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Employee Engagement–What’s Love Got To Do With It?
In a recent post for the Harvard Business Review blog, editor Gretchen Gavett reported the latest Gallup research on employee engagement. In the article, Ten Charts That Show We’ve All Got a Case of the Mondays, we learn—again—that the majority of the U.S. workforce is woefully disengaged and has been for many years. We read—again—that disengagement is associated with anxiety, stress, pain, low creativity, and future turnover. Think about that…anxiety, stress, and pain. Wow.
These facts should sound really familiar to us. They probably feel familiar, too—unfortunately. The purpose of such articles—and this blog—should be to stimulate our determination to improve the situation. But how?
The thing about engagement is that you can’t go at it directly. You have to work on the many conditions—some of which we used to call working conditions—that contribute to employees feeling stressed, fearful, and disinterested in the work. And Blanchard’s research into Employee Work Passion and Optimal Motivation can be really useful to you here.
But, more than discussing the 12 factors that you can improve to help employees feel genuinely passionate about the work and the company, I want to encourage you to contemplate where your heart is. And for that exploration, I’d like to ask you to contemplate these three questions—and read one book:
- What do you want from your employees? List the top ten things you want—or maybe even expect from them.
- What do you want for them? In your heart of hearts, what do you want them to experience at work? What kind of experience do you want them going home to their loved ones having had all day long?
- What differences are there in the tone of the two lists?
I have run this simple experiment dozens of times throughout the world. The lists are always the same. And there is always a difference in the tone and “vibe” of the two lists.
The key idea here is this: If leaders don’t make the shift from fixating on demanding more and more and more from employees without regard for their well-being, no one will ever get out of the disengagement vortex they are in. We will just read another article about it next year.
What is needed more than anything is the soft stuff. More warmth, more emphasis on the deep meaning of one’s work, more discussion about values linkages, more love. Yep. More love.
If that last point strikes you as a little crazy, check out Tim Sanders’ Love is the Killer App. It’s a wonderful read…and perhaps the best gift I can give you today.
This heart shift is a vital part of the strategy to improving the motivation and engagement of your employees. If you want them to shift their energy and be more engaged, shift your heart and love them more. Then, pour that love into improving the environment they work in. Our research shows that they will notice, and they will naturally turn that noticing into improved engagement. Funny how that love thing works…
About the author:
The Motivation Guy (also known as Dr. David Facer) is one of the principal authors—together with Susan Fowler and Drea Zigarmi—of The Ken Blanchard Companies’ new Optimal Motivation process and workshop.
3 Ways People Cope–Instead of Flourish–at Work
“Not looking out for the emotional well-being of our people hurts individuals and organizations in terms of increased illness, stress and disability claims—not to mention the opportunity losses of productivity and creativity,” explains motivation expert Susan Fowler.
Surprisingly, when Fowler talks with leaders about what is motivating them on their current tasks and responsibilities, people recognize right away that much of it falls into a Disinterested, External, or Imposed Motivational Outlook.
- A Disinterested Motivational Outlook is where you just don’t care, and you are going through the motions.
- An External Motivational Outlook is where people justify their actions for an external reward—money, incentives, power, or status.
- An Imposed Motivational Outlook is where behavior is driven by fear, shame, or guilt.
But that comes at a cost, especially when people realize the amount of emotional labor they have been using to constantly self-regulate—finding ways to avoid feelings of pressure, stress, anger, disappointment, guilt, or shame.
As Fowler explains, “We spend inordinate amounts of time just overcoming our feelings of being imposed upon, or just overcoming the emptiness that comes from external motivation. It’s like we are using all of our emotional labor on low-level tasks just to muck around with low-level motivation.
“That might help us cope but it’s not helping us experience the energy, vitality, or sense of positive well-being that comes with higher levels of motivational outlook. Those come from mindfulness, developed values, and a noble purpose, for example.”
The search for a higher quality of motivation
In the Optimal Motivation™ program that Fowler has created with her co-authors David Facer and Drea Zigarmi, the focus is on teaching people a way to have a higher quality of life where they don’t have to use as much emotional labor.
“If you have clarity on what you value—for example, a life purpose, or a work purpose—and if you understand what brings you joy and what you love to do, then you have a higher quality of life and well-being. You may still require some emotional labor from time to time to self-regulate, but it is emotional labor that you’re willing to do because you see how it is related to higher quality motivation.”
That’s important says Fowler because people driven primarily by external motivators don’t achieve the sustainable flourishing and positive sense of well-being that you get with higher levels of motivation.
Fowler explains that as a leader, you need to think beyond imposed and external motivators. How could you invite choice? How could you help people build relationships? How can you increase competence?
“You never want to be the one encouraging a person’s need for external rewards. Don’t settle for motivational models that try to find other ways to manipulate or trick people into giving more. Why not take the conversation to a different level? “
To read more of Fowler’s thinking on cultivating a motivating work environment, check out her interview in the June issue of Ignite!, Don’t Settle for Less When It Comes to Personal Motivation. You’ll also see information about a free webinar Fowler is conducting June 19 on The Business Case for Motivating Your Workforce. It’s complimentary, courtesy of Cisco WebEx and The Ken Blanchard Companies.
Leaders should remove barriers … sometimes they make them worse
Would you recognize an esox lucius if you saw one? Commonly called the Northern Pike, it is a 25-40 pound freshwater game fish. If you observe it in an aquarium, you realize quickly that this animal is the consummate carnivore. Its predatory style is to suspend itself very still in the water until a potential target gets close. Then the pike snatches it and devours it in the blink of an eye. It can literally empty out a fish tank in minutes.
But what happens if the environment is altered and obstacles are added? Researchers experimented with just that by lowering a glass barrier into the aquarium separating the pike on one side from food fish on the other. When the pike goes after a nearby minnow, it runs into the invisible divider. And after a while, the pike stops trying.
But this gets even more interesting. The observers next remove the glass, and the pike continues to avoid going after its natural food. The learned behavior is so strong that some pike have actually died of starvation during the experiment even while minnows continue to brush up against them.
This same type of learned behavior can sometimes be seen at work. It’s a learned helplessness that occurs when you, or someone with influence over you, decides that something can’t be done, or perhaps in the case of business, can’t be done right. In short, the Pike Syndrome is a debilitating situation.
For example, if someone approaches you for feedback on a project or job they’ve been working on, and rather than emphasizing what was done well, you point out what could have been done better. Even if you were right in your critique, almost inevitably there are potential negative consequences.
Or, possibly you are the type of manager who tells people, “If you’re doing your job, you’ll never see me.” When that’s the case, good work goes unrecognized and it is only shortcomings that draw a response from the supervisor.
When good performers experience that type of environment, they learn to avoid their leader’s dissatisfaction rather than risking new behavior that might lead to better results. In the longer term, it may be difficult for them to unlearn that.
So avoid being part of the problem. Give your people their best chance to succeed by removing barriers to performance. Next, acknowledge them when they are making progress. One more thing … it’s critical to get your own behavior in line, before you can help others to do the same.
About the author
Dr. Dick Ruhe is a best-selling author, keynote speaker, and senior consulting partner with The Ken Blanchard Companies. You can read his posts here on LeaderChat the fourth Saturday of each month.
The High Price of Perceived Unfairness—a mini case study
Alexa has been with a global telecommunications company for 15 years, most recently as an upper mid-level leader in the company’s consumer products division.
Alexa took her current post in 2010. That year she led her group to earn Best Retail Operation for the region, going from worst-to-first in a single year. Along with a public award, Alexa received a “Far Exceeds” rating on her annual performance appraisal.
Unfortunately, at the time of her next review, Alexa’s group was slightly below its Key Performance Indicators (KPI) targets and so her boss rated her performance as only “Meets Expectations.” It turned out to be a case of poor timing as the group rebounded and by year’s end had once again won Best Retail Operation.
An important and tangible difference
For Alexa, the difference between “Meets Expectations” and “Far Exceeds” was important—and tangible. In her company, a rating of Far Exceeds meant the employee had a greater chance of a promotion in the next 12 months, a greater opportunity to participate in juicy cross-functional projects that C-level executives track, and a larger base salary and bonus package for the coming year.
Alexa’s boss apologized for the 2011 rating and said he would make it up to her in the 2013 review. Unfortunately, the damage was done; Alexa interpreted her boss’s decision as unfair given her history of taking a last place group to first place in less than a year, and then repeating that high performance. Her boss said nothing could be done.
The impact of that interpretation was that Alexa went from being highly interested and innovative in her role to being more or less disinterested—just going through the motions. She said, “You rate me as Meets Expectations, and I will meet expectations. Nothing more.”
Leading with Optimal Motivation
When talked with about this, Alexa was immovable, so deep was the sense of betrayal. In considering ways to help her, a purely rational, left brain, traditional business analysis of this situation would have us evoking some version of the Nike slogan—Just Do It. In other words, “Alexa, change your attitude, accept your boss’s apology, and get back to it.”
But, that’s probably a fantasy at this point. Alexa now perceives the performance management system as unfair, so she feels hurt by it and wary of it.
Our Optimal Motivation process suggests a different approach. Instead of suggesting that she just get over it, we would recommend that Alexa’s leader’s work would be to address how Alexa feels, and to help her reconnect with her passion for delighting customers, her passion for making the workplace amazing for her employees, and the important financial and competitive contribution her group makes to the welfare of the entire organization. Her manager, then, would be engaging with Alexa in a series of Motivational Outlook Conversations.
What Would You Do?
That’s our approach (and we would be happy to talk with you more about that) but for now, let’s make this interactive.
- What would you do to help Alexa return to the proverbial sunny side of the street?
- How would you engage her manager?
- What changes do you think her manager would want to make so that she or he is successful with Alexa?
Use the comments feature. It would be great to hear your thoughts and how you would address this situation.
About the author:
The Motivation Guy (also known as Dr. David Facer) is one of the principal authors—together with Susan Fowler and Drea Zigarmi—of The Ken Blanchard Companies’ new Optimal Motivation process and workshop.
The High Price of Money (a five-question happiness quiz)
Consider these five statements. True or False?
- Money cannot buy you happiness.
- Money may not buy happiness, but it will buy things that make you happy.
- The more money you have, the happier you are.
- Seeking wealth, status, or image undermines interpersonal relationships and connectedness to others.
- Pursuing money or other materialistic values results in feeling pressured and controlled.
Did you answer True to #1? Most of us have held a programmed value since childhood that money doesn’t buy us happiness. If it did, we reason, we wouldn’t see rich people with substance abuse issues, struggling with their weight, or defending themselves in court against character or behavior accusations.
Ironically, I find that people also answer True to statements #2 and #3. Despite believing that money cannot buy happiness, they believe that money can buy things that make us happy and that the more we have, the better off we are. But that isn’t logical. If money doesn’t buy you happiness, how can having more money buy you happiness?
Research supports the notion that money and happiness are related, but not in the way you might think. If it were true that money buys the things that make us happy and that the more we have the happier we are, then we would expect happiness scales to increase when per capita wealth increases. But that isn’t the case in the United States or any other country in the world. Pursuing and achieving material wealth may increase short-term mood, but it does not increase one’s sustainable happiness.* Both statements #2 and #3 are False.
Not only does money not buy happiness or the things that make you happy, but the more that materialistic values are at the center of your life, the more the quality of your life is diminished. This lower quality of life is reflected in a variety of measures including low energy, anxiety, substance abuse, negative emotion, depression, and likelihood to engage in high-risk behaviors.
The Problem with More
Interestingly, when individuals are asked what level of wealth they need to be happy, both the poor and the rich respond with relative amounts of “more.” No matter how much you have, you always want more—more money, belongings, toys, status, power, or image. But here’s the thing: No amount of riches will buy security, safety, trust, friendship, loyalty, a longer life, or peace of mind. Moreover, thinking you can buy these things destroys any real chance of experiencing them.
Therein lies the problem. We’ve been programmed to believe that our well-being depends on the quantity of what we have. There is a current TV commercial where a little girl tries to explain why more is always better—which is the message the advertiser is trying to convey because that’s what they are offering you—more. The irony is that the little girl simply cannot explain why more is better. It really is funny. But it disproves the very point the advertiser is hoping to make. More is not always better—it is simply a belief that most of us have yet to challenge.
Quality Over Quantity
What if we were to turn the table and focus on quality over quantity? Consider your answer to statement #4. Did you answer it True? One of our most basic and crucial human needs is for relatedness with others. This longing for connectedness is obvious in the explosion of social media and online dating services. The lack of relatedness is detrimental to everything including the quality of our physical and mental health. Research indicates that relatedness is thwarted by the pursuit of materialism.* Yet we rarely link materialistic values and goals to the undermining of interpersonal relationships that influence the quality of our life.
Statement #5 is also True. If you follow any of the popular culture regarding the effects of extrinsic motivation, or what we call suboptimal Motivational Outlooks, you understand the negative impact that feeling pressure or control has on creativity, discretionary effort, and sustained high productivity and performance. And yet, organizations are hesitant to generate alternatives to pay-for-performance schemes and incentivizing behavior, despite the proof that those systems based on materialistic values generate the pressure and control that undermine the quality of our work experience—and our results.
Our Values Shape Us
And here is a great sadness. When you operate from materialistic values, it not only undermines your well-being, it also negatively affects the health and well-being of others. When our focus is on material pursuits, we become less compassionate and empathetic. Our values shape the way we work, play, live, and make decisions. And those decisions impact the world around us.*
Each of us has an amazing opportunity with the understanding gained through recent research and the evolution of human spirit. We can shift our focus from the value of materialism to the more empowering values of acceptance, compassion, emotional intimacy, caring for the welfare of others, and contributing to the world around us. Not only will this shift in focus improve the quality of our own lives, it will also create a ripple effect that ultimately will improve the quality of life for others. For the reality is that the most important things in life cannot be bought. Indeed, they are priceless.
* For supporting research and more information on this topic, I highly recommend the following resources:
- The High Price of Materialism by Tim Kasser
- The Handbook of Self-Determination Theory Research by Deci and Ryan
- The Price of Inequality by Joseph E. Stiglitz
- Website: www.selfdeterminationtheory.org
About the author:
Susan Fowler is one of the principal authors—together with David Facer and Drea Zigarmi—of The Ken Blanchard Companies’ new Optimal Motivation process and workshop. Their posts appear on the first and third Monday of each month.
Optimal Motivation in the Wee Hours
My team and I have been working on a new motivation program that shows leaders how to foster an environment in which employees experience high quality, or optimal, motivation—as opposed to suboptimal motivation based on stress, relentless pressure, aggressive competition, harsh deadlines, and fear.
The program explains the link between three basic psychological needs for autonomy, relatedness, and competence and what we call Motivational Outlooks—the actual motivational experience someone develops around a particular task, goal, or situation. And it teaches people how to shift from suboptimal motivation to optimal motivation anytime they want.
And that’s what I need right now.
As I write this, it is the end of a very long Sunday—a day, some say, for rest. But I worked fifteen hours today after working six yesterday. It is now 12:53 a.m. on Monday morning. I have hardly eaten. I missed phone calls from my dad and from my friends Emily, Alison, and Anthony. I have a meeting 90 miles from home tomorrow morning at 9:00 a.m., which means being up at 5:30. I am exhausted.
Low Quality Motivation
The aggravation I feel is akin to one of the six Motivational Outlooks—the Imposed Motivational Outlook. It is a feeling of resentment that the deadline is so tight, that I feel as if we are in a fire drill, and that it is seen as unreasonable to ask for a weekend free of work and have that reasonable request honored. The Imposed Motivational Outlook tonight comes with a sound track. It plays Noooobody knoooows the troubles I’ve seen…
High Quality Motivation
But, I also feel exhilaration knowing this program is onto something big and important. We are not only tapping a vein—we are shaping the conversation about how motivation in the workplace could be experienced and how the conversation among leaders in HR and business ought to operationalize motivation in everyday programs, systems, and conversations. This is the Integrated Motivational Outlook because all of this vast work is linked to my deepest values and sense that we are making a real difference.
I’m thinking about how my sense of relatedness has been both undermined and supported today. I have felt pressured to get this work done, but I also have felt free to do it using my personal flair and creativity. My sense of competence is soaring because something that used to seem daunting now just seems like any other big project that takes a lot of time, focus, and skill—a project that pretty much anyone could master given the right skill, mindset—or Motivational Outlook—and environment.
Now at nearly 1:00 a.m., writing, expressing, and sharing requires a great deal of self-regulation—to remain focused, to remain sanguine, and to remain awake!
Shift if You Want To
Through it all, I have an incredible tool to help me monitor and manage my Motivational Outlook—and shift it if I want to. Which experience will win this very late night? With what perspective will I color this very long day? Will it be aggravation and exhaustion, or exhilaration from the knowledge that I, as well as the program, have taken strides today toward a higher level of performance and contribution? Will I choose Imposed or Integrated around the time requirements, values, and purpose of this work?
With the last flickers of my synapses, with the final shallow breaths of my groggy self, with the last blinks of my bloodshot and bleary eyes, on the roller coaster of well-being, I choose Integrated and I think to myself, “Physician—heal thyself!”
About the author:
The Motivation Guy (also known as Dr. David Facer) is one of the principal authors—together with Susan Fowler and Drea Zigarmi—of The Ken Blanchard Companies’ new Optimal Motivation process and workshop.
Doing more with less? Start with focus say 40 top thought leaders
John Stahl-Wert, best-selling author and founder of The SHIP Company believes that challenging economic times provide an opportunity for individuals, teams, and companies to get better and to understand things more deeply. Yet, in his experience, “Many leaders and managers see times of restraint as a time to pressure people and provide less in terms of the human side and support.”
This is so foolish, he explains. Instead, Stahl-Wert recommends that leaders “Look at ways to raise up the people capability, not try to pressure productivity.”
Stahl-Wert is one of 40 thought leaders who will be joining Ken Blanchard for a Doing Still More With Less Leadership Livecast on April 24. A free event, this online webcast will bring together thought leaders, via video, to look at ways to engage and support people while meeting the increased performance demands of the current business environment.
Charlene Li, author, consultant, and founder of Altimeter Group who will be joining Stahl-Wert as a part of the webcast says that identifying the vital, critical work that will get you and your organization the results you are looking for is the first step.
“In order to get more done, you actually have to do fewer things, but very crucially, the most important things—and just as essential, make sure all the people around you understand what it is you will do and also what you won’t do.”
Jane Perdue, a principal with Braithwaite Innovation Group suggests that leaders begin by asking themselves some key questions.
“Are we doing the right work, with the right people, in the right way, at the right time, in the right pursuit of company initiatives, and are we using the right information and the right tools to make it so?”
Find a minute to reflect
For leaders looking to reexamine their own work, Ken Blanchard recommends taking a minute to reflect and get organized.
“The reality today is that leaders have to find quiet time to think through what’s really important to do. Today more than ever, you have to identify the 20 percent that is going to give you the 80 percent. You have to find out what is vital when you’re looking at everything you have to accomplish. In order to do more with less, you have to focus your energy on the work that is the most important.
“The next step is to prioritize that work and turn it into measureable goals. Identify three to five things you can get done on a consistent basis. Get your life organized so you can focus and help others organize their lives.”
“Doing more with less means that managers and their people have to be partners. It can’t be ‘my way or the highway,’” says Blanchard. “You have to empower your people. Micromanaging is a thing of the past. Managers can’t be on top of everything.”
There is a silver lining though, explains Blanchard.
“The good news is that if handled correctly, these tough times can actually lead to increased employee motivation. If leaders can create more autonomy by giving their people what they need when they need it, building competency and stronger relationships along the way, they will increase employees’ sense of well-being and overall performance.”
You can read more about what Blanchard and other key thought leaders have to say in this new article from Blanchard’s Ignite newsletter. To learn more specifically about the free April 24 webcast, Doing Still More With Less, check out this link.
3 simple ways to create a stronger team and build customer loyalty
With all of the changes going on in the airline industry over the last few years, it has definitely been more the exception rather than the rule when getting great service while traveling. However, I had a pleasant surprise a few months ago while traveling back home on United Airlines.
Once everyone had boarded the plane and we were all getting settled in our seats, expecting to hear the flight attendant start making their welcoming and safety comments, the captain himself got on the intercom and started talking to us. He didn’t stand behind the little wall that tends to hide the flight attendant from the passengers, but instead stood halfway down the aisle of first class and addressed the entire plane.
He welcomed us all on the flight and thanked us for our business and choosing to fly United. He acknowledged that we have a choice in airlines, and he hoped that this flight would be a great experience for all of us. He then went on to introduce the rest of his “team” as he called them, his co-pilot and flight attendants, saying that they all work together to make the flight enjoyable and safe. He encouraged us to ask the flight attendant if we needed anything during the flight and thanked us one more time before he handed it off to the attendant to finish all of the safety messages. As I sat there, I couldn’t help but smile to myself and think how a simple gesture like personally welcoming the passengers set the tone for a pleasant flight and put the customers in a good mood.
So what can your organization learn from this? Here are three simple ways to create a stronger team and build customer loyalty:
- Always look for opportunities to practice what you preach to your employees about making their customers feel welcome by talking to customers, saying a simple hello, asking how their day is, or if there is anything else to help them with.
- Remind your employees to look for the 1% better concept—the little things you can do while interacting with customers that may not be a huge thing, but may be huge in the eyes of that customer.
- Constantly look for opportunities to praise your team members when you see them delivering great service to their customers. They will feel valued and acknowledged for their efforts and want to continue to serve their customers in a positive way.
I actually was a little sad getting off the plane at the end of the flight knowing I may not see that pilot again on another flight, but happy that he had restored my faith in the airlines and knowing there are leaders out there that really do want to make a difference.
About the author:
Kathy Cuff is a senior consulting partner and one of the principal authors—together with Vicki Halsey—of The Ken Blanchard Companies’ Legendary Service training program.
Leading for Optimal Motivation
Research in the fields of social, positive, and industrial/organizational psychology has repeatedly found that employees thrive best in work environments that allow them to think for themselves, and to construct and implement decisions for one course of action or another based on their own thinking and volition. The research is also clear that we suffer when we feel overly constrained, controlled, or coerced in our effort to produce high quality and high volumes of work.
The Power of Autonomy
In complementary terms used in the Optimal Motivation program, when we experience high quality autonomy at work (as well as relatedness and competence), we are more likely to be more creative, more positively energetic (as opposed to relying on stress energy) and more easily focused on accomplishing any task or goal, no matter how short-term, tactical, and mundane—or long-term, strategic, and magnificent. While leaders repeatedly report they want such creativity and focus from employees, employees repeatedly report how difficult leaders often make it for employees to feel those things.
For example, during a recent keynote presentation, several frustrated participants offered detailed examples of policies, procedures, and both overt and tacit cultural rules that make it difficult for them to feel free, creative, and positively energetic as persistently as the work demands. Nonetheless, a traditional leader response to such frustration is to tell the employees to stop complaining and adjust in some way so they feel less frustrated. Of course, by all means let’s all learn how to source our own sense of autonomy no matter what we are faced with. As if on cue in that conversation, one participant made precisely that a point by citing Viktor Frankl’s experience in a concentration camp as evidence of the kind of transcendence that is possible even in the most extreme environments. It’s a story to live by, to be sure.
Leaders Stepping Up
But, I think we also should be talking about the extent to which managers and executives actively step up to the challenges of changing policies and procedures—and organizational systems—that foment such frustration. Too many executives take a “deal with it” stance, rather than a stance of “let’s look into how we can modify or change this so you don’t have to spend so much mental and emotional energy coping with it like that anymore.”
Willing executives could see such a response as adding moral substance to their leadership, since it would shift from focusing only on what the executives want from employees (to just deal with it and get on with the work) to focusing more on what they want for their employees (a work environment that makes it easy for employees to autonomously commit themselves to meaningful, high quality, and high volume work.)
Leader, Would You Like to Shift?
Blanchard research shows that employees generally respond positively to this leadership upgrade with greater intentions to work at above average levels, to endorse the organization, and to stay with the organization longer. So, with such employee and organizational advantages, managers and executives, what have you got to lose?
About the author:
The Motivation Guy (also known as Dr. David Facer) is one of the principal authors—together with Susan Fowler and Drea Zigarmi—of The Ken Blanchard Companies’ new Optimal Motivation process and workshop. Their posts appear on the first and third Monday of each month.
A Mini Case Study on Motivation
Can you determine at least three important take-aways in this story from a plant manager in India who recently learned the skill of conducting Motivational Outlook Conversations?
On his first day back after his training, the plant manager noticed a Technical Service Executive in the lab having a discussion with an external contractor. While she was wearing safety glasses, the contractor was not. The manager has a no tolerance policy as far as safety is concerned and his normal response would be to call the technician to his office and in his words, “read her the riot act.”
According to the manager’s self-assessment: “I am known to blow a fuse (or two) when safety rules are flouted, however, I managed to keep my cool and decided to test my training.”
He asked the technician to his office and could see that she was worried about his reaction. But instead of leading with his dismay and disappointment, he started by explaining that he had just received some training on motivation. He shared key concepts with her. He then asked her if she thought that the rule to wear safety glasses, even when there was no experiment on, was “stupid” as there is no danger to the eyes. Did she feel imposed upon to wear safety glasses as she had no choice?
Since the technician was invited to have a discussion rather than “dressing down,” she was open and candid. She explained that she had a two-year old child and she was extremely concerned about lab safety as she wanted to reach home safe every evening. To the manager’s great surprise, she also shared that in certain areas, she would prefer even more, not less, stringent safety measures. For example, she suggested that safety shoes should be required for lab experiments that are conducted at elevated temperatures.
But when it came to wearing safety glasses when no experiments were being conducted, she just could not understand the rationale and did, indeed, resent the imposed rule. As a result, she didn’t feel compelled to enforce it, especially with an external contractor. The manager said he understood her feelings and went on to provide the rationale that the intention was that wearing glasses would become a force of habit, just like wearing a safety belt in the car.
The manager said he saw the light dawn in her eyes.
When it comes to your leadership and the motivation of those you lead, consider:
1. Self-regulation is a requirement if you want to lead differently—and better. Challenging your natural tendencies and patterns of behavior provides you with more options on how to lead. The new choices you make can be rewarding and productive for you, but especially for those you lead. As the plant manager reported: “I am sure if I had just followed my normal instincts and given her a piece of my mind, I would have been met with a hangdog look, profuse apologies, and a promise not to ever do this again. And it probably would have happened again. She would have gone away from my office with feelings of resentment and being imposed upon and I would also have had a disturbed day due to all the negative energy.”
2. Admit when you are trying something new. Be honest about expanding your leadership skills. People will appreciate your sincere and authentic efforts. Says the plant manager: “Suffice it to say that in my view, my little experiment was a success. I have since shared what I learned with many of my team members and plan to have more Motivational Outlook Conversations with them in the coming weeks.”
3. Remember that as a manager you cannot motivate anyone. What you can do is create an environment where an individual is more likely to be optimally motivated. Ask (and genuinely care about) how a person is feeling, help them recognize their own sense of well-being regarding a particular issue, and provide them with rationale without trying to “sell” it.
Other take-aways? Please share!
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About the author:
Susan Fowler is one of the principal authors—together with David Facer and Drea Zigarmi—of The Ken Blanchard Companies’ new Optimal Motivation process and workshop. Their posts appear on the first and third Monday of each month.
