Failures, conflicts, competition, threats, rejection, frustration and uncertainty are factors that are found in the business environment today. All these are impediments to performance at the desired level.
Though the fact of the matter is that you still need to deliver performance – and these are not entrained in any organisation as excuses. As a leader, how much ever hard you try to prevent your staff from de-motivation, you will not always succeed.
Causes for some de-motivating factors are external and theoretically your business cannot provide solutions to those. It’s not possible for leaders to be behind each and every employee every time when there is an issue.
In the real world, your role should be to create the conditions where people motivate themselves. The most effective leaders create conditions for high performance through high support and high challenge.
The value of motivation we all know is very high and that it has a direct impact on your business. But do you know how to measure it? Some may say yes, but have you ever measured it? You have heard the phrase that “what gets measured, gets done”. The time has come to start measuring this aspect critically as a potential solution to overcome the never ending challenges and competitive pressures.
There are many reasons for employees to be demotivated; Business or Market related issues mainly at the middle and senior level, organisational culture, work condition or policy issues, personal factors or leadership gaps covering all levels to name a few.
Assess the reasons for de-motivation before considering any action. This is no easy management task. Expert HR support is needed to ascertain this and analysed for potential action.
If you choose, the strategy can be purchased from external consultants. It’s just a matter of paying the price. There is no argument that your strategy provides competitive advantage but the execution is equally or more important. The level of execution is determined by the level of motivation of your people. And it’s intrinsic; meaning internal, so the change has to happen within the individuals. All you can do as a leader is to provide the right conditions for the employees to be self motivated and as leaders to support that process with focused regular communication.
Support and challenge
Factors outside the workplace can lead to demotivation. Remember though, that it’s always a good thing to deal with it positively. If it’s a work reason; great because you can get to the bottom of it and solve it together. If it’s outside work, you can make the workplace the best sanctuary for them. May be signposting them to specialist help and finally demonstrating that you care about them.
Either way, know that a demotivated employee can be like a wounded animal. Can sometimes be wild, emotionally driven, out of focus and most times direct energy towards unproductive activities. Cost of demotivation in short is huge. The effective leader uses support and challenge with team members. One without the other is ineffective.
Dealing with people’s motivation is not about being a counsellor or tyrant. The most inspirational leaders offer high support and high Challenge to become a role model leader.
So seek expert support on this issue externally if the expertise is not available internally. You may be surprised with the results thus the opportunity for improvement. Single differentiator when knowledge and skills are at the same level would be the level of motivation. Level of motivation dictates the rate of execution success. You know what it means to a business.