How to motivate your employees to go above and beyond?
I get to work with some amazing leaders. One of my clients is the CEO of a leading mattress company in South-East Asia.
On a recent call, the common issue of "How to Motivate my staff to go above and beyond their call of duty?" came up.
It reminded me of how so many employees settle into cushy jobs.
Their tendencies are to get comfortable in the security of receiving a consistent paycheque while doing the bare minimum to appease their bosses and not
How do I know this? Admittedly, I was one of them at one point in my career.
I recall asking myself the question; “Why try hard when I know extra efforts won't lead to anything.”
Sound familiar?
So, we sat with this challenge and a few ideas came to mind.
Idea #1 - Hire for ambitions rather than skills
It might be a good idea to look at your hiring process and how you’re filtering for motivated, self-starting people before they join your company. It’s much more effective to hire people with ambition than, teach skills later. It’s a lot more difficult to train someone to be motivated.
Idea #2 - Challenge for growth
It's a given, we all grow through challenges. Getting employees to do something new, something that excites them (like starting a party committee to plan the next team-building event) is a great way to inject challenge and fun. It also helps to identify their strengths and have them work on a small passion project that fires them up - even if it is only 10 to 20% of their weekly work hours. If you have employees that have been with you for many years - say, a couple of decades, things can feel stale and repetitive. This tends to lead to a lack of motivation and job dissatisfaction. And as the creative beings they are, it's very likely that they will seek other ways to scratch that growth itch that may even eat into time and headspace at work.
Fundamentally as humans, we all crave growth because if we aren’t growing, we’re dying.
Idea #3 - Bring meaning to their work
Any great leader will help their employees see the big picture and remind them of the impact their work is making in the company. Everyone plays an important role in the organizational success story. That’s why their role was created in the first place!
It’s up to the leaders to remind their team members of their importance within the organization and the value they bring to the table. Bring meaning to their work, otherwise, it’s just meaningless labor.
Remember, people don’t leave organizations, they leave their leaders and bosses.
Much love,
Alex
P.S. Here are 4 other ways I can help you increase your levels of happiness, peace, and freedom as a creator of your best life;
1. Join Project Elevate – for 3 months of capacity expansion, with weekly group calls led personally by me. We focus on 3 major areas; Lifestyle, Business, and Leadership.
2. Alexander Lin Intensive – The flagship program where you get to unplug, slow down, and reconnect with your reasons for being. It’s an opportunity to spend 3 days with me and the members of my community which could potentially become your life-changing mastermind.
3. Join Kingsmen, the Private Men’s Network. It’s a life-changing brotherhood that makes your success their mission. You get weekly live group calls with me and other leaders—and you join our Private Facebook Group to access personalized guidance and consulting, so you don’t get lost and you stay out of confusion. Usually, the difficult part is the aspect of overcoming fear and building trust. This isn't an issue here! Kingsmen is for anybody interested in what it means to be a leader and take control of their own destiny.
4. Private Coaching is where you bring your desires, I bring my jetpack. Together, we’ll build that ship made of ‘impossible goals’, get them so high off the ground, and have you look back with wonders of why you were thinking so small when we started. It can be challenging, powerful, and transformational. If you’re interested in reserving a future spot, go here.
