
What Not to Do When You’re Trying to Motivate Your Team - denzil_correa
https://hbr.org/2018/07/what-not-to-do-when-youre-trying-to-motivate-your-team
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perl4ever
I think the most motivational thing a boss can do for me is to reliably
provide criticism that shows they think I can improve, and that I _can_ use to
improve.

The most demotivational thing a boss can do for me is to provide criticism
that indicates contradictory demands, or that they don't know what they want,
or that they are unwilling to accept my limitations.

Compliments are not bad, but kind of superfluous - if I've succeeded at
something, genuine recognition means being given something more challenging.
And if I've failed at something, nice words are just twisting the knife if
they are an attempt to obscure the fact someone has given up on me.

~~~
perl4ever
Later it occurred to me to rephrase the above as:

\- achieving trust is the ultimate motivation

\- losing trust is the end of a relationship and motivation

Criticism can be a powerful way of demonstrating trust, but it can also
signify a loss of trust - it's very contextual. Being ignored, too, can
indicate complete trust, or it can indicate disengagement or absence of trust.

------
bmiller2
So I shouldn’t thank or say nice things to my team, because they might see it
as disingenuous? Seems better than the alternative, no?

The article got close to touching on a successful method of motivating, which
is making sure individuals’ contributions are communicated throughout the
organization in a clear and ideally public manner.

------
nefitty
These are great suggestions. It reminds me of the inversion technique that
James Clear wrote so well about:
[https://jamesclear.com/inversion](https://jamesclear.com/inversion)

My question is, what should I do when I'm on the not-receiving-recognition
end? I've tried to think of ways of maybe giving myself positive feedback,
etc. but haven't really fleshed it out yet. I'm basically in a situation where
I don't want to give up the fight to succeed in my role, but it feels like all
that is ever visible are my and my team's failures...

~~~
perl4ever
"It reminds me of the inversion technique that James Clear wrote so well
about: [https://jamesclear.com/inversion"](https://jamesclear.com/inversion")

This seems to be vaguer than what I thought of before clicking on the link. I
generally react to any proposition that seems compelling and obvious and
motivational by asking myself "what if the opposite were true and how would
one determine that?" If the opposite could be defended equally well, then the
original statement doesn't mean much. Sometimes it seems to me like it's most
of what people talk about. Instead of debating, perhaps it's best to just put
it aside as non-productive. Apparently that's a subset?

~~~
nefitty
I think inversion as a problem solving technique is valuable. It's not
necessarily the only tool. For example, to bring it back to OP's article, I
know I want to be a good manager but that leaves me with a very huge space of
possibility and ambiguity. I can reign that in by inverting the problem, "What
would I have to do to be a bad manager?" This bubbles up things like low
transparency, lack of follow-through, chastising directs, etc. Now I have a
clear list of things I definitely should not do and maybe work on if I realize
I exhibit some of those negative behaviors.

