Enhancing the Motivational Climate of Your Workplace

It has been well documented that employees' productivity and job quality increase when we are made to feel welcome at work. In other words, when the motivational climate is enhanced to meet their needs they produce quality work at the 100% rate.

The source that caused them to produce at such high standards came from their employer's attempts at enhancing the motivational climate. As a result, they came to work, not because they had to, but because they wanted to.

By listening to your employees, they will tell you what you need to do to enhance their motivational climate. In the meanwhile, here is a checklist to help you get started. Ask yourself, Do I:

* encourage my employees to participate in goal-setting, planning, and decision-making activities? ( ) Yes ( ) No

* give them credit and recognition when due? ( ) Yes ( ) No

* help them see the Big Picture?( ) Yes ( ) No

* help them see what's in it for them? ( ) Yes ( ) No

* attend to their needs? ( ) Yes ( ) No

* delegate whole units of responsibility with the appropriate level of responsibility? ( ) Yes ( ) No

* select the right person for the task? ( ) Yes ( ) No

* communicate so they understand the first time? ( ) Yes ( ) No

* hold regular, brief, but effective meetings so that they will be informed about developments affecting their jobs? ( ) Yes ( ) No

* take time to listen to them? ( ) Yes ( ) No

* respond to them openly, candidly, and fairly? ( ) Yes ( ) No

* conduct fair and consistent job evaluations? ( ) Yes ( ) No

* support their educational pursuits? ( ) Yes ( ) No

* encourage them to join trade, professional, or civic organizations? ( ) Yes ( ) No

* accept and implement their suggestions? ( ) Yes ( ) No

Total your score. If your No's outnumber your Yes responses, it's time to sit down with your employees and find out from them what you can do to enhance their motivational climate.

Remember: When you maximize your potential, everyone wins. When you don't, we all lose.

© Etienne A. Gibbs, MSW

PERMISSION TO REPUBLISH: This article may be republished in ezines, newsletters, and on web sites provided attribution is provided to the author, and it appears with the included copyright, resource box and live web site link. Email notice of intent to publish is appreciated but not required. E mail: eagibbs@ureach.com

Etienne A. Gibbs, MSW, Management Consultant and Trainer, conducts seminars, lectures, and writes articles on his theme: "... helping you maximize your potential." He offers management and marketing resources at http://www.maximizingyourpotential.blogspot.c om.

In The News:

Yahoo! News: Top Stories

President-elect Barack Obama makes remarks on the nations economy, Thursday, Jan. 8, 2009, at George Mason University in Fairfax, Va. (AP Photo/Lawrence Jackson)AP - President-elect Barack Obama's proposed tax cuts ran into opposition Thursday from senators in his own party who said they wouldn't do much to stimulate the economy or create jobs. Senators from both parties agreed that Congress should do something to stimulate the economy. But Democratic senators emerging from a private meeting of the Senate Finance Committee criticized business and individual tax cuts in Obama's stimulus plan.



Palestinian demonstrators use sling-shots to hurl stones at Israeli soldiers during a demonstration against Israel's military operation in Gaza, in the West Bank village of Bilin, near Ramallah,Thursday, Jan. 8, 2009. Israel resumed its Gaza offensive Wednesday after a three-hour lull to allow delivery of humanitarian aid, bombing heavily around suspected smuggling tunnels near the border with Egypt. Despite the heavy fighting, strides appeared to be being made on the diplomatic front with the U.S. throwing its weight behind a deal being brokered by France and Egypt. (AP Photo/Muhammed Muheisen)AP - The U.N. Security Council called for an "immediate" and "durable" cease-fire in Gaza in a resolution Thursday night even as fighting between Israel and Hamas raged — with early morning airstrikes killing seven Palestinians and pushing the death toll to about 760 in the near two-week conflict.



Florida's Tim Tebow (15) throws a pass over Oklahoma's Auston English (33) during the third quarter of the BCS Championship NCAA college football game in Miami, Thursday, Jan. 8, 2009. (AP Photo/Mark Humphrey)AP - The game defied expectations. Tim Tebow fulfilled them. He rescued No. 1 Florida, running through and throwing over No. 2 Oklahoma for a 24-14 victory Thursday night that gave the Gators their second BCS championship in three years.



Rep. Jack Franks (D-Woodstock) votes to recommend the impeachment of Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich to the House during an Illinois House Impeachment Committee hearing Thursday, Jan. 8, 2009, in Springfield, Ill. The committee voted unanimously to recommend impeachment putting the matter before the full house.  (AP Photo/Seth Perlman)AP - A key panel unanimously recommended impeachment for Gov. Rod Blagojevich on Thursday, setting up a vote that could make him the first governor to face such fate in Illinois' sordid political history. Blagojevich should lose his job for abusing power, mismanaging government and committing possible criminal acts, including federal allegations he tried to sell off a U.S. Senate seat, the special committee concluded.



A sign instructs job seekers at the California Employment Development Department in Sunnyvale, Calif., Tuesday, Jan. 6, 2009. The country lost nearly 2 million jobs through November and more bad news is expected this week when the government releases data on weekly jobless claims and December unemployment. No matter how bad those numbers are, and economists expect at least another 500,000 jobs were lost last month, the pain is stretching into 2009.  (AP Photo/Marcio Jose Sanchez)AP - Trying to survive a deepening recession, employers are cutting their work forces to the bone, leaving more Americans unemployed and with dim prospects of finding a new job any time soon.



Neel Kashkari, the assistant treasury secretary in charge of the bailout program, speaks at the Brookings Institution in Washington, Thursday, Jan. 8, 2009. (AP Photo/Haraz N. Ghanbari)AP - Less than a month after its first report, a congressional panel overseeing the Treasury Department's $700 billion financial bailout is demanding more answers.



Freida Pinto backstage with the best picture award for 'Slumdog Millionaire' at the 14th Annual Critics' Choice Awards on Thursday Jan. 8, 2009 in Santa Monica, Calif. (AP Photo/Dan Steinberg)AP - The critics have spoken, and "Slumdog Millionaire" is their final answer.



Vice President Dick Cheney pauses during an interview with the Associated Press at the White House in Washington Thursday, Jan. 8, 2009. (AP Photo/Ron Edmonds)AP - Vice President Dick Cheney said Thursday that he sees no reason for President George W. Bush to pre-emptively pardon anyone at the CIA involved in harsh interrogations of suspected terrorists. "I don't have any reason to believe that anybody in the agency did anything illegal," he said.



Recruiter Sgt. Mario Ashe (L) and Christopher Stevens talk in the tactical operations center area of the U.S. Army Experience center at the Franklin Mills mall in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, January 7, 2009. The U.S. Army, struggling to ensure it has enough manpower as it fights wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, is wooing young Americans with video games, Google maps and simulated attacks on enemy positions from an Apache helicopter. Departing from the recruiting environment of metal tables and uniformed soldiers in a drab military building, the Army has invested $12 million in a facility that looks like a cross between a hotel lobby and a video arcade. Picture taken January 7, 2009. (Tim Shaffer/Reuters)AP - U.S. policy to win in Afghanistan must recognize the poor nation's limitations and its neighborhood, especially its intertwined relationship with U.S. terrorism-fighting ally Pakistan, the top U.S. military commander in the region said Thursday.



The east side apartment building where Bernard Madoff remains under house arrest is seen Thursday, Jan. 8, 2009, in New York. Prosecutors said Thursday that investigators found 100 signed checks worth $173 million in Bernard Madoff's office desk that he was ready to send out to his closest family and friends at the time of his arrest last month. (AP Photo/ Louis Lanzano)AP - Prosecutors said Thursday that investigators found 100 signed checks worth $173 million in Bernard Madoff's office desk that he was ready to send out to his closest family and friends at the time of his arrest last month in what is alleged to be largest financial fraud in history.



Israelis take cover before a rocket fired by Palestinians in Gaza lands in Beersheba, after they attended the funeral of Israeli soldier Alex Mashavisky, January 7, 2009. (Eric Gaillard/Reuters)Reuters - Israel pushed ahead with its offensive in the Gaza Strip on Friday, ignoring a U.N. Security Council resolution calling for an immediate ceasefire in the 14-day-old conflict.



Jaclyn Holt (R) fills out an application form at a job fair organized by the New Hampshire Employment Security agency in Salem, New Hampshire December 17, 2008. (Brian Snyder/Reuters)Reuters - U.S. employers probably cut the most jobs in at least 34 years last month as the global economic crisis gathered pace and moves by policy makers took time to filter through to struggling companies.



Reuters - A report being released on Friday alleges that the U.S. Treasury has failed to reveal its strategy for stabilizing the financial system, not answered questions asked by a government watchdog, and has done nothing to help struggling homeowners, the Wall Street Journal said.

A man works near a pressure gauge at a district heating plant in Skopje January 8, 2009. (Ognen Teofilovski/Reuters)Reuters - Europe sought a swift restoration of gas supplies on Friday after striking a deal with Moscow on monitoring gas shipments via Ukraine that have been halted by a pricing dispute with Kiev.



People taking the Long Island Foreclosure Tour arrive at a foreclosed home for sale in New Hyde Park, New York in this May 17, 2008 file photo. Citigroup could soon agree to principles that would let troubled borrowers save their homes through bankruptcy, sources familiar with the talks said on Thursday, while industry groups are easing their opposition to the plan. (Shannon Stapleton/Reuters)Reuters - Financial giant Citigroup Inc will support a proposal in Congress to rewrite U.S. bankruptcy law to help troubled mortgage borrowers avoid foreclosure, Chief Executive Vikram Pandit said on Thursday.



Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich gestures as he announces former Illinois Attorney General Roland Burris as his choice to fill the vacant U.S. Senate seat of President-elect Barack Obama during a news conference in Chicago, Illinois December 30, 2008. (Frank Polich/Reuters)Reuters - A legislative committee on Thursday recommended the impeachment of Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich, citing widespread abuse of power including allegations he tried to sell the U.S. Senate seat vacated by President-elect Barack Obama.



Timothy Geithner (R), pictured in Chicago, November 24, 2008. (Jeff Haynes/Reuters)Reuters - President-elect Barack Obama's economic team is urgently overhauling the $700 billion financial rescue package to broaden its scope beyond Wall Street, The Washington Post reported on Friday.



Usama al-Kini, Al Qaeda's operations chief in Pakistan, is pictured in this undated FBI Most Wanted photograph. Al-Kini, also known as Fahid Mohammed Ally Msalam, and a top aide are believed to be dead, a U.S. counterterrorism official said on January 8, 2009, in what appeared to be the latest results of a campaign targeting the militant group's leadership. Operations chief al-Kini was thought responsible for attacks, including the bombing of a Marriott hotel in Islamabad that killed 55 people in September, and an unsuccessful attempt to kill former Pakistani Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto, who was later assassinated in a separate attack, the official said. (FBI/Handout/Reuters)Reuters - Al Qaeda's operations chief in Pakistan and a top aide are believed to be dead, a U.S. counterterrorism official said on Thursday, in what appeared to be the latest results of a campaign targeting the militant group's leadership.



An Israeli army tank takes position on a hill at the border between Israel and the northern Gaza Strip on January 8, 2009. Israel was under intense pressure Friday to end its two-week-old offensive in the Gaza Strip after the UN Security Council called for an immediate ceasefire as the death toll from the war rose past 760.(AFP/David Buimovitch)AFP - Israel carried out new deadly air raids on the Gaza Strip on Friday as the UN Security Council called for an immediate ceasefire to end the two-week-old conflict in the Palestinian enclave.



A man carries firewood in the suburbs of Sofia, Bulgaria. Hopes for a quick resumption of Russian gas supplies to Europe were rising Friday after Russia agreed on the terms for the deployment of monitors in Ukraine.(AFP/Dimitar Dilkoff)AFP - Hopes for a quick resumption of Russian gas supplies to Europe were rising Friday after Russia agreed on the terms for the deployment of monitors in Ukraine.




Focus Leads To Nonprofit Success: Is Your Organization Rowing or Drifting

Picture yourself standing on the bank of a river watching a rowing... Read More

The Top Three Problems IT Managers Face and How to Overcome Them

Todays business environment has changed drastically from just a few years back.... Read More

Creative Writing - business principles produce more quality work, faster

Maximization methodologies have long been used in business to produce quantities of... Read More

Steps in Using the Critical Incident Technique

STEPS IN USING THE CRITICAL INCIDENT TECHNIQUE:1) The incident. Read, review, or... Read More

Innovation Management ? the power of decision makers

Creativity can be defined as problem identification and idea generation whilst innovation... Read More

Popular Business Misconceptions Cost You Money!

Faulty information costs you money! Which of these popular business misconceptions do... Read More

The Top 10 Requirements for Your Business to Become and Remain Profitable

We live in a relentlessly competitive world. The daily pressure to work... Read More

Conflict Resolution Training- When Personal Safety is an Issue

Conflict generally arises by having your needs, desires, perceptions and values challenged.When... Read More

Tales from the Corporate Frontlines: The Role of Character in Leadership

This article relates to the Senior /Top Level Management competency, designed to... Read More

Innovation Management ? does the idea fit with the firm?

Creativity can be defined as problem identification and idea generation whilst innovation... Read More

Innovation Management ? The Need For Knowledge Managers

Creativity can be defined as problem identification and idea generation whilst innovation... Read More

Are You Ready to Sell Your Business

Make Sure You Understand Your Motivation for SellingAre you thinking about selling... Read More

Teaching Large Companies To Think Like The Little Guys

Q: I am an executive at a large company and in our... Read More

Delegation for Business Leaders - How Letting Go Works

A leader's role is to focus on those areas of operation where... Read More

Employers - Protect Yourself from Custody Battles that Hold Your Company Hostage

Child custody? How'd that get to be an employer's concern?When an employee... Read More

How To Hire Superstars

Can a person's behavior and values really determine if they will be... Read More

What to do When You receive a Bad Check

As a small business operator, personal checks may be one method to... Read More

Business Innovation ? Tacit Knowledge

Creativity can be defined as problem identification and idea generation whilst innovation... Read More

Smart Staffing: Replacing a Key Manager

Have you been in this situation? One of your top managers left... Read More

Project Heroes

Project heroes. We've all heard of them. Some of us have even... Read More

Business Innovation ? Status Games

Creativity can be defined as problem identification and idea generation whilst innovation... Read More

Bullying and the Not for Profit Organisation

Where there is people there is politics! Bullying is now a major... Read More

The Seven Cs: Partnership Danger Signs - Conflict Becoming the Norm ? Part 1

A series of articles exploring the seven critical areas that can indicate... Read More

Manage Communication to Add Value

Management guru Tom Peters says white collar workers and managers in functional... Read More

Knowledge Management - Leadership Behaviours Which Encourage Knowledge-Sharing

The concept of knowledge management or knowledge sharing makes intellectual sense to... Read More

Weaknesses of Wishing

When you're starting a business, you might wish for a lot of... Read More

Delegation: When to Delegate, Who to Delegate to

There are some very simple guides for delegation.Most people delegate based on... Read More

Improvements In A Large Public Electric Utility In South America

The company decided to develop and implement an improvement program. The main... Read More

A Management Strategy

I witnessed some interesting behaviour from one of our premier management schools... Read More

Can Your Corporate Policy Pass the Monkeys, Bananas, and Water-spray Experiment?

Five monkeys were placed in a cage. A banana was hung on... Read More

Crisis Management Essentials - How to Communicate Effectively During a Crisis, Emergency or Disaster

A crisis, emergency or disaster can happen at anytime and anywhere.Just ask... Read More

Twitch Speed: Reaching Younger Workers Who Think Differently

Every parent, educator, and manager knows that "Nintendo children"--those born after 1970... Read More

Knowledge Management - Keys to Successful Communities of Practice (Networks)

How can I make my community of practice truly effective?How can I... Read More

Competencies for HR Professionals in Knowledge-based Industry with Reference to IT, ITES-BPOs

Introduction"High performing HR function affects bottom line nearly 10%"- A surveyCompetencies have... Read More

Inspiring Loyalty and Contentment in Your Workforce

One of the first things I look at when I take over... Read More

The Role of the Machine Metaphor in Mixed-initiative Organizational Leadership

"Can This Marriage be Saved?" So reads the title of the cover... Read More

Take Your Firm to the Next Level

So you did such a good job in 2003 at bringing in... Read More

Four Employee Behaviors That Can Kill Your Business

I found it important to clarify for employees what "deal-breaker" behavior was... Read More

Great Employees = Passionate Consumers

Companies spend millions of dollars each year identifying their brand, and then... Read More

Money, Motivation, Success and Who?

It was 7:30 on a Saturday morning, and I was setting up... Read More

Cold Water Comments - What They Are and How to Manage Them!

Cold Water Comments - What They Are and How to Manage Them!... Read More

Business Innovation ? the Value of Structure

Creativity can be defined as problem identification and idea generation whilst innovation... Read More

How to Say No

Rejection hurts. No one likes to give it or to receive it.... Read More

Five Tips for Analyzing an Income Statement

In today's article, we'll be looking at the income statement, which is... Read More

Employee Motivation: Make Everyone A Cheerleader For Your Company

Do you manage by walking around? What do you see? People excited... Read More

Stomp Out Leeches In Your Company

Recently, I felt appalled to see a political candidate running on the... Read More

Five Steps to Better Employee Management

Hiring employees is a huge responsibility. Before hiring anyone, be sure to... Read More