While an instructor may run a class with stern discipline, that doesn’t always translate well when that instructor puts on his management hat. The job of the owner/manager is not to be a dictator, but to tell people how they’re doing, what they’re doing, give encouragement, and give advise.
IN motivation, we only become committed to something to the degree to which we are allowed to discuss it. We only become involved and loyal and excited about any task to the degree to which we can contribute our opinions and our ideas.
Discussion has a one-to-one relationship to motivation. If you want your people to be motivated, have high self-esteem, be positive and be committed, then they need an opportunity to talk about what they are doing. And more than that, good people will not tolerate a work environment where they are no involved in their work.
We’re going to talk about three factors of motivation. The first in leadership style. This is a key factoring determining how motivated people are within the team. Sometimes just changing the leader changes the whole performance of the school.
The second is the reward structure within the school. In other words, is it a happy place to work/train or is it a negative place? Is it a performance-oriented place or a politically-oriented place?
hose are the three keys. By the way, good schools are always trying to structure the work so that the nature of the work fits the nature of the person, and the two of them combine for high self-esteem and peak performance. For example, they match the instructors who work well with children with the appropriate classes. Conversely, they keep those who are more suited for adult classes in those classes as well.
The reward structure, the climate, and the nature of the work can be changed slowly and have to be thought through, but leadership style is the thing that can be changed the fastest. IN other words, you can go from being negative to being positive, and as a positive leader you suddenly become a multiplying factor in work.
Now, the three R’s for motivation are rewards, recognition and re-enforcement. Rewards must be based on performance. The only way for a reward structure to work, in helping the school to be successful, is that it must be related to performance. You must not reward anything – not rank, not seniority, not longevity, not education, not anything but performance.
Recognition is something that managers owe to their people, and one of the greatest complaints in the workplace is not being recognized for good work. Whenever a person does something that is good, something that is exceptional or even makes a good try, give them recognition and give them, three, re-enforcement.
Remember what we know from behavioral psychology:What gets re-enforced, gets done again. So every single time that you give praise, privately and publicly, for any behavior, you know you’re going tog et more or it. If you don’t praise and re-enforce good work, behavior and quality work, you’re going tog et less of it.
Whatever you want more of, you reward, recognize and re-enforce. Successful schools create environments where the only way that you can get ahead, is by achieving the recognition in the areas that contribute to the school’s goals.
Management by values is the next concept. I think this is really important. What it simply says is that, the deepest of all human needs, right at the cure of the self-concept, I the need for meaning and purpose. What you believe in and the higher the value of the school – quality, friendliness, service, respect for the individual, building self-esteem, training and growing people – whatever your values are, those are the values that stimulate, trigger motivate and inspire people. But don’t assume that people know what the values are. It’s important that you as the school owner continually re-enforce the values in action.
That means when somebody’s having a problem that’s where you have to deal with a difficult student, that’s where you demonstrate what your values, When you deal with somebody who is being unfair or demanding, that’s how you demonstrate what the school really stands for.
