I was in a meeting with a team of "newbies" to the company yesterday. It was my chance to introduce myself, tell them about the company, let them know about our culture, and impress them with some of my whitty humor (I am still convinced more people in this case laugh from nervousness rather than my quippy humor... but my ego tells me I am the Jay Leno of the conference room)... After all was said and done I did the normal question and answer session [dead silence - as usual]. Then from the back of the table came a rather profound question that I hadn't been asked in this situation in a long time - "how do you motivate your people?".
Now you have to understand something about what I hold as my values and opinions about employees (at any level). I believe people want to get three things out of the work they do. 1) they want to do something they are passionate about (this is a tough one), 2) they want to feel their daily contribution of the work they do is part of a bigger cause, and 3) they want to make money to support their lifestyle.
Most leaders asked about how they motivate people will give you the same age old answers: "I make it fun to work here", "I joke with my people (love the term "my people" - I call it the Moses syndrome - so, if that is how you refer to the people you work with - let your people go)", and my all time favorite "I try to be their friend as well as their boss" - there are thousands more ways people try to answer that question, some good, some not so good; in any case my goal is to answer that question here. How do I motivate people?
People, for the most part, want to be inspired. Why do you think Barnes and Noble has done so well over the years? It is an inspiration hub. People are inspired by other people, places, things, etc. Some people are inspired by music, some by their favorite authors, some by great speakers, some by their own reflection in the mirror, some by nature, some by giving to others, some by teaching, some by being taught, and the list goes on. We live our lives to be inspired, we seek the next adventure of having our hearts and minds enlightened by an event, a spoken word, something that causes our emotional meters to go haywire and drives us to return to that form of euphoric energy that compels us to feel, assess, act, and want to be more than the sum of our parts. Inspiration moves us to action...
So, when asked how I motivate people, the answer is simple - I find out what inspires them (either in the moment, or in their lives) and then I empower them to release their passion while doing their day to day job. Sounds complicated, but it really is not. For some of the people I work with music is important to them. They know their favorite genre, the bands/singers/musicians, that really get to them, and listening to music while at work allows them to engage inspiration while working (thank goodness for the iPod and personal MP3s - used to everyone had radios and that sparked a whole new set of issues with one persons inspiration being another person irritant). Some people like to read their favorite authors, some enjoy surfing the web, some love gadgets, computers, geeky things like stats (oh, that's me - I just raised my hand)... whatever the case I create an environment ripe for inspiration.
Then I provide vision. What is to come - how we are part of a bigger cause. My goal this year is to bring in customers we have the priviledge of serving and let them meet with the folks that are responsible for interacting with them every day. I have done this several times over the years in different situations and what I find is that empathy for the customers situation, mixed with the reality of their experience from their own words, inspires people to act differently with the other customers they deal with.
Not a tough concept, but execution of the idea is key. Being part of a bigger picture is an age old concept. The idea that my action/thoughts shared/ideas/etc are input to a larger more powerful machine that can accomplish what I believe to be bigger than life itself is important. People serve God (yes - I did use that term in the singular) because it satisfies a personal need to be driven/forgiven/loved by a being that is the ultimate in power and universal control. Any work they do because they are inspired by the power of their experience means they are contributing to a cause that is eternal, much larger than they are, more complex than they will ever be... but to be a part of that is spiritual, moving, and satisfying. It is the same in the workplace. "People don't leave companies, they leave Managers"... I have heard this line oh so many times in my career and each time I do my BS meter goes off...
People leave companies because they lack good insight to a bigger vision, a connection to a larger cause through the work they do (and usally a low-life, non-caring, micro-managing, egotistical manager is not good at sharing vision - but I won't pick on them at this point). A relationship with the person you work "for" is good, but the people we are drawn to are the ones who make us feel special, like we matter, and they follow those who lead with vision. You don't even really need charisma, but you do have to posess the ability to instill visions of serving a larger cause to move people to action.
For years, I put in 10-14 hours a day without blinking (mind you, it did catch up with me after awhile and I cut back to 10-13 hours a day), but during that time I was inspired by my leaders - those people who showed me "line of site" into why the work I was doing was chaning the face of business. People in the business world were counting on my ideas, my inspiration of a staff of people... I belonged to a cause that was much greater than the sum of it's part. I was motivated by that, I was inspired by the customers, business leaders, speakers, employees (even the gal behind the coffee counter that was working to make her way in the world by supplying the java habit of other inspired laborious hacks like me...), and that inspiration fueled my fire... What I was doing "mattered" and that is what counts...
So, find your inspiration, seek out the fuel that drives your very reason for being, and if you are not in a job that is satisfying you, helping you reach your dreams, making you feel you are part of something special and great, well, get out. Find a new place to rest your laurals so you can be inspired and inspire others.
I have found that it isn't love that makes the world go round (it actually has to do with some force in the universe that allows us to spin at a high rate of speed and through gravitational pull we stay put, but that wouldn't be a quippy close), it is the act of inspiring and being inspired. So, take notes, find out what inspires you, and go forth, be inspired, and find a way to inspire others....
See you on the left...
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