A self-motivated employee – reality or Utopia?
16.09.2008
Elena Eliseeva, XADO
The subject of motivation as one of the HR-management areas has probably been ignored today only by the lazy. However, a great number of publications does not make this subject less vital. Besides, expecting to be in accord with most of my colleagues, I believe that of all HR-management functions (search, recruitment, training, development and assessment) motivation management is one of the hardest things.
Moreover, experts differently look at the issue whether employees can be motivated at all: ranging from a firm conviction in the justice of the saying ‘give the wolf the best food, but he would hanker for the wood’ to a belief that a clearly elaborated system of motivation, desirably west-oriented, may be a panacea for all organizational woes.
In my view, human motivation cannot actually be managed at all. At the root of motivation there are individual attitudes to oneself, people, work and life as a whole. And the work on changing attitudes relates if not to the domain of psychotherapy, then to a profound psychological consulting anyway. Motivation means putting sense into life, which is very individual and where the principle of pulling the right strings can hardly be applicable.
It’s no secret that many leaders wish to see a self-motivated employee who, once hired by the company, will set himself clear and measurable goals and successfully achieve them on his own.
It’s also a common knowledge that a percentage of such self-motivated people is very small because a very small number of individuals cultivate their abilities, their mindset, convictions, goals and values. As a rule, within a period of time, such people become successful leaders themselves. And, since no one cancelled the projection mechanism in human mentality, these leaders are absolutely positive that their employees must also be self-motivated and should know “everything by themselves”. The only thing required of a boss sticking to this approach is to pay salaries and bonuses timely.
In such a situation, many HR-managers (especially in home companies) were witnesses to the following picture: when an owner (a boss) is setting first bricks to his company, he often feels shortage of funds to pay high salaries and arrange comfortable workplaces. He engages people by inspiring them and promoting his goals and ideals. As the organization begins to earn income, “person number one” gets more focused on money. He says something like it is necessary to earn more to make high salaries for the employees too. The time passes and there he is: there is him, the founder, and a small team of individuals (having been for ages with the company), highly motivated, who also like this business, and there are all the others – who just do the job and don’t try to reach the stars, sometimes even letting things slide. The boss cannot find the reason – he pays them salary that must be motivating by itself! And most probably the reason lies in the fact that the leader never talked about the goals after he had built up his business team, he never let his employees feel their involvement in the common cause, never made them feel like their work was important for the company whatever was the role they were playing.
Many of us may argue that our (Ukrainian, Russian – actually no matter which, post-Soviet, on the whole) realities give a leading preference to a pecuniary motivation. However reluctant I feel about trivialities as far as HR-management is concerned, nevertheless, I’d like to note that a salary is a hygiene factor (according to Hertzberg): if an individual receives a low salary, he will work badly, but if he is highly paid, it cannot guarantee that he will work well. In addition, the money interest differs from a real involvement in a sense that the former works from 9.00 till 18.00. Only when a person is keen on his work and is aware of his importance and involvement with his company, will he put his heart into his business rather than punch a time clock.
It’s a matter of a minor concern for the leaders, which is clear enough. Business-type people as they are, they don’t consider that an individual will perform efficiently at his workplace not only for a particular financial reward but also because this job gives him pleasure or makes him think of himself and his work as important for the company. Because he feels happy at his job – however pathetic this may sound. Spending most hours of our life at work – this fact alone should make us think, “Am I happy at my job? In my profession?...”
An American website dealing with positive psychology studies contains a very simple and succinct formula of happiness: pleasure + engagement + meaning = happiness.
American positive psychologists were not paving a path to the subject which was times ago dwelt upon by our great Ukrainian philosopher Griroriy Skovoroda who expressed a concept of happiness as he saw it. Skovoroda believed that human life is aimed at happiness that could be pursued through key factors, which are freedom, public duty of an individual and “affined labor”, which means dedicated labor. The great Ukrainian philosopher frequently mentioned an importance of “related, congenial labor” for a human life. An impossibility to be occupied with a favorite activity may cause individual’s degradation, turn his life into mere existence, into daily vanitas vanitatum. And all motivating systems will be useless…
So what, if motivation is difficult or almost impossible to manage, should we lose our heart and forget about all these Maslow’s pyramids, Hertzberg’s Two Factor Theory and others of that ilk – when “it somehow works” without any motivation theories?
This is not a way out, and professional HR-specialists know it. In my view, the way out is a motivating organization of labor, which is called motivation management today. This means a style of management when a leader reveals energy potential of his employee and “sets his self-motivation to work”.
This sort of management refers to the book “First, Break All the Rules. What the World’s Greatest Managers Do Differently” by M.Buckingham and C.Coffman seeing the major task of the best manager in being a catalyst for turning employee talent into production.
As motivation cannot possibly be managed, a manager (a boss) should reveal an employee’s motivation (talents) and help him open up his potential and be efficient at a given company on a given job. Following this Buckingham’s and Coffman’s concept, an essence of motivation management can be formulated in four keys of best managers:
- Select an individual.
- Explain what is expected of him.
- Encourage him.
- Promote his growth and development.
This is just how these functions were formulated proceeding from a deep knowledge of human nature, which says:
- People don’t change that much.
- Don’t waste time trying to put in what was left out.
- Try to draw out what was left in.
- That is hard enough.
When applied to solve the four major tasks of a manager, this approach will help us understand the following:
- Staff must be selected for their talent, not just experience, intelligence or will (talent is understood by the authors of the above-mentioned book as recurrent patterns of thought, emotion or behavior; something that is within a person and cannot be taught like skills).
- Explaining expectations it is necessary to clearly define the right results as opposed to the right steps.
- When encouraging an employee, focus on his strengths rather than weaknesses.
- An individual should be developed by helping find the right fit for him and not just climb the next step of the company ladder.
If need be, one can plunge deep into the subject and write that if you, as a leader, want to create motivating conditions for your employees and don’t fancy an idea of solid financial investment in the launch of any globally new motivating system, you’ll have to adhere to some principles of motivating organization of labor, such as:
- employees must understand the meaning of what they are doing;
- results of their work should be important for someone in particular (a customer, a supplier, etc.), people must satisfy their need of being involved in achieving the result;
- motivation to work significantly grows when an individual is recognized for his participation in this work: provide an
- opportunity to an employee being successful in his work to report his results to a superior boss;
- it is necessary to maintain a regular feedback, make the employees feel like they are important and their work is significant for the common goal;
- set goals together with your employees, and they will put more of their personal energy into achievements;
- recognize good work of your employees: success without recognition leads to disappointment;
- make sure criteria to measure the quality of work are clear and transparent;
- assign tasks to your employees not only within the area of their current development (things they are competent and efficient in) but also within a wider area of their closest development: make skill-upgrading a condition to achieve a raised bar of the task and they’ll attach the meaning to enhancing their competencies.
I think that this list may be extended by any successful leader on the basis of his own experience.
Making a brief summary on the subject expressed in the title of this article, we may draw up the following conclusions.
- It is more effective to search for and work with self-motivated people than to spend time and money on their motivation because people all the same are guided by their own motives and personal beliefs. Regardless of all motivating systems.
- I define a self-motivated employee as a person with talents (in terminology of Buckingham and Coffman) to given work. How a talent may be revealed? There are two clear signs: quick learning and pleasure. Those activities an individual is quickest in coping with, including the process of acquiring new skills and competencies, and is able to derive pleasure of are his talents. This makes self-motivation to such a job.
- The only thing required from a boss in this case is motivation management or performance management, a notion offered by the modern HR-terminology. Each manager has his own performance management program, his own style of management, but all these differences are based on common principles predetermining their success.
Therefore I’d like to conclude by wishing my colleagues, both beginning and experienced leaders: implement motivation management and have more self-motivated employees!
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