What does motivation have to do with creating the right environment?

#blog blog Mar 16, 2023

Hello and welcome to the second edition of the Motivation Matters Newsletter

If you read the first edition you will understand the difference between Motivation and Inspiration, in this edition I’ll explain how motivation is as much to do with the environment we create as the work we do.

Let’s look at how we can create our own environment that will motivate us from the perspective of a business owner. In my “How to become a High Flier” course I cover the 7 skills and key attitude which contribute to the self-directing skills for life.

Rather than falling into the trap of thinking everything happens to us, we need to take the attitude of responsible initiative by shaping our own environment. This involves accepting we can influence most things with the right attitude and avoiding the trap of becoming a work victim.

So what has this got to do with motivation you may be thinking, well motivation is essentially how we feel about our work. To feel good about our...

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Everyone understands motivation don’t they?

#blog blog Mar 07, 2023

Hello and welcome to the first edition of the Motivation Matters Newsletter

Each fortnight, I’ll be diving deep into the topic of motivation and why it’s so important for personal and business performance. In this episode I will explore why many are confused by what motivation really is and why most Motivational Speakers are more Inspirational than Motivational.

The word Motivation can be described as a portmanteau because it’s a word that’s made by blending 2 or more words together, in this case motive and action. The motive part refers to our reason and the action part is what we then do as a result of the reason.

We have been lead to believe that there’s such a thing as a Motivational Speaker which begs the question, can we be motivated by listening to a speaker? Or in other words, can someone give us a reason to do something?

Unless we are in a position of desperation and have to make decisions based on need then I will suggest we can be inspired...

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Can you measure motivation?

 

How we can identify, describe, measure, and maximize motivation for everyone in your team and most importantly you? The tool I use is motivational maps the reason I use them because it identifies motivation. It takes about 10 minutes. It's an online questionnaire it describes using nine motivations which I'm gonna go through with you now.

Firstly, what does is it gives us, you'll see three groupings. There's three relationship motivators. There's three achievement motivators, and there's three growth motivators. So we are all, a combination of all these. . But what we've gotta do is find the right order for us. Which one's most important down to them one that's least important.

So there's three groups of three, and what we've also gotta think about is what does each one mean? So I'm gonna go through each one of them to give you a quick overview. So top left is the defender. The defender is the motivation for security, predictability, and stability. The friend is the motivation for...

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How do you maintain your energy?

#blog blog energy motivation Feb 25, 2022

There is a lot of talk about energy at the moment because of the ever increasing cost of keeping warm, keeping the lights on and filling up our vehicles. Without going into the politics around why this is happening, it’s worth considering the role that energy plays in our life.

The definition of energy according to oxford languages is: - power derived from the utilisation of physical or chemical resources, especially to provide light and heat or to work machines. It can also mean the strength and vitality required for sustained physical or mental activity and this is the meaning I’d like to explore.

One of the ways we gain energy is by what we eat and we know that somethings give us a short burst of energy and others give us energy that is less intense but tends to last a bit longer. When we need energy it’s easy to reach for something that will quickly give us the boost we need but continually doing this can make us feel we are on a rollercoaster of energy with...

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Are you automating your processes?

#blog blog Sep 10, 2021

If your business is going to set you free you need to think about how you can automate the processes in your business. This may sound obvious but in my experience it can easily be put off for too long.    

A good way to work out whether something is worth implementing would be how fast you will get a return on your investment. Make sure you account for your own time at an appropriate hourly rate based on the salary of replacing you.

Lets take software, which is a considered purchase that will automate a process in your business. The cost would include the purchase price of the software, any specialist help to get the system set up correctly, training of staff, possible reduction in productivity short term and on going support costs. 

Work out the potential cost savings by using the hourly rates for everyone that will benefit in the first year and then divide the total cost to implement by the first year’s savings. The number you get is the amount of...

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Avoid the swamp!

#blog blog Sep 03, 2021

If you have a job description for all of your team, do you have one for yourself? If your first reaction is general dogsbody then you definitely need to complete this exercise. As I’ve mentioned before, it’s oh so easy to create a role that’s made up of all the tasks nobody else wants to do and the likelihood of that keeping you motivated is unlikely.

Let’s start with your job title, does it describe your role accurately? If it has Managing in the title is your main responsibility to manage and are you doing it? Did you intend to become a manager?  

We can all do things well that don’t motivate us for a short while but as time goes by it becomes a problem and can easily turn into resentment. You may well be good at something which you spend a lot of your time doing but if it doesn’t motivate you eventually it will catch up with you.  

Being clear about your ideal role will prevent you getting caught in the swamp. This is a...

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What problem are you solving?

#blog blog Aug 28, 2021

Every business that has ever been started was set up to solve a problem so we need to be clear as to what that problem is. The three things we need to consider is What is the problem, how do we want to fix it and why does it matter? 

Let’s take supermarkets which as you know is something I’ve spent a lot of my time working in. Is every supermarket set up to solve the same problem? You could say that they are all there to supply the needs of their customers with a range of goods.

When my father set up our family retail business he had come from many years of doing the same for a national retailer. His experience was supplying a wide range of products at competitive prices to as many people as possible.

After a while he realised that the problem we were trying to solve in a neighbourhood store was different than the one he had been solving before. Where price used to be an important factor in the large supermarkets, what was now more important was convenience.

Back in...

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Who's in charge around here?

If you have followed me for a while you’ll know that the inspiration for the Reluctant Leader Academy was my own experience of not wanting to be in charge.

There is no doubt we need people to step up and take charge, every team needs a manager, If they are motivated to be there and have the right skills all the better.

When we say someone is motivated to be in charge, essentially they enjoy making decisions on behalf of others and like being in a position of influence.

In Motivational Maps language this is the Director motivator and is rewarded by giving responsibility and a title that indicates authority. Other strategies to fulfil this motivation would be to give them a mentor or allow them to deputise before taking a permanent role

Because of their desire to be in charge they could encounter difficulty when is come to managing people if they are not aware of their motivations. This could be from someone who is motivated by freedom and not want to be managed, a creative...

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