E/LMS 100: How to Motivate Employees

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There's no magic wand to solve the problem of how to motivate a team: It is a process that you must cultivate daily. Additionally, not every team will respond to the same tactics, and individual behaviours and performance must be taken into consideration. However, there are a few general best-practices for motivating a team that you can follow to help you find success.

Make Them Feel Appreciated

When your employees do something that goes above and beyond expectation - working overtime to meet a deadline, delivering an excellent performance in a presentation, or excelling in a project - make sure they know that you've recognized and appreciate their efforts. When someone does a good job, tell them! Well-deserved praise helps employees feel like they're on the right track and motivates them to keep working hard.

Emphasize Work/Life Balance

This will obviously vary based on the type of work you do and the policies of your company, but managers do typically have some ability to set expectations around work/life balance. Even if your office doesn't allow flexible hours or requires employees to be on-call off the clock, you can still find ways to show your team that you understand the importance of their personal lives. This can be as simple as encouraging people to use their full allotment of vacation time each year, to take sick days when they're not feeling well, and to leave on time when workload allows.

Take an Interest in Their Career Path

People like to feel like they are working towards something, not just coming in and punching the clock every day. While you can't create opportunities for promotions or financial incentives if that simply isn't feasible for your company (although room for growth is always going to be a motivational factor), you can take an interest in your employees' career paths and professional development. Take time - perhaps during your yearly or quarterly review process - to ask your employees what their goals are and what skills they want to build and help them find creative ways to work towards them.

Make Them Feel Connected to the Company's Bigger Mission

People also tend to work harder when they can connect what they do on a day-to-day basis with something bigger - whether it's a company's mission, success, or profit. This is especially important for employees who don't work in customer-facing roles. Teams behind the scenes affect the end customer just as much, so it's important to draw out those connections and help them remember the importance of their contributions.

Listen to What They Have to Say

Listening is one of the most important things you can do to positively impact employee motivation. Help your team feel like their voices are heard! Be open to ideas and opinions (and if you hear a good one, make sure you give credit where it's due if it gets used). If an employee is having a hard time, either professionally or personally, make sure they know that your door is open if they need someone to talk to. If your employee has a frustration or a concern, give them the chance to voice it in a safe, non-judgmental space. Simply positioning yourself as someone your employees can trust, and who will treat them with respect, is one of the best ways to motivate employees.

Demonstrate Good Leadership

All of this comes down to being a strong leader. Demonstrating the qualities of a good leader - providing a vision to your team, thinking strategically and creatively, communicating effectively, embracing authenticity and self-awareness, and being dependable - will go a long way towards building your team's trust in you, which will, in turn, motivate them to do their best.

Quality of Technical Management

Employees expect help and guidance from their manager. This means that the manager must have the necessary technical knowledge as well as a knowledge of human nature to guide them and gain their respect.

A manager who doesn’t know the work himself and who can’t work with people sets a poor example to employees.

Action by management? The following aspects are important:

Develop a thorough technical knowledge and working skills.
Develop a good knowledge of human nature.
Help employees by training them and solving their work problems.

Organisational Policy and Rules

Each organisation has certain rules and conditions that must be complied with, for example: leave, working hours, overtime, discipline, membership of a pension fund, etc. These rules, and especially the way in which management and managers apply them, can influence a worker’s motivation to work.
What can a manager do in this regard?

He must ensure that he himself knows and understands the policy, rules, and conditions of service.
He must inform his workers thereof.
He must see to it that the rules and benefits are applied fairly.
He must clear up any uncertainty about conditions of service and fringe benefits that workers might have.

Interpersonal Relations between Manager and Co-workers

People have a need for friendship, acceptance, and recognition from other people and want to belong to a group. People therefore like a job where they get on well with their managers and co-workers.
If relations aren’t good, or a worker doesn’t feel part of the group, he becomes unhappy, he doesn’t do his best in his work – and he will then possibly also not stay with the organisation for long.

The manager can do the following:

Try and develop good relations between yourself and your employee.
Thorough induction, training, proper communication, and fair discipline contribute to good relations.
Treat employees with the necessary respect and fairness.
Be friendly and helpful.
Listen to problems and help to find solutions for them.
Encourage employees to function as a team and make a newcomer part of the team.
Show sincere personal interest in, and respect for, your people.

Salary and Fringe Benefits

One of the reasons why one works is to earn money to meet certain basic needs. A worker’s will to work is adversely affected if he is dissatisfied with his salary, doesn’t know how it is calculated and why money is deducted. This dissatisfaction leads to a negative attitude towards the organisation.
Although you as manager can’t do much about an employee’s salary, you can apply the following:

Ensure that the person knows how his wages are calculated.
Help him if he has queries about his salary.
Explain to him where, how, and when he will be paid each month.
Don’t hold a worker back if he qualifies for promotion.

Working Conditions

Most people prefer to work in a pleasant and safe working environment. Therefore, the work should always be of such a nature that the employee isn’t hindered in the performance of his duties. The following aspects of the working conditions can reduce effectiveness, namely: a shortage of the necessary material and equipment, unnecessary danger, a shortage of safety equipment and unnecessary delays.

The manager must do the following:

See to it that workers always have the necessary tools and equipment.
Keep the workplace pleasant and clean.
Create a safe environment by removing unsafe conditions and train employees in industrial safety.
Provide the necessary safety equipment such as dust goggles, hard-hats, gloves, etc.

Security

Security is one of the most important human needs. This means that a person would like to have a job where there is security in terms of his position, his salary and fair treatment. If a worker feels that he has no security, can lose his work at any time, and is treated unfairly, he will be uncertain of himself and not at all productive.