Energise Your Team: 6 Top Tips for Managers & Leaders

In a world where workplace disengagement is at an all-time high – just take a look at Gallup’s latest State of the Global Workplace report – keeping your team energised isn’t just a nice-to-have: it’s a competitive advantage. With quiet quitting still making headlines and burnout levels rising, leaders who can spark and sustain enthusiasm within their teams are more likely to succeed.

But how do you elicit that spark of excitement? Drawing inspiration from Benjamin Zander, the charismatic conductor of the Boston Philharmonic Orchestra and an influential figure within leadership and management training, we provide six tips to help you strengthen your culture and energise your team:

1. Grow people

Would you rather work for a manager who uses your skills, or grows your skills? Like the orchestral conductor, the leader’s power depends on their 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. Yet rather than simply using an orchestra’s skills, a conductor is also invested in growing the skills of their people, enabling them to be the best that they can be.

Take Benjamin Zander. At every rehearsal, he puts a blank sheet of paper on the stand of each musician. This paper is an invitation to the players to give feedback on the rehearsal, including how effective it has been at helping them to perform at their best. This practice fosters an environment of continuous learning and mutual respect.

As a public speaker, Zander is one of the most inspiring people on the leadership circuit. On the clip below, he talks about learning, emphasising that 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! When you walk the floor, be a source of positive energy – it will be reciprocated. 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! Their energy – or lack thereof – seeps into the entire team. Motivation plummets. Calls sound dull. The once-buzzing sales floor now feels like a waiting room at the dentist’s office.

Contrast this with a manager who brings energy, celebrates small victories and injects a sense of purpose into the work. Enthusiasm is the life force of inspirational leadership. Be spooled up. Be polished. Be excited about what your firm is doing. 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 potential for growth.

Helping people to recognise their potential is as much about resetting your own expectations as anything else. When leaders focus on building self-belief, they’re essentially fostering what Stanford psychologist Carol Dweck calls a growth mindset – the belief that abilities and intelligence can be developed through effort, learning and perseverance.

If a manager assumes an employee is simply “not a natural salesperson” or “not leadership material,” they’re imposing a fixed mindset limitation. But a leader who embraces a growth mindset will challenge those assumptions, believing that skills can be cultivated with the right support.

So instead of seeing performance as static, look for potential. Instead of reinforcing doubts, help reframe them. By actively encouraging others to stretch their capabilities and challenge limiting beliefs, you can create a workplace where people thrive.

4. Don’t underestimate the importance of fun

A high-performance culture isn’t just about working hard – it’s about creating an environment where people want to perform at their best. Successful orchestras, like high-performing businesses, thrive when there is both discipline and joy.

Benjamin Zander embodies this balance. His rehearsals aren’t just about technical precision; they’re about unlocking passion and energy in his musicians. He encourages them to embrace mistakes as learning opportunities and to play with feeling. His leadership style turns an orchestra from a group of skilled individuals into a collective body that enjoys creating music.

The best workplaces function in the same way. If a team is too rigid, constantly under pressure and without moments of levity, performance suffers. Musicians in a joyless orchestra will play the notes, but they won’t bring them to life. Similarly, employees in a stale workplace may meet their targets, but they won’t innovate, collaborate or go the extra mile.

So, how can you inject fun into your workplace? It doesn’t have to be big, flashy events. Zander often asks his musicians to celebrate mistakes with a joyful “How fascinating!” instead of feeling embarrassed. This simple shift turns tension into curiosity.

5. Use recognition

Recognition is probably the most underused motivational tool. Give people the opportunity to earn recognition. Not just your top salespeople but everyone, including the support staff on whom the business depends.

People who feel unappreciated usually want more money to do the same job. Find ways to shine the spotlight on their achievements. Zander’s practice of highlighting individual contributions within the orchestra serves to elevate morale and encourage collective success. Recognition motivates. Making someone feel like a star is a great way to retain talent.

How many of your people have received recognition or praise for doing good work in the last seven days? In addition to performance against key indicators, give recognition to those who come up with new ideas and collaborate well with others. Embed this emphasis on recognition in your approach to management training!

6. Motivate yourself

As a leader, your attitude and energy directly influence your team. 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.

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