Individuals vary in what energizes and motivates them. As leaders, you can engage others and make them want to do well for you by learning to recognize and leverage what motivates members of your team. Communicate what you need from others and get them to commit by ensuring understanding of your directions and goals to facilitate goal attainment. Consider the following to get others to do more than they believe possible:
Help others grow and learn from their mistakes, so they can see how to raise the bar on their performance and delivery.
If they were achieved, could the results be sustainable? If sustainability is questionable, identify steps or processes you can implement to ensure targets can be repeatedly met.
Reflect on meetings and conversations held with your team. Consider the messages and tone you set for sustainable, continuous improvement. When discussing goals, increase the focus on repeatable excellence: how team members can make an impact and benefit personally. Look for ways to improve your dialogue.
This step often allows you to more easily identify potential efficiencies or improvements. Also, document the process for meeting large goals. Share these success stories with your team and entire organization to help others learn.
Show everyone how their work is influencing the broader organization. Highlight a higher organizational purpose.
Strive to deliver more than requested or promised for every project or task. Continuously challenge yourself and others to do more than you think possible or have done before.
Acknowledge when members of your team exceed expectations. Use this positive reinforcement to help establish a norm of excellence.
This process starts with you. Don’t just deliver upon expectations – think about how you can truly delight your customers, both internal and external. Make this your personal pledge.
Learn More. To learn what you and your team are passionate about, please consider our new DRiV™ personality assessment tool. By evaluating what drives and drains people in their careers, the DRiV can help predict optimal leadership styles, determine effective team composition, and implement more engaging work practices. Click to learn more.
Leadership Development Services. For information about LWF’s full range of services designed to strengthen your organization, teams, and individual employees, please visit our website.
