Addressing Forms of Team Demotivation

“Motivation” is a noun.  The plural noun is “motivations”.  Motivation is a reason or reasons for acting or behaving in a particular way, or a desire or willingness to do something; or the state of enthusiasm.  In a business or organisational context, motivation is the enthusiasm to get the job done, by starting rather than procrastinating, by persisting in the teeth of challenges.  Motivation is the driver of organisational and business growth.  As such, loss of motivation, or motivational failure, in human resource jargon, can be fatal. 

To address loss of motivation, we need to consider the reasons for that loss.  According to research, these reasons fall into four categories, what the researchers have labelled motivation traps.  They are a mismatch of values mismatch, a lack of self-efficacy, disruptive emotions, attribution errors.  It is important we understand the nature of failure in order to address it. 

The first, and perhaps, the most common is the mismatch of values.  People are moved by self-interest.  There has to be something in it for them, and it should be worth the effort.  When the employee, the volunteer, the person in question, feels a disconnect with the task, or if they are sceptical of its value, they experience and erosion of motivation. 

This is easily addressed.  The work distributed must be explained within the context of the whole so that they understand that their contribution is crucial.  People want to feel valued.  If there is interest value, where there is a compelling intellectual connection, people will be motivated.  It appeals to their self-esteem and their ego, because now, there is a sense of self-worth and value to their contribution.  Related to this is the sense of identity.  People identify with their occupations when there is a sense of esteem or prestige associated with it.  This is why companies spend money and effort to give titles to even the most mundane position.  A better way would be to draw out the specific capabilities of the person, and how that is related to the task or job at hand. 

This also points out to the importance of the task.  One of the quirks of organisations and teams is that we sometimes overlook how crucial specific tasks or jobs are simply because we do not realise their worth.  Too many leaders assume the most important tasks have the highest profile.  In fact, a good administrator or coordinator, for example, is the foundation that holds everything together.  This must be highlighted.  It builds respect in the team, and raises the morale of the support team.  There is value in utility which must be reflected in importance.  Additionally, compensation must be commensurate to work and responsibilities.  This is the basic measure of importance. 

Secondly, motivation is tied to confidence.  When people believe they are not up to a specific task, they are demotivated.  This is where we work on building their confidence, having mentorship, and putting in place training before assigning a task.  This is because, people who lack competency in a task naturally assume that success at a particular task requires the investment of far more time and effort than they are willing to afford.  We need to convey to the that they have greater ability than they realise, provide mentorship, and bolster their confidence and esteem.  This is a major part of people management. 

On the other hand, we also have the situation where people are demotivated because they feel a task is beneath them, and they are over qualified.  The assignment of the task to them could be seen as an insult, and this creates tension.  People with an inflated sense of importance are one of the greatest human resource challenges, since they tend to challenge the system, and make mistakes.  These people cannot be mentored; they must first be disabused of these notions of overconfidence.  Otherwise, they take no responsibility for their mistakes.  Unless these people have some value to the team that makes it worth the effort to accommodate them, it is simply more expedient to discard them for the sake of team harmony.  Otherwise, it may be possible to reframe the importance of the task, and make them understand its worth. 

Another form of demotivation is caused by negative emotions.  This happens to the best of people.  Due to events such as divorce, a death in the family, or other concerns, they could be having anxiety, depression, anger, or grief.  This requires a different management tack: empathy.  Sometimes, people simply need time.  Other times, they need to be given space.  And when they have had time to process these emotions, we sit down with them and have a conversation.  The intent is to engage in active listening. 

Different types of emotions require a different method of response.  People who are consumed by anger are often overwhelmed with a sense of injustice.  This is addressed by getting them to focus on the perceived injustice or wrong and reframe it.  The next step is to consider legal and effective means of remedying that wrong.  This empowers them.  If it is depression, their sense of self-worth is affected.  It is not possible to point out that any sense of inadequacy is an illusion logically, since this is not about logic.  Rather, we address this by pointing them in a different direction, to focus on what they feel adequate at, and build them from there.  Anxiety and grief are relatively easier to address, and require a listening ear.  In any case, should these emotions be overwhelming, it makes sense to have them engage a professional. 

Finally, people get demotivated due to a misattribution of errors.  This means they either cannot identify where they went wrong in a task, or they misattribute it to causes that do not address the issue.  An inadequacy of time management is an attribution error, for example.  Constant tardiness, or missing deadlines is a common form of it.  This is addressed by helping them identify the cause, and working with them to rectify it.  The intent is to bring the cause of the error back into their control so they can take responsibility for it.  When people believe the cause of their problems are outside their control, they will not make any effort to address it, and this leads to a spiral of demotivation. 

Essentially, people need to be nurtured and built, since they are the foundation of a great team.  When properly motivated, that team can achieve wonders.  When mismanaged to demotivation, even the best people are unable to function.