6 Tips To Energise Your Team

Business is picking up and it might just be an exciting ride. For your team to thrive and bounce back strongly, a key aspect of your leadership and management role will be reenergising your team.

What follows are six tips you can implement to help strengthen your culture and create a great place to work, be it hybrid or office based:

1. Grow people

Would you rather work for a manager who uses your skills, or grows your skills? The leader’s power, like the orchestral conductor’s, depends on the ability to make other people effective, and to bring their talents together so that the whole adds up to more than the sum of its parts. But rather than simply using an orchestra’s skills, a truly great conductor – like an exceptional leader – should also be invested in growing the skills of his or her people, enabling them to be the best they can be.

Take Ben Zander, principal conductor of the Boston Philharmonic. Zander puts a blank sheet of paper on the stand of every musician at every rehearsal. This paper is an invitation to the players to give feedback on how effective the rehearsal is at helping them to perform at their best. Zander has the inspirational leadership attitude: everyone grows here.

Benjamin Zander is himself involved with leadership and management training, and we think he is one of the most inspiring people you can listen to online. On the clip below he talks about learning, and explains the concept of ‘you cannot learn anything unless you make a mistake’!

2. Be an enthusiast

We can all be a little more like Zander in our sales and leadership roles. Put a crackle in the air. Have fun! There is only one attribute more contagious than enthusiasm in the workplace, and that’s lack of enthusiasm. Some managers are like the living dead! Have a lead by example attitude. Be spooled up. Be polished. Be excited about what your firm is doing.

When you walk the floor, be a source of positive energy – it will be reciprocated. Enthusiasm is the life force of inspirational leadership. Even if all you do is walk more quickly, you will find you energise those around you.

3. Nurture self-belief

The single most effective thing you can do to motivate someone is to build their self-belief. A high performance workplace is usually one in which people feel confident about themselves and their role.

Helping people reach their full potential is as much about resetting your own expectations as anything else. Be very aware of any unnecessary limitations you, or others, are putting on people and challenge negative beliefs or judgements.

4. Don’t underestimate the importance of fun

High performance cultures are fun cultures. Individuals believe in themselves and each other and enjoy what they do, making the workplace a great place to be. If you want to get the most out of employees, but you can’t remember the last time you all had fun together, plan a Covid safe social activity.

5. Use recognition

Recognition is probably the most underused motivational tool. Give people the opportunity to earn recognition. Not just your top sales people but everyone, including your support people without whom the business would fall apart.

People who feel unappreciated usually want more money to do the same job. Find ways to shine the spotlight on the achievement of others. Making someone feel like a star is a great way to retain talent.

Recognition motivates. How many of your people have received recognition or praise for doing good work in the last seven days? In addition to good work, give recognition to those who come up with new ideas and those who collaborate well with others.

6. Motivate yourself

Every time you come into contact with a member of your team some of your attitude will rub-off on them. If you’re feeling flat or uninspired, this will cause them to feel likewise. Never underestimate the importance of how you communicate with yourself. If the voice in your head is telling you that an obstacle is ‘insurmountable’ or market conditions are ‘unfavourable’ then this will come across to others. Developing a ‘can-do’ attitude in yourself is one of the best ways to inspire it in others.

Learn more about LDL leadership & management training.

Read LDL’s article in HR Zone 5 tips to inspire your team.