Some time ago, I started writing an article with tips on how to improve motivation in the work environment for people who act with you in the organization. Altogether, I selected 25 suggestions. Since I believe that the tips that were left out I decided to divide the theme into two texts. In the first one, I highlighted 15 tips and now I bring 10 more ideas to make everyday life at work more enjoyable.
However, if what you are looking for are suggestions on how to improve your own motivation at work, check out this other article in which I write exactly about this.
When people realize that you do not have hidden agendas, that you act transparently, and that you do what you say, they feel more motivated at work and proud to be part of your team. Do you know why? Because they feel safer with a boss that will not deceive or manipulate them, and will share the good and the bad with them.
It’s great to feel that you work for someone who is honest, whom you can trust and really count on. This makes people feel much more at ease and comfortable, and their productivity increases. It has to be real though, and the team will judge you based on your actions. Words are not worth much if your actions are not compatible, because “words convince, but the example draws a crowd”.
It is much more stimulating to perform a task, function or work on a project when people understand the purpose of what they do and the impact of their activity on the organization.
This promotes a sense of connection, of importance, of responsibility, of belonging, which at the same time helps people to understand if their own purpose in life is related to what they are doing. When it all combines, the result is a more engaged, connected, motivated team.
Positive feedback (Photo: Racorn / 123RF)
There are people who only give feedback to their subordinates when something bad happens. To this kind of boss, positive feedback is a rare moment and when it does, it’s just to highlight something negative in the sequence.
If you act in this way, here’s my suggestion: stop wasting time and take each and every opportunity you have to reinforce positive behavior with positive feedback.
The effect of such behavior is electrifying! People will understand very clearly what the right attitudes are, what they do well, and receive encouragement to continue acting this way and receive more positive reinforcement from their boss.
Fun helps your team maintain a high performance for much longer. Take Cirque du Soleil as an example. Anyone who has already been to their show must have noticed that after acts of great precision and difficulty, we the audience are the ones who feel tense and distressed. It is at this time that the troupe enters with a fun act that makes us laugh and … done!! We are ready for another act!!
When I watch these shows, I always wonder how much of that show we could bear to watch without such breaks to laugh and chill out. At work, the tension to deliver results has the same effect on you and your team. Taking breaks and bringing in some fun helps you relax, relieve stress and stay motivated.
Get into the habit of always asking yourself which of your team’s members are better prepared and able to perform a certain activity or task and whenever possible, designate that person with that responsibility. When a person uses their best qualities, they feel better, happier, more motivated, and have a higher performance.
In fact, being able to use your strong points frequently at work is synonymous with professional quality of life. This does not happen all the time, but if you can get your team to be required most of the time to do what it does best, you’ll be well on your way to creating and managing a high-performance team.
One time, in the company cafeteria, an employee who had worked with me in the past told me that she was angry with her manager and quite discouraged.
I asked her the reason why, and she told me that the night before she had stayed in late at the company, working carefully to finish a report. The next day, she arrived a little late, and upon arriving at her desk her manager publicly scolded her saying that it was disrespectful and showed a lack of commitment to the company.
There you have it. Demand the presence of people if you want an unmotivated team and mediocre results. Give people autonomy and demand performance and you will have the opposite result, guaranteed!
Closed gate (Photo: Jose Fontano / Unsplash)
This is a tip that encourages many to perform well above average. It happens when a colleague or subordinate comes to vent with you that a particular department or person thinks they are not able to do something or even that they are feeling themselves the victims of prejudice.
My suggestion in these cases: stand by them and encourage them to prove that the others are wrong, saying that you will provide all the support they need to make it happen and see the result in their motivation. This has already happened to me.
I remember one time when I tried to approve a product launch, at an innovation committee meeting; both the marketing and sales vice presidents said no, and figuratively speaking, they closed the gate in my face. I was very upset about it because I thought I was right.
On hearing about what had happened, my director and boss encouraged me to use a new approach and prove that both were wrong. For the next two weeks, I spared no efforts to do so, and I still remember the look on the face of my sales vice president when, after half an hour of heated discussion between us, he paused and said: “You know what? Your line of thought is so flawless that we should approve the project if only to congratulate you on the way you’re acting”.
He left his desk, approached the marketing vice president, and using my arguments, convinced him to approve the project which, incidentally, was a great success. I swear I do not remember the bonus I received that year nor how I was formally evaluated, but to this day I find it amusing to remember that I proved them both wrong and that I was right. I forced my way in through the gate!
We can hardly do relevant things within the organization by working alone. We generally need the help and cooperation of other people and, as you may know, this is not always possible. When we encourage teamwork, we are reinforcing the team’s ability to help themselves, cooperate and get stronger.
This generates a lot of motivation in the day-to-day work activities because people will feel safe and that they belong to a team, knowing they can count on the help of their colleagues whenever they need it. More than that, they will feel even better when a colleague asks for help and they can provide it. This in itself generates a lot of joy in many people.
Setting up a security hook (Photo: Joseph Pearson / Unsplash)
It is very difficult to be motivated when you feel unsure. I remember one time, when after a year as the head of a startup, I had to tell the team that I could not guarantee that the startup would work out and that we could all soon be out of a job. I suggested that if someone was in a delicate financial situation at home, they could look for a new job and could count on my support.
I asked them how they would like me to act from then on and was surprised by the answer: everyone told me that they wanted to continue, but they asked me for just one thing, which was to be 100% honest and straight with them all the time about the chances of the business succeeding or not. I replied that it was possible, but it would not be easy for me or for them. We all agreed and that was how we proceeded.
One year later, the startup came through and we all stayed together. Looking at it today, I think that even at that insecure moment, the feeling of being well-informed was crucial for us to have a safe space, at least among ourselves, and that was essential to our motivation in the work environment and our survival that year.
This last suggestion reinforces the previous one because it also provides safety for the team members. Even if you have to wash your dirty laundry behind closed doors, defend your team when interacting with other departments, as this greatly increases their trust in each other and in you.
To illustrate the suggestion, let me tell you a story about what happens if you do the opposite. Once, in a very tense meeting due to the lack of results, I saw the company’s board of directors demanding explanations from a fellow director about “who was to blame” for the mediocre result delivered by her department.
After a stressful moment, she turned to her five managers, also present at the meeting, pointed her finger and said, “they are!”. I think you can imagine what happened to all five of them, right? Well, the motivation to work with that director vanished and in a few months no one else was on that team and the director was fired.
Cover photo credit – Boy about to fly (Photo: Yarruta / 123RF)
