“Stop trying to motivate your employees,” I told Ryan as we settled down at our table at Chick-fil-A. Ryan is the general manager of a fast-growing small business in Atlanta. A week earlier, he contacted me to ask for help motivating his underperforming employees.
“Nothing seems to be working,” he said in a frustrated tone. “They show up late, don’t follow rules, and at times just don’t seem to care.”
This sounds very familiar I thought as I listened. I hear this often from many of my clients as they try to manage their teams.
“We’ve tried giving them more money,” Ryan said. “Even had more meetings,” he shared. “Nothing seems to be working”.
Ryan did not want to hear what I was about to say.
“You are not responsible for your employee’s motivation,” I stated boldly.
Ryan looked at me with a confused stare. “I’m not?” he responded.
“No, your employees are responsible for their motivation” I shared.
This makes sense if you consider that despite amazing progress in science over the past hundred years leaders have yet to find a way through the skulls of our employees and then manipulate the workings of their brains to cause them to feel more motivated. Not humanly possible.
Hence, we are all responsible for our attitudes, which include self-motivation.
Very simple thought with terribly complicated implications for leaders.
“Ryan, are you still with me?” He seemed to be just catching his breath from my last statement. He seemed both elated with the idea that he was not to be held responsible for his employee’s motivation and confused as to how to move forward.
“That’s the good news Ryan,” I said.
“The bad news is that you are responsible for three important factors that can have a dramatic impact on the collective motivation of your team.”
#1. You are responsible for hiring self-motivated workers. Since we now know that we can’t motivate them ourselves, it just makes sense that we must instead look for talent who already have high levels of self-motivation. A significant part of the interview process must focus on the level of self-motivation of the candidate.
#2. We must create a work environment that supports highly self-motivated workers. In his best-selling book on motivation, Drive, Daniel Pink tells us that the three drivers of motivation are autonomy, mastery, and purpose. Autonomy means giving our employees the independence they need to operate effectively. Mastery is giving employees opportunities for professional growth. Purpose is making sure your organization has a powerful “why”. A reason for being. Provide heavy doses of each of these three factors and watch your employee’s motivation grow exponentially.
#3. Eliminate the de-motivators. This must come first. Before any employee can feel motivated, we must eliminate any inherent work elements that might cause them to feel demotivated.
The best example is money. Money is not a motivator. Never has been. Show me someone who does a celebratory dance when they receive their bi-weekly paycheck. Doesn’t happen. What happens if there is no paycheck or if it is delayed? Employee motivation will plummet. Lack of money can be a significant de-motivator. The key is to take money off the table for employees as a concern.
Other examples of de-motivators can be technology not performing as expected, difficult work conditions (hot, cold, crappy furniture, etc.), and being surrounded by under-performing terrorist-like employees.
If the leader can master these three areas, you will find yourself surrounded by highly motivated employees and there will be a long waiting list of like-minded applicants waiting to get in. Examples of this include Chick-fil-A, Quik Trip, and Zappos.
Okay, I think I got it”, said Ryan with a more positive look on his face than he had when we started.
I could see Ryan needed more time to digest this newfound knowledge. This was going to be a paradigm shift for him, just as it has been for others. And yet much easier to understand than to put into practice in a small business. But then what other options do you have?