Know Thine Employee

Managers often try to motivate employees as a group rather than individually. It is extremely important for you to take the time to really understand each employee on an individual basis.  This will ensure that you are aligning any extrinsic motivations like pay increases, bonuses and recognition with the intrinsic motivations of each employee.  When it comes to employee motivation there is no “one size fits all” solution that can be designed.

Your first task is to take the time to clearly understand what motivates each of your employees.  I would recommend first looking at the sixteen basic desires theory.  This theory was created by Steven Reiss after he studied over 6,000 people and helps show why people do what they do.  Once you’ve taken the time to understand which of these qualities motivates each of your employees you can align your extrinsic motivation plan with their needs.

I will use myself as an example in this scenario.  I am motivated by curiosity (the need to learn), order (the need for organized, stable, predictable environments) and a little by power (the need for influence of will).  Based on these key areas we can put together an annual goals document that outlines key projects I can work on that best utilize my intrinsic motivational needs.

After the goals are documented you should utilized your one-on-one sessions with your employee to not only discuss status on their projects, but how they “feel” about their work and how well these intrinsic needs are being satisfied by the work.  The key here is to make sure your employee’s intrinsic needs are ALWAYS being met. They will not be happy with their work if these needs are not met.

Throughout the year I would suggest that you look for extrinsic ways to reward the employees for accomplishing their goals.  Some will be motivated by public recognition while others will prefer private.  Going back to me as an example, you could reward me by sending me off to training (curiosity) or maybe by giving me the opportunity to lead a sub-team for a specific project (power).  Again, this goes back to knowing your employee!  If you haven’t taken the time to do this you will probably default to giving the person a pat on the back during a team meeting, but this might not matter a bit to them.

When year-end comes and you’re working to determine pay increases and bonuses you can continue down the same path as you did previously by looking for ways to frame the rewards in a way that directly relates to their intrinsic motivations.  If your employee is motivated by saving then remind them about how much this bonus will contribute to their retirement fund.

What I learned in Behavioural Science class (wk 2)

Wow, I’m really excited about all of the cool stuff I’ve been learning in school this week. I thought, rather than posting all of my homework assignments I would just pick one that was the most interesting. I don’t want to annoy people with floods of writing!

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The seemingly insignificant act of hearing and seeing a baseball hit by a bat, moving to catch the ball and then catching it in a glove actually requires the use of almost every part of our brain!

First we see and hear the ball being hit by the bat. The sight of the bat about to strike the ball is first registered in the Occipital Lobe inside the Cerebral Cortex. It’s possible that these images are also processed by the temporal lobe. Next the sound from the bat would arrive and would be processed by the Temporal Lobe. At this point another function of the Temporal Lobe would also kick in which is motivation so that the rest of the body and brain will be motivated to expend the energy necessary to catch the ball. This in turn would cause the Medulla to start preparing the body for some potential stress of moving by altering the respiration, heart rate and blood pressure. A goal in the Frontal Lobe has now been set to catch the ball.

During this preparation process our subject is monitoring the ball’s direction, speed and velocity as well as also utilizing the Parietal Lobe’s spatial and mapping functionality to try to predict where the ball will come back down. This way the body can move to the proper location and not need to dive or slide to catch the ball. Efficiency is of key importance is most of the brain’s operations.

Next, the Cerebellum will utilize its ability to control movement to get the subject walking or running over to where it believes the ball will be landing. After getting into the right position the Cerebellum will use another function to adjust reflexes and balance for the entire body to ensure that the subject does not fall over or drop the ball. After the ball is caught the Medulla will begin sending signals to the body to let it know that it can now begin relaxing.

As you can see from this short description almost every portion of the brain is utilized during this process. Hopefully this gives you a view into how diverse, flexible and powerful the human brain really is.

What I learned in school during week one

As some of you may or may not know I decided to return to school and try to finish off my degree in Business Administration.  It’s pretty crazy to look back and see that it’s been almost 7 years since I last attended classes.  In an effort to try to get the best grades possible I thought it might be an interesting experiment to post the output from my classes here on the blog.  It actually forces me into a different mental state where I am not only writing for the teacher, but to ensure that what I’ve learned is clear for my readers as well.  Please let me know what you think so I can get even better.

Week 1 learning summary:

BEH 225 – Introduction to Behavioural Science

Psychology was not considered to be a formal discipline until 1879 when Wilhelm Wundt from Germany setup the first laboratory of psychology.  Prior to this time, it was considered to be a discipline of philosophy.  Because of these differing perspectives psychology has taken many paths over its young life, and is an extremely large umbrella under which hundreds of disciplines are covered.

In believe that the rise of cognitive psychology in the 1960s has had a larger impact on psychology than any other sub-field.  The primary reason for this belief is that cognitive psychologists were actually able to expand the definition of psychology which firmly supports my belief.  Additionally, I feel that neuroscientists in the future will be able to answer many of the “black box” questions that have been eluding psychologists for many years.

I also see the power of cognitive psychology in my every day work for Intuit’s customer care department of Turbotax.  As a team we continue to try to better understand our customer needs during extremely busy tax seasons by utilizing voice of the customer (survey), “follow me home” (naturalistic observation), case and mock-case studies to help us try to understand which key levers we can pull to effectively impact our key business outcomes (correlational research).

I look forward to learning more about the field of psychology and how I can use the scientific tools to better understand my current and future customers.  Additionally, I would like to understand more about neuroscience as I believe that it holds the keys to many currently locked and other yet unidentified doors in science.

ETH 125 – Cultural Diversity

Before reading this first chapter of the book I thought I had a clear understanding that race was effectively just skin color or the continent that someone was from, but now I realize that I was very incorrect.  I have often interpreted the terms almost interchangeably, which I believe is what many people do every day.  

Due to the rapid growth of the world population, it is imperative that everyone has a clear understanding of the differences between these terms.  By the year 2020 it is estimated that the population of China will outnumber that of the United States, Canada and Mexico.  If we do not come to terms with the underlying issues we run the risk of finding ourselves assimilated by another group just due to them viewing us as ignorant.

For me personally it is hard to turn off my analytical side which wants to constantly categorize and bucket people.  Between my daily work, school and social activities I do consistently interact with people of various races and ethnicities. It is human nature to assume that you know how someone will behave, but once you get to know them you typically find out that you were nowhere close.  I’ve had many situations in my past where I’ve been pleasantly surprised, but it’s important to be sure that you’re adopting a very open mindset and approaching these situations as a chance to learn from the other person.