and understanding on those days when I come home late and fall short of my husbandly and fatherly duties. Thank you forefathers for fighting to create a country of freedom of choice to worship God without fear. Thank you mom and dad, now departed, for all the sacrifices to make my life easier. Thank you special friends from college that have let me be me, for the last 25 plus years. Thank you past mentors for your guidance. Thank you cherished staff that made me look good by your hard work, dedication, and confidence in my leadership.

See? It isn't too hard to find people, reasons, or ways to say "thank you." Now you try it. Discover again the power of two simple words. Discover how it can make a difference at home, and in business.

See you next month!