Your motivation – Your responsibility?
By Helle Bundgaard | Founder | Motivation Factor©
Motivation, efficiency and happiness are inextricably linked. When your motivation is high, you will experience a greater happiness and greater efficiency. In addition, your ability to innovate and to be creative depends on your motivation – you can say that motivated people are not always innovative – but innovative people are always motivated.
In other words, your motivation is too important to be put in the hands of others. You simply cannot expect your boss, colleagues or anyone else to provide you with motivation because it is something that comes from within and is unique to you. Motivation is your responsibility. The recipe for your successful motivation contains four ingredients:
Energy:
- What drains your energy (Energy Drainers)? Think about the situations that stifle your motivation. It could be facing specific assignments, your colleagues’ behavior in certain situations, your boss’s inability to do one thing or another – or perhaps something else that reduces your desire to continue working.
- What gives you energy (Energy Enhancers)? In what situations do you feel that you forget time and place and just keep working? What tasks do you love? What is it that characterizes a “good day at work” for you?
Identifying your individual Energy Drainers and Energy Enhancers is a great place to start building motivation. It allows you to know what you should try to achieve and what you should try to avoid to be happier, more effective, and ultimately more motivated.
Needs:
Your needs are your strongest motivators.
- Example 1) You have the need “to be active”. Being Active means that you like to be busy and have lots of activities in your daily life. You thrive with a full calendar, and you tend to be restless if you do not have jobs waiting on your to-do list.
- Example 2) You have the need “to succeed”. Being Successful means that when you have a goal, you go for it. The setting and achieving of a goal is a key driver for you. You typically measures your success in achieving your goals.
Your needs change over time, depending on your situation, your place in life, your age, and much more – but it is an absolute prerequisite that your needs are met in order to obtain any sort of motivation. This of course requires that you know your needs and focus on them. You can learn your needs either by taking the time to be cognizant of your feelings, or even better, with a test that ranks your needs from 1 to 5.
Examples of needs might include: honesty, certainty, recognition, respect, being appreciated, order, being active, personal power, control, being successful, balance, freedom, being right, and being heard.
Talents:
We all have talents, and we feel good when we use them. By focusing on, and working with what you do best, your brain will release happy hormones and boost your motivation.
- Example 1) You are good at “mastering”. The talent of “Mastering” means that you prefer to be a specialist rather than a generalist and you will always try to be among the best in your field, and strive to become an expert.
- Example 2) You are “creative”. The talent of “Creativity” usually means that you are always looking for the “new”. It fascinates you to create something new, whether it is a new product or a new way of doing things.
Along with your needs, your talents are your main motivational drivers. When you get the opportunity to leverage your talents, you will experience the greatest job satisfaction. Time will fly when you are putting your talents to use and you will find tasks have taken on a new excitement. Remember that tasks are never exciting in and of themselves. They are only interesting because they match your talents. If you don’t already know your talents, you can take a test to rank your skill from 1-5.
Examples of talents may include: leading, organizing, discovering, mastering, communicating, connecting, contributing, listening, and creativity..
Purpose
You probably know what to do and how to do it. But do you know why you need to do it? The final ingredient in your motivational cake is your purpose.
- Do you feel that you are part of something bigger than yourself?
- Do you know your contribution to the overall strategy or objective?
- Do you understand and feel confident about the purpose of the job you perform?
If you answered “yes!” to the three questions above, and you’ve mastered the first three ingredients: energy, needs, and talents then you are probably highly motivated.
Motivation Factor® enables you to identify what to pursue and what to avoid to stay highly motivated.
Imagine if you knew exactly how to motivate yourself and/or your staff. Motivation Factor helps to verbalize your vision – and provides you with the tools to work structured and professionally with your own and/or your employees’ motivation factors.
Motivation and research
Recent brain research tells us that our motivation is rooted in our individual needs and talents. When it comes to personal change and the development processes, it is essential to focus on what drives you towards the goal, and it is equally important to know what to avoid in order to stay motivated. With this knowledge, you can maintain your determination and focus along with motivation and willingness to adapt. Learn more about Motivation Factor tools and programs here.