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Each year companies use incentives to motivate their people — gift cards, travel awards, choices of merchandise. Non-monetary incentives are a $90 billion dollar industry and growing.
While we certainly support the idea of rewarding employees for their good work, we can’t help but remember meeting an outstanding sales professional who, for two years in a row, won a trip to Hawaii as one of his company’s top producers.
Sheepishly, he admitted that he’d never taken the trips; he was terrified of flying.
The problem we find is that many companies use non-cash incentives with the best of intentions, but without really knowing what motivates their people. And most of our people are motivated in wildly different ways.
A few years ago, we worked with eminent psychologists Dr. Travis Bradberry and Dr. Jean Greaves, authors of “Emotional Intelligence 2.0,” to develop the Motivators Assessment, a scientific test to determine a person’s core motivators. After tests with working adults around the world, the results showed that humans share a group of 23 fundamental motivators that drive us at work. Each of us varies in which of these specific drivers are most important to us and the particular order of priority. Some are primarily driven by teamwork and challenge, others more by ownership and service, still others creativity and learning.
Think of this as akin to the way DNA shapes each person. Those with the same educational degree, those in the same profession, even those in the same family may be motivated by very different things.
More than 200,000 people have completed the Motivators Assessment, and we’ve found that each person has a motivation fingerprint that can help a manager understand how best to reward them. Some workers thrive on recognition, such as receiving a gift card from their boss, while others are minimally motivated by that. Some who are strongly motivated by a spot cash reward, while others feel more appreciated if they are rewarded with the privilege to lead a project. Some people would love to be recognized with an opportunity to become a mentor, while others would find such a task to be an intimidating burden.
Managers who have a more refined understanding of the motivators of their employees are able to find more effective ways to reward them. Yes, it may take more time and effort, but the benefits for those who do this can be profound.
One manager who benefitted from the process is Diane Weed, vice president of the Denver division of Wendy’s. Weed has eight direct reports who oversee all the restaurants and the thousands of Wendy’s teammates in the Rocky Mountain area. She put her team members’ Motivators Assessment results on a grid and examined the similarities, uniqueness and cautions.
An eye-opener, Weed told us, was that seven of her eight team members had “Learning” as a top driver. For her, it fell in the bottom three. That information has helped her ensure she’s rewarding her team members with opportunities to learn and grow. That sends powerful messages: Not only is the company willing to invest in these employees and help them move forward in their careers, but their manager actually knows and cares about the specific things they find motivating.
Leaders who want to retain top talent in this competitive environment must learn what drives each worker and tailor rewards to individual preferences. Conventional wisdom has long been that all members of a company will be motivated by the same incentives (and it’s often what the boss thinks is rewarding). That’s old-school thinking that is preventing leaders from maximizing their team’s performance.
Try the Motivator Assessment Tool Yourself
Curious about what truly motivates you or your team? Use the Motivators Assessment Tool for free at motivators.findmojo.com.
