What Motivates People? How to Motivate Your Team

tatyanamoaton
Jul 27, 2018
9 min read

Updated: Dec 19, 2018

In this post you will get a foundation for recognizing what motivates people and understanding how people’s motivations differ depending on their current needs.

UNDERSTANDING MOTIVATION

The good news is that psychologists who have spent a lot of time studying what motivates people, so we don't have to, have come up with some tried-and-true guidelines that can help you motivate anybody.

PLAIN ENGLISH

Motivation An incentive, an inducement, or a stimulus for action. A motivation is anything—verbal, physical, or psychological—that causes somebody to do something in response.

But no matter how much experts would like to find one key to motivating people, the truth of the matter, is that individuals are motivated by different things, different environments and stimuli and what motivates each of us changes throughout the periods of our lives. So using some combination of these theories might be your best bet in motivating people in the everyday world, at your workplace, or organization.

EVERYONE IS NOT THE SAME...OR ARE THEY?

Take this example. You have two employees, Michelle and Raven. They make the same amount of money. They have the same size office with the same size window. They received the same end-of-year bonus. They were promoted through the ranks at the same speed. You gave them each a nice box of candy for Christmas and equally praised their achievements at the annual employee meeting.

But one is happy, while the other is completely miserable. How is this so? Simple: Different things appeal to different people, and contrary to the old adage, what’s good for the goose is not always good for the gander.

If you’re trying to motivate a particular individual, the first piece of advice I can give you is to take a little time to get to know them! Notice what seems to make that person happy, excited, bored, or frustrated. And here’s a neat trick to use whether you’re dealing with an individual or a group: Just ask them what you want to know! Plain and simple! Nothing is stopping you from sitting down with your employees and asking them to tell you what puts the shine in their eyes and smiles on their faces. Try a few of these questions to help you get a picture of a person’s motivations:

Why did you take this job?
Why do you come to work each day?
What do you like best about this job?
What do you dislike about your job?
What frustrates you the most?
What makes you feel the most valued?
What was the best job you have ever had? Why was it so good?
What do you expect from this job?
What do you want from your life a year from now? What about five years from now?

If you’re concerned that people won’t answer your questions about their jobs and their levels of satisfaction honestly, make it an anonymous survey. If employees know that you can’t identify which comments belong to which employees, they’re more likely to respond frankly to questions such as “What do you dislike about your job?”

People’s answers to these questions are more likely than not to be very diverse. One employee might come to work for just the paycheck, another for the friendships with their co-workers, and yet another for the challenge of taking on difficult projects. One person will thrive on change, while on the other hand another will be threatened by anything but structure and the status quo.

MOTIVATING INDIVIDUALS IN GROUPS

Does the fact that each individual feels motivated by different things mean that you can’t motivate a whole group of employees at once? No, not at all! There’s nothing wrong with determining what kind of motivation the majority of people in an organization will respond to and then providing that motivation. But the key to motivating a group of people is to vary the kinds of motivation you provide. That extra day off for the holidays might not mean much to that single person without a family to visit and who lives just to come in to work. Just make sure that the next perk you offer will be something that they WILL appreciate, such as an employee of the month award that recognizes their devotion.

MOTIVATION PATTERNS

Luckily, this variety of motivation among people doesn’t mean it’s random chaos out there. The good news is that there are patterns to what motivates people. Understanding those patterns can help you spot which kind of person or group of people you’re dealing with.

MASLOW’S HIERARCHY OF NEEDS

A well-known theory that is very relevant to motivating people is Abraham Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. If you have ever taken Psychology 101 in college, you probably remember this one well: People have a hierarchy of needs that determines their actions. These needs start at the most basic level of physiological needs, which include such fundamental requirements as food and clothing. Once those needs are satisfied, people move on to the next level.

PLAIN ENGLISH

Maslow’s hierarchy of needs A theory stating that human beings have an innate order, or hierarchy, for the things they want. When one level of this hierarchy is satisfied, they move on to the next.

Take a look at Maslow’s hierarchy, listed from the most basic at the bottom to the most advanced at the top:

SPOTTING SOME REAL EXAMPLES AROUND YOU

Look around you; if your company/organization is typical, you should see people being motivated at each of these levels:

The mail clerk who’s just out of school wants to pay off his car loan and make the rent every month (physiological needs).
The single mother/junior executive works to provide medical and insurance benefits for herself and her child (security needs).
The chatty man in accounting loves the people he works with and lives to organize the lottery pools (social needs).
The middle manager that works 70 hours a week to earn that next promotion (esteem needs).
And there’s sure to be somebody who does his job not for money, nor for friendship, nor for a fancy title, but because it fits his value system: This is truly what makes his life worthwhile (self-actualization needs).

You can easily use patterns that apply to individuals to identify group needs. Groups of people who do the same kind of work or perform the same level of work often share the same needs. Here’s an example of a way to identify a group need. What motivates employees paid by the hour is different than what motivates salaried workers. For example, let’s say you decide to let people go home early on the day before a holiday, but you never indicate to the hourly people that it’s okay for them to record those extra four hours on their time-sheets so that they get paid for the time off. It’s doubtful that the hourly workers felt it was a perk to lose four hours of pay just before a holiday. In this instance, time off was a motivator to salaried people but was a demotivator to hourly employees.

CAUTION

Avoid using the same motivator over and over again. If you give the team a reward lunch every month rather than when they’ve performed exceptionally, that lunch will become routine rather than motivating.

MOTIVATIONS CHANGE

So that’s it, right? Recognize what kind of need motivates somebody to work and meet that need, and you’re all set? Well … no. Unfortunately, it’s rarely that simple because people have different needs at different times in their lives.

For instance, once the mail clerk earns enough to cover the rent with money to spare, their physiological needs are met, and they may start to look for more job security (security needs on the Maslow hierarchy). Or they might jump to the esteem level and look for advancement within the company. Likewise, the person who has had years of promotions and who is respected by their peers because of all their hard work might stop and wonder if all these promotions are worth it if they don't have the time or energy to stop and smell the roses. That’s when they’ll move into the self-actualization phase and perhaps decide to chuck the big salary and impressive title in favor of consulting part-time from home and returning to school to study graphic design.

Not only do people progress through these levels, but they also may bounce back and forth among them. When a major company downsizes, someone who was concerned only with creating a social life at work might jump right back to the security level when they feel their job is threatened. These different levels of need and the fact that people move among these levels throughout their lives are why it’s so important that you get to know the people you work with. Understanding their positions in life and their positions within the company will help you identify the best way to motivate them at any given time.

The very same principle of change and growth apply to groups of workers as well. At the beginning of a challenging project, social camaraderie and free pizza might be enough to motivate a group of people to work long hours. But it’s likely that this same group will need more substantial recognition and tangible gestures of esteem, such as promotions or bonuses when you’re a year into the project. Keeping in touch with the group—and learning to gauge its mood and its needs—is an important part of deciding how best to motivate it over the long haul.

DON’T CONFUSE YOUR MOTIVATION FOR THEIRS

One of the biggest mistakes managers and supervisors make is to assume that what motivates them is what motivates their employees. That’s just human nature. If you’re motivated by things that bolster your self-esteem, you just can’t imagine someone who simply doesn’t need the promise of a raise or a promotion to keep them working. You might just have to walk a mile in their running shoes before you can relate to their perspective.

Here’s an example: I once worked in a small company located in an office building with many other small start-up companies. One day, I ran into the office manager from the company next to ours in the parking lot. She had quit and was loading a box filled with her personal belongings into her car. When I asked her why she had quit, she told me that she felt uneasy because her boss kept giving her more responsibility and more promotions. I was amazed: I was craving more responsibility and more challenge from my job after climbing out of the ranks of assistantship, and you couldn’t make me go back for all the tea in China.

But this woman had quit to take a job as a secretary, which was actually a demotion from her current position. Her boss hadn’t recognized that this employee, though bright and capable, didn’t want more responsibility. In fact, she was made insecure by the constant change in her job description and level of responsibility. If her boss had understood that, he might have been able to structure a job to better suit her needs and desires. This was a young, dynamic company, and I have no doubt he could have created such a position. But he couldn’t imagine someone satisfied with her position and wanting to stay right there. Because he couldn’t understand what motivated her, he lost a good employee.

Use employees’ yearly performance reviews as a time to take stock of their current motivational needs. Ask each employee what he or she wants to get out of the job in the next year. If you see patterns of need among several employees, institute policies that address them so that you can motivate all employees to work more productively and be more satisfied with their jobs.

COMMON MOTIVATORS

To help you see the other person’s point of view, take a look at this list of things that stimulate different people to perform their jobs well:

Money
Respect
Challenge
Structure
An attractive work environment
Praise
Flexible work hours
Feeling like part of the team
Wearing casual clothing to work
Contributing ideas
Travel
Not having to travel
The chance to learn new skills
Promotions
Camaraderie
Recognition
An award
Telecommuting
Free soda in the lunch room
A discount on company merchandise
A great retirement plan
Independence
Bonuses
A creative environment
Being thanked for extra work
Believing in the job
Working with other people
Having set processes
The boss’s trust

To truly understand how motivations change, just think about what’s motivating you to report to work every day. Is what motivates you today different than what motivated you a year ago? Five years ago? Ten years ago?

Now that you know something about the different forms and patterns that an individual’s needs fall into, you could probably take this list and slot each item on it into Maslow’s hierarchy. Keeping that hierarchy in mind will help you remember that people look for different things out of their jobs, and will help you become a better motivator.

As you choose what you might want to try to motivate your team, keep in mind the guidelines in this post, and choose the right motivation for the right people and circumstances.