Without a doubt, motivation is a core factor in reaching team goals and enhancing productivity. Motivation may be intrinsic, arising from personal ambition, or extrinsic, originating from rewards such as praise or money. Regardless of the types of motivation, engaging your team ensures their productivity and striving for the best. We will delve into how to motivate your team and create an environment where employees feel appreciated and energized to unlock their ultimate potential.

1. Different preparations of Motivation: Intrinsic and Extrinsic

Intrinsic Motivation:

Derived internally, driven by personal goals, values, or certain feelings of achievement, this type of motivation is at its strongest when aligned with personal satisfaction. Binding of this sort can be genuinely powerful.

Extrinsic Motivation:

As the phrase suggests, there are certain benefits that are best attained and directly received from other people. It may not be sustainable in the longer run, but can push people to accomplish specific tasks and work towards deadlines.

2. Approaches to Enhance Team Member Motivation

Motivating a team is more than scheduling activities; it is means fostering an atmosphere open for development, responsibility, and excitement. Consider the following tips:

Praise in Public, Coach in Private

Giving commendations in public can greatly enhance team members’ self-esteem and motivation. When a team member accomplishes something noteworthy, shout it out to the entire group. Not only does this help the person receiving it, but it also encourages others to achieve more. On the other hand, when there is criticism to be made, do it privately. This practice helps to maintain a supportive environment and allows people to save face.

Offer Rewards and Recognition

As the saying goes there is no free lunch, rewards are also a token of appreciation. Consider both monetary and non-monetary rewards to motivate your team.

Monetary awards: Cash prizes, shopping or gasoline vouchers, bonuses at the end of the year, or stock options.

Non-monetary awards: Consecutive month proclamations, personalized thank you letters, or a lunch treat by the boss are all ways of enhancing team morale.

This portion automatically phrased itself based on the earlier requirements giving recommendations on enhancing the morale of team members. Remember to think critically on improvements that will render the goals timely with ease of acceptance of the reward.

Motivation and innovation can be greatly driven by the culture of the workplace. Whether employees face new challenges or attempt to take risks, their contributions must be recognized and rewarded. An employee that tries to take on a challenge and fails should not be met with punishment; instead, encourage them to always try their best. Such a shift in the means of motivation will help nurture creativity, improve problem-solving abilities, and enhance productivity.

Employees are more prone to seek out results when dealing with goals that are challenging, yet remain achievable. These “stretch goals,” if set correctly, can propel members of a team towards engaging more vigorously with tasks set out before them. Goals can always be simplified to promote more greatens, such as completing them in steps with rewards granted upon each milestone. Celebrating along the way will always keep the entire team fueled with the motivation to strive harder.

Every employee is motivated by something different, and therefore to engage them, one must know what drives them. Spend some time with your team learning who they are outside of work. People’s interests, achievements, or even family provide a deeper understanding of their life outside of work, and such understanding will foster better integration and association. Doing so will drastically reduce the gap of becoming just co-workers into being a cohesive team, and functions within the company such as team building sessions, office parties, and even training sessions help increase employee morale.

Create Development Prospects

Help your staff grow by providing training sessions and opportunities for skills enhancement. Employees who are aware of their potential career trajectory feel self-motivated to work at their peak productivity. One team member in an organization who feels appreciated and valued would always be willing to put in their best efforts.

Provide Fair Remuneration

While the paycheck is not the main motivator, some base compensation that correlates with an employee’s experience and worth, helps keep motivation at a reasonable level. If someone believes they are worth more than what they are getting, they end up being disengaged and disinterested, which leads to attrition. Conversely, unmerited compensation can produce laziness and indolence. Hence, the moderation should be sought in order to keep the employees charged.

Refrain From Micromanaging

Wage equilibrium is dependent on the amount of work each employee is willing to undertake so as to remain properly motivated, and the amount of work the extra paid employees are self willing to undertake. Motivation for every task must account for the impact it can have on one’s efficiency and the output quality. Refraining from micromanaging provides the add benefit of motivating freedom on how processes are executed. Not controlling each step allows the team to have more trust and feel as though their input does matter.

Do Not Penalize Employees

Failures give us an opportunity to learn and do better in the future and should never be seen as a reason to punish an employee. If team members are penalized for making mistakes, they may become reluctant to bring forth any new ideas or take any risks. Train them to learn from their failures and challenge themselves beyond their comfort. This helps the team to innovate and learn from their experiences.

Important Points

• Understand the employee’s expectations and what motivates them.
• Public recognition elevates morale while private one-on-one sessions provide constructive feedback.
• Provide defined achievable tasks that require extra effort to obtain set goals.
• Provide motivational or material incentives to the employee that match their level of contribution with the companies’ goals.
• Allow the team to assume a sense of responsibility and organize their work independently without interference.
• Facilitate training and other means of improving the members’ skills to help them focus on personal development.

These techniques will ensure that you have a team that is motivated and prepared to work towards the achievement of goals and embrace hurdles as a team. Motivation isn’t a one-size-fits-all approach, be it in form of incentives or aid – combining it with a healthy working environment will surely ensure positive results.

Categories: Team Management Skills