How Are We Motivated?

How are we motivated? The answer is different for each person. For some, it is the prospect of being promoted and moving up the ranks in the company. If you are family oriented, naturally being able to provide your spouse with a roof over their heads. As you can see, this is different for each person given the age, gender and circumstances.

If you want to motivate people, you have to get them involved. Allowing them to do so enables them to provide the group with ideas that were never done before. That way, they know that they exist within the organization and there voice counts.

Apart from delegating certain tasks, another way to motivate people is by communicating with them. Talk to your people regularly by going to their desk and asking how they are. If you can’t see them personally, get them on the phone or shoot an email. Naturally, you want to see how they are doing so you can help them if they are in trouble.

When your people do something right, don’t forget to give them a pat on the back as some positive reinforcement. Doing so allows them to feel special and be recognized as a member of the team. If it is within your budget, give them a plaque of appreciation or some other reward.

If you think their accomplishments are too easy, make it more challenging by lifting the bar one notch higher. Just remember the objective must still be realistic so your team has a fighting chance to get it.

To perform the task, some bosses don’t provide any tools to help their staff. This is not helpful at times but if your team is resourceful, then this is good. For those that need help, offer them a bone. You can help them out yourself or give them words of wisdom that will set them in the right direction.

Will everyone in the team perform at par with the others? Chances are, some will falter. Instead of reprimanding them, deal with it so they can catch up with the rest of the group. Failure to do so will affect the overall performance of the team, cause high turnover and even low morale.

If you want to motivate others, you have to be able to have faith in them. To do that, you don’t always have to breathe down their necks. From time to time, you ask updates from them to see how things are progressing.

Now that you know how to motivate people, how do you motivate yourself? One way to motivate yourself is to get inspiration from others. If you know someone who has been able to do something in the company, make this person your role model and try to perform a similar feat.

If you don’t need anyone to get you motivated, it will not be that hard to use your inner strength and think about what you want to do in life. At work or anywhere else, there are short-term and long-term goals.

What you can do in a week or a month is short-term while those that could take years are known as long-term goals.

Once you have figured that out, this is when you write down specifically how you are going to do it. What materials or resources do you need to accomplish them? Are these readily available or do you need some help in getting it?

The next phase is to develop a plan and then carry it out. If there are no obstacles, you will succeed in your endeavor. If you suffer from setbacks along the way, regroup and try to do it again.

After each goal is accomplished, write down how it was done in a diary and keep it. That way, you can always look back if you need some inspiration or are facing a similar situation.

We are all motivated differently and this can make us do things which we never thought was possible. If you don’t have it inside you, a little push in the right direction is needed so you get to accomplish and brag about it.