Unblock Your Team With 4 Mental Fitness Motivation Building Blocks
Motivation - from the Latin motivus, meaning a "moving cause" - drives human actions.
Busy supervisors need to remember that when giving new assignments to team members who may already feel skeptical, unprepared, or overburdened with their responsibilities.
Consider a scenario where a supervisor, going on leave, tasks a program director with developing a plan for a departmental study, expecting it upon return. Unbeknownst to the supervisor, the request crushes the program director, who is typically dedicated and enthusiastic.
The program director didn't feel they had a choice, weren't confident they could meet the requirements in the available time, and didn't see any value in the effort.
Negative emotions signal that something is wrong and needs our attention. In the short term, they motivate us to pay attention. They might even support taking some action that brings relief.
But, disappointingly, the relief is usually short-lived when the unresolved negative emotions resurface.
Internal saboteurs gut a leader's confidence, sour their mood, and block their ability to positively influence the challenges they face. When negative, sabotaging emotions throw a leader into a multi-day tailspin, recovery can feel impossible.
Fortunately, recovery can be quick and effective with easy-to-implement remedies.
Let's begin with a story about math and baseball.
The teacher, noticing a student's interest in baseball, gave the 4th grader math assignments that focused on batting averages, team winning percentages, pitcher earned run averages, and several other similar baseball statistics rather than the textbook math assignments. Six months later, the student reported to the teacher that math was now his favorite subject.
The connection between math and something the student valued motivated him to overcome his learning difficulties. Like a rolling stone, success gains momentum.
Motivation is a core ingredient when a team member's or team's enthusiasm is critical. It activates the sage brain channel –where team members do their best and most creative thinking.
Understanding motivation is one of the most important things we do in our lives because it has much bearing on why we do things we do and whether we enjoy them or not. – Professor and Author Clayton Christensen (1952-2020), Developed the theory of “disruptive innovation.”
Self-efficacy, mood, and value are three motivation building blocks that power up the sage brain channel.
BLOCK 1 - Self-efficacy is the belief that a performer can or cannot (low or high self-efficacy) accomplish a specific task or goal. It's about the performer's confidence.
Like laying a foundation before constructing a building, self-efficacy establishes the groundwork for success with a new assignment. Low confidence, motivated by fear, shakes the foundation.
These options lay the foundation for receiving assignments positively.
Invite team members to remember something they did previously and succeeded. Ask them to list factors contributing to their success and consider how they might help in the new situation.
Invite team members to search their experience for something they excel at doing. Ask them to reflect for a few seconds on how they got to be good at it and how they might adapt the pathway to the new assignment.
The supervisor in our story could have used one of these options to move the program director into their brain's PQ channel. From this more optimistic place, the director might have imagined how their team members and collegial network could be enlisted to help with the plan.
BLOCK 2 - Mood is a temporary state of mind. It can shift quickly and positively or negatively impact the experience of a situation. A team member's mood influences their ability to hear (or not) what someone says.
Like charging a battery to ensure full power, a positive mood opens a team member's capacity to imagine different possibilities for success with a new assignment. A bad mood, motivated by fear, drains our batteries.
These options charge up the batteries for seeing possibilities in a request.
Provide a team member with a written description of the assignment and their role. Review it verbally with them briefly. Ask them to think about it for a week, make some notes, and then return to discuss it.
Think through what sources of resistance to the assignment could be. Consider what is already on the team members' plate that cannot be shifted, what might be reprioritized, or whether the timing or scope of the new assignment is flexible. Be prepared to offer some choices.
The supervisor in our story could have used one of these options to keep the program director's thoughts flowing from their brain's PQ channel. From this positive place, the director might have more quickly found alternative ways of doing the assignment that served everyone's interests.
BLOCK 3 - Value answers the question, What will my effort be worth to me (intrinsic value) or the world (extrinsic value)? Team members need to connect to the value of a request to avoid losing them motivationally.
Just as an artist primes a canvas with a base layer to enhance the final painting, seeing the benefit from an effort prepares a team member to receive a new assignment with an open mind. A closed mind locks out opportunities.
When buy-in is around an assignment's value, the sage PQ channel kicks into gear, and a leader will likely get 120% of team members' energy. The organization will get less than 50% if they don't see the value.
Selling value also empowers confidence-building.
A mic drop moment: Jack Wilson worked on two asset sales as a human resources executive. Both involved terminating all employees and then rehiring them for the new company. The day the first asset sale was announced, the CEO walked into Jack's office and said: "I just want you to know that there is nobody I would rather do this asset sale with than you." Then, he got up and left Jack to think about that.
That affirmation heightened Jack's self-efficacy, mood, and sense of value for the task ahead. It shifted him from anxious feelings about the task to a motivating sage mindset.
These options prime the canvas for seeing how a short-term task contributes to building future professional capacity.
Honestly, unpack the "WIIFM" point of view for yourself, each team member, and the whole team to create a shared understanding of an assignment's purpose and impact. Ask, 1) What's in it for me? 2) What's in it for our team? 3) What's in it for moving our mission or making a difference?
Have a conversation with the team leader(s): Understand what is uniquely important to them to experience and help them find the opportunities to do that in carrying out the work. Like a curious child taking its first steps, ask a team member to take out a blank sheet of paper and write down their initial ideas for designing the assignment in one minute. Then, ask them to say one thing they like about each idea.
The supervisor in our story could have used one of these options to inspire the program director's curiosity and desire to learn something new. This is especially helpful when team members feel overly confident about succeeding or being prepared.
In our volatile, uncertain world, one other building block is trusting leaders will help remove obstacles and solve hard things when they happen.
BLOCK 4 – Safety Net assures that a trusted person will help when the going gets rough.
Just as warming up before a workout helps prevent injuries and improves performance, team members thrive when they know their leader will intervene to reduce mistakes or failures.
These options motivate a supervisor to be their team's safety net, drawing on all the other motivation building blocks.
Boost your self-efficacy by painting a vibrant picture in your mind of the project's purpose and the difference it will make for the organization.
Brighten your mood by imagining what could be some of the obstacles to success and who could help you remove them.
Bring value by recognizing team members' excellent work and thanking them regularly for small steps.
The supervisor in our story could have used these options to inspire a powerful positive mindset in the program director. They could have gone on leave knowing they did everything they could to help the program director be motivated to succeed.
When supervisors operate from their brain's PQ channel, their positive influence is motivating. Now that's positive, productive leading.
I am grateful to my colleagues Jack Wilson H. Nathan Charles, PhD, PCC, SP(EIA), CPQC, CMC, Ruby Brown, and Catrese Brown, four accomplished leaders and leadership coaches who contributed to this article and motivated me to make it happen!
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