Influencing a Motivated & Engaged Project Team

Facilitator: Faith Wood info@imind.ca #Inspiring_Minds www.facebook.com/faith.wood1

The story of the Flying Dutchman is probably the best known ghost ship. The ship was sailing around the Cape of Good Hope (the southern tip of Africa) when it encountered a bad storm. Because of the captain's refusal to sail for safe harbor, the ship was lost and the captain and crew doomed to sail the seas forever. It is said that the appearance of the Flying Dutchman is an omen of disaster and that it is seen most often during stormy weather. So how many of you (like the crew of the Flying Dutchmen) have ever felt like you were waiting for disaster to inevitably strike your team? Perhaps even feeling like you couldn’t trust that the leadership would be willing to hear your pleas or even potentially keep you safe? This presentation is about figuring out how to stay engaged, engage others and motivate successful team outcomes.

www.faithwood.com #Inspiring_Minds

We call books - like the ones I am about to show you on the next slide - rulebooks. They claim to have the secret sauce for what it takes to succeed. There’s just one problem with rulebooks: they typically don’t actually work. And, they often dash our hopes when our expectations for success go unrealized. Let’s face it, if success were as easy as a few simple steps, wouldn’t we all have achieved it? Rulebooks suggest that the world can be captured in a small and fixed set of rules. This is rarely the case, but Simplicity certainly does appeal to us.

• 40 – 50% real potential is all that is being applied by employees towards success of the organization

• 78% of people who work on significant projects in

their organization, think these will fail. And we wonder why we feel a lack of engagement!

How will you remain competitive, grow your business or achieve your organizational goals if only 30% of those you lead are actually engaged?

Gallup defines “engaged” employees as those involved in and enthusiastic about (or committed) to their work. They contribute to their organizations in a positive manner. Gallup 2013 confirms that 70 percent of employees are “not engaged” or are “actively disengaged”.

This is Dave. He’s been waiting a long time. As you can tell by the lantern he works for the railroad. Thought his boss should motivate him. I see he is still waiting for that to happen.

No matter how you define it, you need it! Engaged people are invested in their performance and are doing good work. Engagement is tied not only to profitability and productivity, but to innovation, customer satisfaction and even lower health care costs.

Most Common Motivation Strategies: 1. Fear 2.Incentives 3.Opportunities

Observe staff like you would a petri dish – what makes them grow, interact and react? As a leader, learn how to identify the needs, wants and desires of your employees.

Think about your 3 most recent team members (hires)…

Identify 4 things you know about them personally (what are their interests, names of family members, where were they born, what brought them to you?)

If you are paying attention to them, you should be able to figure out what intrinsically motivates each of them or at least what is important to them.

Team Mindset Priority

Since successful projects don’t happen individually, we need to inspire team engagement & team accountability. Why is that not as easy as it sounds? The people side is often the most complicated part of any project or conflict for that matter. Does everyone believe that we have each other’s backs or do we think we are about to be tossed under the bus?

Jaded & Cynical Perhaps you have a few folks who could be just a little bit difficult to engage and motivate?

If you want to increase employee engagement, it might be time you amped the engagement-trust connection

If you want to increase employee engagement,

it might be time to amp up the

engagement-trust connection

Trust doesn’t happen overnight. It grows slowly. How can you grow it?

Trust is produced in a climate that includes four elements: Honesty: Integrity, no lies, no exaggerations Openness: A willingness to share and receptivity to information, perceptions, ideas Consistency: Predictable behavior and responses Perceived Fairness: Treating people with dignity, lack of bias and attention to fairness

How do you rebuild shattered trust?

Rebuilding trust requires commitment and consistency to overcome past trust violations. Trust can strengthen when the trust violator is seen to make behavioural changes.

Trust inspires confidence and causes employees to feel empowered and engaged.

Attention • Do they have yours, • do you have theirs?

Affiliation Approach

The concept of Influence

Affiliation: What do we have in common?

Approach Strategies

Meet people where they are before you try to take them where you want them to go!

Guess what people want from you?

Respect Trust, Compassion, Stability, Hope.

Compassion requires a leader to be transparent. Stability isn't a word used much today. And Hope requires a leader to believe it exists.

Foster Opportunities for Personal Growth

We all crave a sense of belonging and a desire to be significant

Strategies for Keeping Engagement: Always be communicating. Know when (and who) to let go of. Be picky! Be a great place to work!

Discover & invent ways to make work more fun for everyone!

You cannot outsource motivation

Create a Motivational Climate

We need to feel we are capable, competent people, and positive feedback provides this.

Always take the time to rejuvenate both your organization and your workers.

To stay rejuvenated, here are a few suggestions: 1. Always think about the big picture. 2. Promote innovation. 3. Be compelling, upbeat and interesting. 4. Conquer complacency 5. Be generous with praise. 6. Be excited and rejuvenated yourself.

Increase Energy and You Increase Synergy • Eat properly and take breaks. • Laugh out loud. • Exercise. • Breathe.

A Motivational Checklist

1. Be visible 2. Know everybody’s name 3. Spend time building

relationships, one-on-one 4. Acknowledge individual and

group contributions 5. Say thank you when it is

deserved 6. Share as much information

as you can (both good and bad)

7. Celebrate successes

Yup, still waiting

For now….That’s a wrap! Share your comments before you head off?