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Successful Leadership - How to Motivate People

The first step to figuring out how to motivate the people you’re leading is to get to know them well: their likes and dislikes, their strengths and weaknesses, their hopes and dreams, and what’s important to them – in short, “what makes them tick”.

Of course, some people are much more open to discussing these issues or revealing information about themselves at work, than others. Some like to keep a very clear split between work and home. You must respect this, but that doesn’t mean there aren’t still things you can do to help motivate them to do their best at work, it might just make it a little harder!

You can discover whether they’re motivated ‘away from’ things they don’t like or don’t want, or ‘towards’ the things they do; and apply positive or negative motivation techniques accordingly. (N.B. Negative techniques can provide positive motivation for many people!)

Other ways I love of motivating people can be summed up in the fish parable from the book Fish! A Remarkable Way to Boost Morale & Improve Results by Stephen Lundin, Harry Paul & John Christensen. In this parable, a fictional Manager must transform a chronically unenthusiastic and unhelpful department into an effective team.

Down the street from her office, Seattle’s real Pike Place Fish market is extremely successful, thanks to its fun, bustling atmosphere and great customer service. By applying simple lessons learned from the actual Pike Place fishmongers, the manager discovers how to energise the people who report to her and effect an astonishing transformation in her workplace.

So what are these simple lessons she learnt for energising and getting the best out of her staff?

1.Choose your attitude – there is always a choice about the way you do your work, even if there is not a choice about the work itself!

2.Find ways to Play – you can be serious about your work without being serious about yourselves, & fun is energising!

3.Make their day – engage with your customers to make their day, and make each other’s day (by offering a helping hand or a word of support)

4.Be present – be focused on each other and your customers.

You may realise as you read this that you are actually a part of the problem yourself, in that you’re not motivated, enthusiastic and energetic at work. My tip therefore would be to do the internal work first (or get some help if you’re struggling) so that you start to lead and motivate yourself before introducing the concepts and starting to implement at work!

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Julie Johnson, The Success Club .