“Motivation” may be an overused buzzword in business spaces, but that’s for a good reason. Without motivation, your team falls apart. No team can operate together effectively without motivation – but where does motivation come from? If you’ve been asking yourself that question, here are some proven methods for improving motivation in the workplace.

Lead By Example

You can give all the inspiring speeches and run team-building retreats all you want, but if your workers aren’t observing you upholding the same values you expect from them, their motivation is going to plummet. For example, you might say that you expect an employee to keep their video turned on during Zoom meetings, but then don’t do so yourself.

The result will be a whole lot of eye rolls and dissatisfaction. When you want something from people, you have to be prepared to do it yourself.

Change “From” to “For”

Instead of framing your attitude towards employees as wanting something from them, try instead thinking about what you want for them. Wanting your employees to turn out excellent work is natural, but try wanting to give them an excellent work environment that results in better employee retention. Nothing will motivate employees better than knowing they can trust their employer to take care of their side of the bargain.

More Autonomy

If you tend to micromanage, you may have noticed a correlation between your increased need for control and your employees’ lack of motivation. This is no coincidence – the more you remove your workers’ autonomy, the more you damage their natural sense of motivation.

Instead, try empowering your employees by giving them back their control and allowing them to feel competent. Ensure that they can ask questions without feeling shamed for not knowing everything and that making mistakes is met with understanding.

Increase Connectedness

One of the major needs your employees have is a sense of connectedness in the workplace. Since humans in general need to feel a part of something bigger and they spend the majority of their waking hours at work, it falls to the workplace to provide that sense of connectedness.

This can be accomplished by having a collaborative culture in the workplace, as well as a set of goals that align with meaningful values. Your employees may just show up to work to collect a paycheck, but having a larger goal to work towards as a team can generate a surprising amount of motivation.