Motivation Myths--What You Need to Know

What would your response be to these two questions I was asked this week?

From an executive in a large company: “Alan, how can I better motivate my front line employees?”

How would you answer that question? Is your reaction, “What a great leader, she really cares about her people!”

From a long-term employee : “My boss just doesn’t ‘get’ me and I’ve lost my passion for what I do.”

Is your reaction, “I understand that—in fact, I’ve felt that way before!”

Both of these scenarios (and the reactions above) convey a common misunderstanding about human motivation--thinking that motivation comes from “out there.” Many managers think they can and should motivate their team members. And many team members are waiting for their managers to learn how to better motivate them.

That’s the “Motivation Myth”—that we can motivate others and that others can motivate us. Not only is that not true, it’s disempowering. If the motivation myth were true, we would be dependent on others for our motivation.

If you can’t motivate someone else—and if no one can motivate you, what is the solution? Here are two:

Managers: Align what you need a team member to do with what they already want to do. If that can't be done, you don't have a motivation problem, you have a "job fit" problem.

Employees: Find a company and a job role that needs what you are naturally motivated to do. Yes, that might be challenging, but you will be glad you did--and so will your new employer.

The fact is that we don’t have a motivation problem at work. We have an “alignment” problem—we’re trying to get employees to do something they're not naturally motivated to do. Maybe it's time we gave up the motivation myth and began to find the right match between jobs and employees who really want to do those jobs.

Alan Allard, Executive Coach and Speaker
www.alanallard.com