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Motivating Employees to Achieve Peak Performance
As a leader, motivating employees is a critical element to your success.
Leadership is about influence. It starts with the initial contact made to recruit new employees, proceeds through the entire welcome process, and continues everyday until the employee departs the organization.
Recruiting: New Employees and Critical First Impressions
New employees arrive full of enthusiasm. Whether this is their first job or a career change, it is a big decision; the employee wants to believe that they made the right career choice.
To be fair, the employer has made a significant investment in recruiting and is optimistic as well. Leaders will do well to continue motivating employees with that same positive approach throughout their welcome process.
Retention: What Motivates Employees?
While recruiting and the welcome process establish critical first impressions, day-to-day leadership determines retention within an organization and the desired loyalty that motivates others.
A good leader knows that people respond similarly to how they are treated. When employees feel that they are treated with dignity and respect, they exhibit a much greater sense of loyalty toward their boss.
For example, when a coach makes it a habit to teach first, the players tend to respond positively because they feel like their growth and development is an important part of being on the team.
Conversely, when the coach does not teach the fundamentals and ensure the desired level of understanding, the perception is that results or "winning" is more important than our need as individuals to develop and grow.
Unfortunately, when leaders lose sight of their role as a coach, mentor, or instructor, the loyalty that inspires employees to stay the course and give that extra effort slips away.
Simply put, when we believe our boss has our best interests at heart, we feel appreciated and we are more inclined to put in the extra effort needed to succeed.
Ideally, each of us wants to be a part of something greater. We want the experience of being on a winning team and the pleasure of sharing our success with our teammates.
Just like youth sports, we want to participate in activities that we enjoy and those where we have the ability to learn and grow. We want to be challenged and to be proud of our accomplishments. We want to know that our victories were well-earned because we worked hard.
Take a look at whether you manage or lead and whether your team has that sense of loyalty necessary to remain committed to your most challenging goals.
Those who lead most effectively are able to consistently inspire loyalty from others.
Keeping Good People
Roger Herman presents nearly 200 ideas for motivating employees in his 1990 book, Keeping Good People. He breaks these ideas down into these five overarching strategies: environmental, relationship, support, growth, and compensation.
One example that he addresses is an employee recognition program along with many others. Later, he went on to co-author several other helpful books, including How to Become an Employer of Choice.
