Would you dispute the power of appreciation? No, me neither. But
something that must come pretty close to it is the joy of satisfaction. You could even say that satisfaction is the ultimate of self-appreciation.
Of course that is something that was clearly evidenced at the
recent Olympics. Who could ever forget the joy of achievement witnessed by
medal winning athletes? The joyful celebrations of a Usain Bolt or a Mo Farah?
Sometimes such celebrations were a stark contrast to the tears of
those who failed to win a medal. Of course neither really fits with the Olympic
spirit that it not the winning but the participating that counts. But in both
cases the extreme emotions are shaped by expectation. For the winners the joy of meeting or
exceeding expectations crowned their efforts while the desolation of those who
didn’t win stemmed from their inability to meet their own expectations.
Yet these emotions were not unique to medal-winners and non-medal winners
respectively. There were many instances of disappointment from silver and
bronze medal winners who had expected gold. And, on the other hand, there were
many non-medal winners who were ecstatic to have achieved PB’s (Personal Bests.)
So it would seem that the pleasure of participating is in fact tied to personal
performance and, more pertinently, to the ability to claim that you had
performed to your potential.
And, when you think about it, this is no different to life
generally. When you perform to or exceed expectations you are happy, and when
you fail to do so, you are unhappy.
So what lessons are there here for you and your business?
Surely the most glaring is that the more people you have who are
performing to their expectations, the more happy people you will have. Unfortunately
business is ongoing and, unlike the Olympics, is not concertina’d into a single
two week period. Thus you not only have to ensure you help make your people
happy, but you have to ensure that you sustain that happiness.
But don’t despair. You are not responsible for this! Just as an
athlete is ultimately responsible for their own performance so your people are
responsible for theirs. If they cannot perform to their own expectations they
will not be satisfied and nothing you can do will make them happy.
However, you may be doing things that make them unhappy. Persisting
in identifying new ways to monitor and measure performance and then trying to
find ways to incentivise superior performance is definitely one of these. The
key lesson from the Olympics is that the emotional response is personal. Satisfaction
brings joy and joy is power. But this power is intrinsic. Thus you need to be
looking for more intrinsic motivators to engage your employers.
Daniel Pink is a champion for research that proves that extrinsic
motivators – sticks and carrots – not only don’t work for any non-mechanistic
task, but can be counter-productive. In his book “Drive” he states that “For
too long there has been a mismatch between what science knows and what business
does.” Are you failing to follow the science? Are you persisting with extrinsic
motivators rather than developing the intrinsic ones?
You only have to take a look at your own life experience to understand
the science and recognise how powerful intrinsic motivators are. So why persist
looking for the wrong sort of motivators? Give your people autonomy of determining their own performance and you will create the joy of
satisfaction. You will also release a power that will transform your team and organisational performance.