Motivation in Practice

Motivation in Practice delivers hands-on training activities that transform key motivational theories into practice.

Using this pack will help your managers establish what motivates individuals and teams. Your managers will practice and develop the skills necessary to motivate their people, to produce real commitment and higher performance.

Motivation in Practice puts key motivational theories into context, explaining them in relation to real people, and real issues that your managers face on a day-to-day basis. They’re all clearly explained in jargon-free terms. In addition, you’ve got ready-to-run activities that apply motivation to day-to-day management issues such as team briefings and performance reviews.

Of course you can also dip into these activities to inject fresh ideas into your performance management courses on coaching, performance reviews and appraisals, team building and development, stress management ... the list goes on.

Learning includes:

• The use of money as motivator
• What motivates each member of a team
• Keeping teams focused and committed throughout a period of organisational change

Contents

1: Management and motivation - an introduction
You introduce participants to the strong links between management and motivation, and to some relevant back-up research. Together, you will define both terms and the participants will have the opportunity to rate their strengths and weaknesses as motivational managers.

2: Theories... loads of theories
Here participants are introduced to the key theories involved in motivation in order to help them appreciate the links between the different approaches and assist them in identifying key components they can apply at their workplace. A training game enables them to demonstrate their current knowledge of motivational theories.

3: Five steps to heaven?
Participants look at the work of one of the main motivational theorists - Abraham Maslow - and his five-stage motivational Hierarchy of Needs. The participants apply Maslow's approach to members of their current team by brainstorming possible actions that can act as motivators at each stage of the hierarchy.

4: Motivator or hygiene factor?
Participants are introduced to the key concepts behind Frederick Herzberg's Two Factor Theory. They work on a questionnaire to help them identify levels of motivation. Participants finish the session by producing an action plan of steps they can take to help motivate their staff and increase their performance and effectiveness.

5: Motivation and job enrichment
Participants focus on McGregor's Theory X and Theory Y approach to management and examine the effects of these two approaches in a modern business context. Participants identify how they can adopt a Theory Y style and Herzberg's Motivators to enrich the jobs and performance of their workforce.

6: Money, money, money... it's a rich man's world
You put forward the idea that money can be a mixed motivator, and review the work of two leading motivational theorists - Frederick Herzberg and JS Adams. This should aid participants' understanding of how to use the positive aspects of money to motivate their staff. Focusing on Flexible Pay and Benefits Systems, the participants identify a range of benefits they could introduce in any organisation and their views are compared with research findings on a range of benefits.

7: Setting goals and objectives
Participants examine goal and objective setting as a means of improving motivation and focusing performance at work, and look at the work of Edwin Locke and Gary Latham. Participants identify their life and career goals, and refine these while receiving support and guidance.

8: Powerful performance reviews
You introduce participants to the two key skills required to sustain improved performance from motivated staff - setting challenging objectives and providing effective feedback on performance. Examples linked to research establish that a combination of setting goals and providing effective feedback is most effective in motivating staff to outstanding and sustained performance. An exercise provides participants with an opportunity to set effective objectives, and give and receive feedback.

9: Managing employee participation
Participants focus on the benefits, skills and strategies needed to delier a team briefing meeting and facilitate a dsicussion around key issues. Based on research findings that have identified some fo the common ways in which organisations are trying to improve the motivation of their workforce, this activity looks at one of the 'top five' - team briefing meetings.

10: Beware - quality team at work
Participants are introduced to the conditions under which a quality-focused team can flourish. They are then given an opportunity to use the tools and techniques such a team could use at work. Participants work in syndicate groups to apply this approach to a current workplace problem.

11: Motivational leadership
Participants examine the essential ingredients of developing a motivational leadership style, and have the opportunity to rate their current levels of leadership and identify ways in which they can improve. You discuss the idea that leadership is different from, but supports, management - leadership provides a key that can unlock a team's abilities. Some of the influences on choosing a style are explored before participants look at a matrix of four common leadership styles.

12: Motivating your team
By looking at the key features of a highly motivated and effective team, participants are able to relate their own teams to the five stages of team development and produce an action plan for motivating their teams at work. The participants' ideas are compared with McGregor's researched characteristics of effective teams.

13: Developing your competence
You discuss with participants the concept of competence, and offer them an opportunity to rate themselves and produce a personal development action plan to improve their competence at work. Participants help each other to identify which range of appropriate opportunities they will use to develop each of their top-three competency needs.

14: Coaching for success
The essential role of learning and development as an aid to personal growth is identified, and the ways in which coaching at work can assist effective development are established. Participants have an opportunity to practise the Seven Step Coaching Process.

15: Developing your career
Designed to introduce participants to the importance of being proactive in managing their career, this activity enables them to take stock of their current situation and plan purposefully for the future. Participants are encouraged to reflect on the difficulties faced by employers adopting a flat or lean structure. The work of key motivational theorists - Maslow and Herzberg - is discussed as a prelude to participants examining their own driving forces for satisfaction at work.

16: Networking to success
You introduce participants to the benefits of developing a network for support, advice and career development. This enables participants to assess their own network and practice, and to develop their interviewing skills in order to secure career-related information.

17: Motivating while managing change
Participants focus on the difficulties they may face when trying to maintain motivation while introducing organisational change. They have an opportunity to review and develop their skills in helping their team work through a five-stage model of change by using counselling skills. You introduce the Change Model, which helps participants understand the five stages that individuals work through when they are coming to terms with change.

18: Stress and motivation
Participants are introduced to the links between stress and motivation. The positive aspects of stress are identified before you introduce the downside of too much stress, and its effect on both work and health. This makes participants aware of the debilitating and demotivating aspects of too much stress and so gives them an opportunity to identify and develop strategies for managing stress. Participants identify a need for balance between their work and other aspects of their lives and undergo a short relaxation activity.

19: Personal development planning
You introduce participants to the skills and techniques required for developing action plans that are based on a realistic assessment of their current situation. Links are drawn between the effectiveness of personal development planning and the work of key motivational theorists. Participants identify their development goals and produce an effective action plan through a series of guided discussions.

508 pages, with 159 OK to copy pages.