We Can Motivate Others With Our Attitudes and Beliefs

Managers motivate others through a combination of pushing teammates to strive harder and pulling at them to inspire them to do more. Your attitudes and beliefs can affect how you motivate at the office and how you behave towards your team. Discover if your preconceived notions make you a pusher or a puller at the office in terms of how you get others to accomplish more.

First, Some Statistics

Nearly half, or 45 percent, of people among a sample of 299 said they preferred pulling, or using inspiration, to motivate others. More than one third, or 35 percent, preferred driving employees hard to get things done. The remaining 20 percent used both pushing and pulling.

In a separate survey of 87,000 leaders where they were rated on their effectiveness, a full 78 percent were more effective at pushing employees to work hard versus just 22 percent who were more effective at pulling. The best leaders used a combination of both aspects of motivation to get the job done, which is why you should employ both techniques as motivational tools.

Know Your Own Personality

Understanding your own personality demonstrates whether you prefer to push or pull employees, or both, when it comes to how you motivate others. Pushers achieve their own goals in the time allotted or sooner, follow through on commitments with care and precision and hold themselves accountable for deadlines and completing all objectives by a set time. Pullers are passionate about their work, give praise and compliment others for a job well done, energize people to achieve greater results and provide coaching and mentoring to try to inspire others.

These personality traits shape your attitudes towards how you get your team to accomplish its goals, which is why you need to be self-aware of your own mindset.

Attitudes and Beliefs Behind the Drive to Motivate Others

Attitudes of those who push include pushing others to do more and giving staffers a specific goal with a deadline. Are you a boss who says the team needs to get something done by a certain time or the company may lose the account? This pushes employees to work harder as a motivational tool. Similarly, teams tend to get projects done faster when they have a specific deadline with which to reach certain goals because deadlines sharpen people's focus, efforts and energy.

People who pull to motivate others tend to feel like they have a positive impact on their team. Rather than make deadlines, leaders may find themselves catering to the individual needs of employees. Rather than force someone to work at the office, some team members may work harder when given a flexible, work-at-home arrangement. Using employee surveys or just talking to colleagues are both great ways to get feedback on what motivates them to accomplish their goals.

The most effective leaders motivate others with the right combination of pushing and pulling. When you want to improve your own leadership capabilities, no matter what role you have with a company, look at the leadership principles of your own mentors to see how they blend pushing and pulling.

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