Someone explained to me that motivation is internal. You can’t motivate someone; you must give them the opportunities to motivate themselves. It made total sense to me, & I even had lots of personal examples spring to mind that backed it up.
But then I discovered that it’s not totally correct.
I listened to a podcast with Dr. Richard Ryan, a clinical psychologist & co-developer of Self Determination Theory, one of the leading theories on human motivation.
Now I’m certainly not the most cited researcher in psychology & absolutely not in the top 1% of researchers in the field like Dr Ryan is, but I’m going to do my best to explain.
You can indeed motivate someone. There are so many ways in which you can do this. You can promote them, give them a pay rise, send them on development programmes. Indeed, anything that gives them more than they have now.
You can also motivate someone by threatening to take someone away, but that’s a subject for a later date.
However, these quick fixes, tend to be like eating a bar of chocolate. There’s an immediate positive impact, but it’s not long lasting.
Anything that motivates someone from the outside tends to have a short impact, quickly forgotten.
So, if your team has moments of frustration, are feeling low, a quick fix motivator does exactly what it says on the tin. A quick fix. It doesn’t solve the challenge.
If you want to solve the challenge you have to think long term. Now, we’re back to my original belief.
If you want long term motivation, then create those opportunities for your team to motivate themselves.
Research shows that when that motivation comes from within, it lasts longer, you have highly engaged individuals and world class teams.
So, as a leader how can you help?
- Give people autonomy – give people freedom & space to thrive, take an active role.
- Enable people to increase competence – encourage sharing skills & developing new ones, give & ask for feedback.
- Help people build connections – work alongside others & develop understanding of each other.
Give them a try.