Tips On Employee Motivation

Motivating Your People

You can make their day

• Start the day right. Smile. Walk tall and confidently
• Walk around your workplace and greet people
• Share the goals and expectations for the day
• Let the staff know that today is going to be a great day
• It starts with you. You can make their day

Use Simple, Powerful Words

• Say "please" and "thank you" and "you're doing a good job."
• How often do you take the time to use these simple, powerful words, and others like 3. them, in your interaction with staff?

Make Sure People Know What You Expect

• Supervisors think they have clearly stated work objectives, numbers needed, report deadlines and requirements, but the employee received a different message.
• When requirements change in the middle of the job, or project the context for the change is rarely discussed.
• Make sure you get feedback from the employee so you know he understands what you need. Share the goals and reasons for doing the task or project.

Provide Regular Feedback

• First is knowing how they are doing at work and sharing it with them.
• Set up a daily or weekly schedule and make sure feedback happens.

People Need Positive and Not So Positive Consequences

• Hand-in-hand with regular feedback, employees need rewards and recognition for positive contributions.
• Employees need a fair, consistently administered progressive disciplinary system for when they fail to perform effectively.
• Nothing hurts positive motivation and morale more quickly than un addressed problems, or problems addressed inconsistently.
• People need to know what they can expect from you.

It is a Discipline, be consistent

• Consistently, in a disciplined manner, adhere to what you know about employee motivation.
• The key to supervisory success in creating positive employee motivation and morale.
• The challenge is to incorporate them into your skill set and do them consistently - every day.

Continue Learning and Trying Out New Ideas

• Use whatever access you have to education and training.
• You may have an internal trainer or you can seek classes from an outside consultant.
• The ability to continuously learn is what will keep you moving in your career.

Learn the Roles & Responsibilities of A Leader

• Learn the roles and responsibilities of supervisors and managers and how to:

1. provide feedback, praise and recognition
2. give instruction, delegate tasks and projects
3. listen actively and deeply
4. manage time and meetings
5. problem solve and follow up for continuous improvement
6. make decisions
7. build empowered teams and individuals in a teamwork environment

Fine tune these Competencies

• The more comfortable and confident you are about these work competencies, the more time, energy, and ability you have to devote to spending time with staff and creating a motivating work environment.

Make Time for People

• Spend time daily with each person you supervise.
• Key employee work motivation factor is spending positive interaction time with the supervisor.
• Schedule one-to-one on a public calendar so people can see when they can expect some quality time and attention from you.

Schedule Quarterly Performance Development Meetings

• These are not the performance appraisal sessions for your people.
• Exclusive one-to-one sessions devoted to employee performance development.
• Most people want to learn and grow their skills at work
• Make a performance development plan with each person and make sure you help them carry out the plan.
• You can make their year

Focus on the Development of People

• Encourage experimentation and taking reasonable risk to develop employee skills.
• Get to know them personally.
• Ask what motivates them.
• Ask what career objectives they have and are aiming to achieve.
• The quarterly performance development meeting is your opportunity to formalize plans for people. You can make their career.

Share the Goals and the Context

• Prepare staff in advance if visitors or customers will come to your workplace.
• Hold regular meetings to share information, gain ideas for improvement, and train new policies.
• Hold focus groups to gather input before implementing policies that affect employees.
• Promote problem solving and process improvement teams.

Take Responsibility

• Take responsibility for your actions
• The actions of the people you lead
• The accomplishment of the goals that are yours.

Be Accountable

• If you are unhappy with the calibre of the people you are hiring, whose is accountable for that?
• If you are unhappy about the training people in your work group are receiving, whose is accountable for it?
• If you are tired of sales and accounting changing your goals, schedule, and direction, whose accountability is it.?

You can make their experience

• You are creating a work environment in which people will choose motivation. It does start with you. You can make their whole experience with your company.

The ability to motivate others comes through discovering how to connect with others and challenging them to be more of what God has created them to be.