Teach Employees the Skill of Optimal Motivation

We can’t all be motivated all the time – but as a talent manager, it’s your job to inspire at least some of that motivation. Employees play a huge role in just how motivated they want to be. How best to motivate your employees is addressed in a recent article from Susan Fowler, a senior consulting partner with The Ken Blanchard Cos. and contributing writer for Talent Management.com.

In trying to understand what motivates people, psychologists studied animals. Think of motivating a dog to give you a high-five with the reward of a dog biscuit. Well, wouldn’t that same tactic work to motivate people at work? Apparently, yes – hence rewards and incentive programs.

Now, incentivizing employees to do things they don’t necessarily like doing has been accepted as common practice. Rewards, complex compensation systems, competitions with prizes for the winners and formalized recognition programs are supported by a burgeoning industry providing extravagant ways to motivate workers.

Motivational tactics have changed due to the ease of access to information. It isn’t quite as easy to motivate employees anymore when they can easily find out what others are being offered. What can you do to offer the best or irresistible to your employees? Go deeper. There are three questions and answers that can help you take advantage of the latest trends in motivation and utilize them in your workplace.

First off, what if motivation is taught as a skill? Employees on every level within the organization are continually judging their work environment … how they judge the environment effects their experience. Organizational factors like collaboration, feedback, task variety and job growth have been valued positively in one study. When employees see these things positively, they are more likely to have good intentions toward the organization. Which in turn, will encourage the employee to endorse the company, perform better and use discretion in regard to the company. With this knowledge, you can find ways to create a passionate workplace. Encourage passion from your employees. Inducing passion isn’t easy, as most employees tend to think that they are solely responsible for such an emotion.

Essentially, motivation is a skill that can be taught, learned, nurtured and sustained, and individuals are more responsible than previously thought of for their own motivational outlook. This makes them less dependent on talent leaders’ efforts to overhaul organizational systems, policies and procedures that need changing.

This doesn’t mean that practices and policies need to thrown to the way-side, it just means that teaching motivation as a skill will be more beneficial for your employees and the organization. Take into consideration that perhaps people are always motivated, there are just different types of motivation.

The second question is “What if people can choose a better motivational experience?” Research shows there are five intentions that lead to employee work passion that can enhance employee motivation rates. Click here to read more about how to let your employees choose a better motivational experience.

“What if we consider optimal motivation to be an opportunity?”. You might be asking, sure, but at what cost to the company? Does this mean salary raises or bonuses and monetary rewards? Consider only rewarding the top 10 percent of the company. What about the other 90 percent? These traditional tactics may not be as useful as they once seemed to be. It’s time to teach your employees the skill of activating optimal motivation. Click here to read the full article and gain the inside information to teaching your employees the skills needed for optimal motivation.

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