We live in interesting times. As I’m writing this, I’m chatting with two of my friends in different countries. We now have so many tools to contact each other but we are getting more individualistic. One might say that we are moving towards becoming a singular plurality. Concepts aside, we live in a society and expect that this state will give us some benefit. We also do not want to let go of our individuality. I think a simple model starts with this set of equations:
Performance = Ability X Motivation where Ability = Aptitude X Training X Resources and Motivation = Desire X Commitment
For this post, let’s focus on Motivation (Ability we’ll deal with later…). As the preface suggested, you will need to motivate your divisions as both groups and individual members. There are tons of publications on how the manager can create a positive environments for her/his employees. You put the goals in place and give them the tools they need. The division would fall in the “tools” category. They would enable its members to do more than what they could do individually. With this initial work, work with a division would be similar to what would be done with an individual.
It becomes more interesting when you think of how you are going to use rewards. The division’s rewards should encourage team spirit and cooperation. Most people take the easy way when looking at groups and reward all members equally for any good action in the group. What you’ll achieve however is not quite what you want. The group might perform a bit better but every member of the group will feel like they are doing good work. If this is not the case, you are reinforcing bad behaviour in certain of your people. The better approach is to target a set of traits that you want in the members of the division. Once you have them identified, you reward the individuals that exhibit those traits. Punishing those who do not act the way you want them shouldn’t be necessary if you are clearly making the distinction in giving out your rewards.
This approach is not perfect. It will probably create tensions within the division and exacerbate the storming phase. You have to be careful to truly understand the division and what they are going through. You must make sure that the appropriate people are rewarded. The worst thing that can happen is the reinforcement of the “stealer” behaviour, the one who takes all the glory after someone else has done all the work.
It should be noted that, in a performing division, the members should be close to equally useful and this problem shouldn’t arise.
Next post, we’ll look at the Ability part of the equation.
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