9 TOP TIPS TO MOTIVATE YOUR TEAM –
AT NO COST WHATSOEVER
There are some relatively simple things to making your team more productive, which you can implement straight away, that don’t have to cost anything to your business. Here are our top tips to create a team that is energetic, enthusiastic and employs high standards. As a leader, make it your aim to enforce these every day and you’ll see the difference from day one. It’s not always about raising salaries (which will come as a relief to you) – these tactics can achieve a high-performing and happy team:
- RECOGNIZING AND REWARDING HIGH ACHIEVERS
Simply acknowledge when someone in your team achieves a goal, as this will inspire them to aim even higher, be well-respected amongst their colleagues, and motivate others to give things a go. Make it simple by giving a shout-out to someone at your next team meeting, when you walk past someone’s desk or just stick a post-it note to their screen and make it personal.
- DON’T SWEAT THE SMALL STUFF
Sure it can be annoying but if you have a good worker who is constantly 10 minutes late, don’t sweat it if their work is usually up to your standards. Your employees are not robots (thankfully!) so treat them as human beings.
- REALLY LISTEN
As much as it’s tempting, and yes you’re busy – don’t just pretend to be interested, as many people do. Learn to actively listen and use this to its fullest potential.
- CLEAR COMPANY AND ROLE PURPOSE
Communicate your company’s mission clearly and frequently. This also applies to individual roles. Make sure everyone knows the big picture, and how the work they do contributes to that.
- BE GENUINE AND SET A GOOD EXAMPLE
Use your manners and be respectful with your team. Be personable and kind to everyone, even on days when you don’t feel like it. This is the true sign of a great leader as people look up to you and need to respect you. How you act and your daily mood is contagious. Choose to spread cheerfulness and energy instead of negativity and fear at work.
- YOU DON’T HAVE TO HAVE ALL THE GOOD IDEAS
You have a team for a reason. Use them and seek them out for their ideas, and listen to them. If the ideas that transpire are good – implement them straight away and encourage other managers to do the same.
- DEAL WITH IT, STRAIGHT AWAY
If someone isn’t pulling their weight in the team, this can be very demoralizing for the rest of the team. Your best bet is to deal with problem team members straight away. Talk to them one-to-one and make sure they know what they’re doing wrong, as well as what they’re doing right. Ensure that they have clear takeaways from the meeting and make a plan to better their performance. If they don’t improve after several performance meetings, let them go. You owe it to the rest of the team.
- DON’T BE BLINDED BY YOUR PERSONAL PREFERENCES
The truth is you can’t like everyone and everyone can’t like you. As a manager, you still have to treat everyone equally and be careful to let your personal likes and dislikes blind you to who is actually doing a good job. Strive to be a fair manager, as you’ll want to be able to objectively recognise a job well done.
- BUILD YOUR DREAM TEAM
Work to build your ideal team that strives for excellence and celebrates success. It will be incredibly motivating for all team members if you demand high standards for everyone and hold everyone to account for their areas of responsibility.
At Adaptive Technology Group our team of IT experts work to build long term partnerships with our clients. In order to do that, we make sure our core team values the ATG vision, has continuous collaboration, is always learning and striving to be the best in our industry.