Have you ever been part of a highly-motivated, high-morale team?

If you have, chances are that most days you were happy coming in to work. You had fun collaborating with your colleagues, and, together, you were able to come up with some great ideas. Because of your focus and enthusiasm, you probably did some of your best work with this group.

Teams that are highly motivated and positive are not only fun to be part of, but they also accomplish far more than teams that are struggling with morale.

This is why it’s so important that, as a leader, you strive to build a positive team. In this article, we’ll show you how!

https://www.mindtools.com/pages/article/building-positive-team.htm?utm_source=Twitter&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=mtpage

Do you have any habits that could harm your work or career? Maybe you check your email when you’re in meetings, turn up late to client visits, or take personal phone calls when you’re supposed to be focusing on your work. You might even let habits like watching too much television or excessive Internet surfing stop you working on learning goals in the evenings and at weekends.

Bad habits like these can damage reputations and limit what’s possible in our lives and careers, so it’s important that we learn how to deal with them.

In this article, we’ll look at bad habits in more detail: we’ll explore why certain behaviors become habits in the first place, and we’ll show you how you can overcome them.

https://www.mindtools.com/pages/article/bad-habits.htm?utm_source=Twitter&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=mtpage

Have you ever been in the situation when you really didn’t believe what someone was saying? Did you have a sense that something didn’t ring true or a gut feeling that all was not right? Perhaps they were saying “Yes” yet their heads were shaking “No”?

The difference between the words people speak and our understanding of what they are saying comes from non-verbal communication, otherwise known as “body language.” By developing your awareness of the signs and signals of body language, you can more easily understand other people, and more effectively communicate with them.

There are sometimes subtle – and sometimes not so subtle – movements, gestures, facial expressions and even shifts in our whole bodies that indicate something is going on. The way we talk, walk, sit and stand all say something about us, and whatever is happening on the inside can be reflected on the outside.

By becoming more aware of this body language and understanding what it might mean, you can learn to read people more easily. This puts you in a better position to communicate effectively with them. What’s more, by increasing your understanding of others, you can also become more aware of the messages that you convey to them.

There are times when we send mixed messages – we say one thing yet our body language reveals something different. This non-verbal language will affect how we act and react to others, and how they react to us.

This article will explain many of the ways in which we communicate non-verbally, so that you can use these signs and signals to communicate more effectively.

https://www.mindtools.com/pages/article/Body_Language.htm?utm_source=Twitter&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=mtpage

Most of us spend a lot of time at work. Yet a lot of people feel their jobs are not as fulfilling or engaging as they could be.

A 2014 Gallup survey of U.S. workers found that less than one-third were engaged in their jobs, 51% said they were “not engaged,” and 17.5% said they were “actively disengaged.” Unfortunately, the data from global surveys is quite similar.

Worrisome numbers like these have many business leaders wondering what types of big changes could be introduced to improve worker engagement. Fortunately, my research has found that small interventions that increase employees’ sense of psychological ownership of their jobs — like personalizing their offices with photos of their families or favorite posters, allowing them to choose their own work title, and giving them ownership of ideas, a team of people, or a product — can dramatically improve their sense of engagement in and happiness with their jobs, and their productivity as well.

Psychological ownership refers to the experience of possessing and being psychologically tied to an entity. Such feelings of ownership are fundamental to human life. Every day, we interact with a variety of objects we own, both material and immaterial. The state of psychological ownership is not only cognitive but also affective: simply by calling an entity — whether an object, another person, or a job — “mine” suggests that we have an emotional connection to it.

Employees often express a desire for greater psychological ownership of their work, believing this will improve their job satisfaction and happiness. Management research has found that these expectations do play out. For instance, using data from over 800 employees, Linn Van Dyne of Michigan State University and Jon L. Pierce of the University of Minnesota Duluth found that employees’ sense of psychological ownership for the organization is positively associated with both their attitudes (job satisfaction and commitment to the organization) and work behavior (performance and organizational citizenship).

Read more at:

https://hbr.org/2015/12/how-to-make-employees-feel-like-they-own-their-work

Your people may have all the expertise in the world but, if they’re not motivated, it’s unlikely that they’ll achieve their true potential.

On the other hand, work seems easy when people are motivated.

Motivated people have a positive outlook, they’re excited about what they’re doing, and they know that they’re investing their time in something that’s truly worthwhile. In short, motivated people enjoy their jobs and perform well.

All effective leaders want their organizations to be filled with people in this state of mind. That’s why it’s vital that you, as a leader and manager, keep your team feeling motivated and inspired. But of course, this can be easier said than done!

In this article, we’ll go over the key theories, strategies and tools that you can use to help your people stay enthusiastic about their work.

https://www.mindtools.com/pages/article/motivating-your-team.htm?utm_source=Twitter&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=mtpage

How often have you had a conversation with someone, and thought you were paying attention to him or her, only to realize shortly afterwards that you can’t remember what he said? Or, perhaps you got distracted while he was speaking and missed the message that he was trying to deliver.

In today’s busy world, it can be hard to shut out distractions such as noise and electronic devices, and our own thoughts or reactions can draw us away from a conversation. So, how can we listen more effectively? When we listen “mindfully,” we can be aware of these barriers and still remain open to the speaker’s ideas and messages.

In this article, we explore mindful listening and suggest simple ways you can use this technique to improve your listening skills.

https://www.mindtools.com/pages/article/mindful-listening.htm?utm_source=Twitter&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=mtpage

It’s not unusual for executives to enter a new job with deep-seated feelings of being an impostor. Our research studying thousands of leaders rising into bigger jobs revealed 69% feel underprepared for roles they assume. Forty-five percent had minimal understanding of the challenges they would face, and 76% said their organizations were not helpful in getting them ready. Fearing exposure as a fraud, many leaders overcompensate with extreme attempts at flawlessness. There are three common, but mistaken, beliefs they share:

“I have to be perfect.”

Many driven executives struggle to accept that flaws and mistakes are part of being human. And when you act as if you are, or should be, perfect, you eventually expect it of others as well. The followers on whom those unfair standards are imposed typically revolt and withdraw their support. Starved for acknowledgement, such followers wait to pounce on any hint of (hypocritical) deficiency, leaving no room for executive missteps. Executives, fearing criticism and exposure, work to perpetuate the illusion of infallibility — and perfectionism becomes a self-perpetuating prison. Sixty-seven percent of our respondents also struggled with micromanagement, a common symptom of managerial perfectionism.

Followers need assurance that leaders know they themselves are flawed, and will in turn be understanding of other people’s slip-ups. Leaders should be up front about what followers can expect about their strengths and foibles. They must welcome feedback, encouraging candor when their weakness becomes problematic for others and apologizing early and often when they make mistakes. A leader’s greatest source of credibility is, ironically, their vulnerability. Owning imperfections wins trust; hiding them doesn’t.

“I have to be 100% fair.”

When it comes to resource allocation – from compensation and promotions to strategic priorities – leaders are scrutinized for “fairness” in unfair ways. Many employees expect to get overlooked when it comes to performance evaluations, promotions, pay, and access to resources and opportunities. A fragile economy and colossal gap between executive and worker wages continue to fuel distrust. Organizational injustice is in the eye of the beholder, and sometimes those that play the “that’s not fair” card lack facts. It’s easy for leaders suffering from impostor syndrome to worry too much about placating these people.

While people want to be treated equally, not all jobs are equal; not every contribution holds equal value. Instead of trying to treat everyone the same, be clear that disproportionate performance and results get disproportionate rewards, resources, and opportunities. When executives try to neutralize these differences by creating the false appearance of egalitarian polices that “treat everyone the same,” they provoke the very anxieties they sought to allay because people instinctively know that everyone is not the same.

Followers want to know the rules, and know leaders care when the rules are broken. If employees understand the standards, and how rewards will be distributed, they will believe there is no capriciousness beneath those choices. They want to know leaders have their backs, despite the realities of organizational injustice. One executive we worked with, thinking he was showing empathy, said to an employee, “I know our bonus structure is messed up, but there’s nothing I can do.” Making himself a co-victim reduced his credibility as he advertised feeling powerless to advocate for change.

“I have to be accessible 24/7.”

Leaders never feel they have enough time to give, and followers don’t feel they get enough. Two-thirds of our respondents claimed they had insufficient time to offer those they lead. The challenge is how to negotiate with each follower what they need and how to provide it. Don’t let militant gatekeepers prevent access to you, but don’t offer unlimited access either — don’t become everyone’s answer ATM. Set clear boundaries and enforce the need to work within them. Maximize the impact of your time with creative processes that help the whole team have shared access, rather than relying on too many one-on-one conversations.

Followers really want reliability. They need to know that if they have problems, leaders will help find solutions. If there’s something they can’t make sense of, leaders will offer perspective. If they can’t get an adjacent department to cooperate, their leader will run interference. While the amount of time spent doing these things will vary, it’s only when followers conclude leaders aren’t reliable that the amount of time they get with them becomes an issue.

The executive stage is a high-wire act. Anchoring yourself with transparent principles can help you weather the harsh blows dealt by the discontented. Satisfy your team’s real needs, and don’t worry about contorting yourself into what you can never be.

By Ron Carucci

https://hbr.org/2015/12/great-leaders-know-theyre-not-perfect

Many health care organizations today are striving to deliver better patient outcomes at lower cost and to be rewarded for accomplishing both. Most have begun this journey with pilot projects to obtain valid measures of outcomes and cost for one or two medical conditions. They implement process improvement and standardize care pathways from a patient’s initial office visit through all aspects of treating the condition, and then explore offering new value-based payment models, including bundled payments, for those conditions. To accelerate the dissemination and adoption of this value agenda for many more medical conditions, leaders should now consider establishing a new central office to oversee the creation of all the capabilities and information for such initiatives.

A “value management office” can greatly enhance an institution’s ability to improve outcomes and costs across the enterprise. At a minimum, it can serve as a center of excellence to assist decentralized clinical units in outcomes and cost measurement and management, set priorities for continuous improvement projects, facilitate the creation of value-based payment models with insurers and employers, and ensure that new information technology platforms are aligned with the value agenda.

https://hbr.org/2015/12/health-care-providers-need-a-value-management-office

We all know that job satisfaction often hinges on the quality of the relationships we have with our bosses. Yet in today’s rapidly evolving, 24/7 workplaces, it’s not always clear what managers should do to create the most satisfying work experiences and the happiest employees. My research into the world’s most successful bosses has unearthed some common practices that make work much more meaningful and enjoyable. If you supervise others, make sure you do the following:

Manage individuals, not teams. When you’re under pressure, it’s easy to forget that employees are unique individuals, with varying interests, abilities, goals, and styles of learning. But it’s important to customize your interactions with them. Ensure you understand what makes them tick. Be available and accessible for one-on-one conversations. Deliver lessons cued to individual developmental needs. And when it comes to promotion, look past rigid competency models and career ladders for growth opportunities tailored to the ambitions, talents, and capacities of each person.

Dr. Paul Batalden, a professor emeritus at Dartmouth College’s Geisel School of Medicine, who previously worked under Tommy Frist at healthcare giant HCA, told me that his former boss was “such an unusual CEO” of a company that size. “You could always get to see him. He always had time.” Samuel Howard, another Frist protégé who is now CEO of Xantus Corp, added, “when you asked him to do something, he would roll up his sleeves” and work with you to get it done.

Go big on meaning. Most employees value jobs that let them contribute and make a difference, and many organizations now emphasize meaning and purpose in the hopes of fostering engagement. But this is also the manager’s responsibility. You can’t rely on incentives like bonuses, stock options, or raises. You’ve got to inspire them with a vision, set challenging goals and pump up their confidence so they believe they can actually win. Articulate a clear purpose that fires your team up, set expectations high, and convey to the group that you think they’re capable of virtually anything.

Legendary bosses like Bill Sanders in real estate, Julian Robertson in hedge funds, and Bill Walsh in professional football all communicated visions that entranced employees and left them hell-bent on success. Scot Sellers, a protégé of Sanders who went on to become CEO of Archstone before retiring in 2013, recalled that his former boss “would lay out his vision and say, ‘I would like you to be a part of it.’ You were so honored to be asked… that you just wanted to jump in and say, ‘Sign me up!’”

Focus on feedback. A 2013 Society for Human Resource Management survey of managers in the U.S. found that “only 2% provide ongoing feedback to their employees.” Just 2%! Many bosses limit themselves to the dreaded “performance review” and often mingle developmental feedback with discussions about compensation and promotion, rendering the former much less effective.

As I’ve written elsewhere, some organizations are changing their ways, but even if yours sticks with traditional reviews, you can still supplement that with the kind of continuous, personalized feedback that the best bosses employ. Use regular—at least weekly—one-on-one conversations to give lots of coaching. Make the feedback clear, honest and constructive, and frame it so that it promotes independence and initiative.

Hedge fund manager Chase Coleman remembered that his former boss and backer, Tiger Management founder Julian Robertson, was “very good at understanding what motivated people and how to extract maximum performance out of [them]. . . . For some, that [meant] encouraging them, and for others, it [meant] making them feel less comfortable. He would adjust his feedback.”

Don’t just talk… listen. Employees tend to be happiest when they feel free to contribute new ideas and take initiative, and most managers claim they want people who do just that. So why doesn’t it happen more often? Usually the problem is that bosses promote their own views too strongly. Employees wonder: “Why bother taking risks with new ideas when my boss’s views are already so fixed?”

The best leaders spend a great deal of time listening. They pose problems and challenges, then ask questions to enlist the entire team in generating solutions. They reward innovation and initiative, and encourage everyone in the group to do the same.

Football coach Walsh went out of his way to encourage input not only from his assistant coaches, but also from the players themselves. He did this before the game, during the game, and afterwards when watching game film. This more collaborative approach probably had something to do with his track record with the San Francisco 49ers: six division titles, three NFC Championship titles and three Super Bowl wins.

Be consistent. Who could be happy with a boss who does one thing one day and another thing the next? It’s hard to feel motivated when the bar is always shifting in unpredictable ways and you never know what to expect or how to get ahead. So be consistent in your management style, vision, expectations, feedback and openness to new ideas. If change becomes necessary, acknowledge it openly and quickly.

Kyle Craig, who worked with restaurant impresario Norman Brinker at Burger King in the 1980s, remembered his boss’s consistent humility. “He was never unwilling to admit his failures and mistakes, which puts people around him very much at ease.” Bill Walsh, meanwhile, came across as consistently confident. As former 49ers wide receiver Dwight Clark remarked, “There was just an attitude. He walked with a strut almost—not cocky, just very confident.” These superbosses had dramatically different approaches, yet both worked well because they were consistent.

No behavior a boss adopts will guarantee happy employees, but managers who follow these five key practices will find that they will help improve well-being, engagement, and productivity on any team. The common denominator is attentiveness. Pay close attention to your employees as individuals. Take that extra bit of time to build their confidence and articulate a vision; to provide constant, ongoing, high quality feedback; and to listen to their ideas. And ensure that your own messages are consistent. Is it hard work? Yes. But it’s worth it.

Sydney Finkelstein is the Steven Roth Professor of Management and Director of the Leadership Center at the Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth College. His new book is Superbosses: How Exceptional Leaders Manage the Flow of Talent (Portfolio/Penguin, February 2016).

From the quietly confident doctor whose advice we rely on, to the charismatic confidence of an inspiring speaker, self-confident people have qualities that everyone admires.

Self-confidence is extremely important in almost every aspect of our lives, yet so many people struggle to find it. Sadly, this can be a vicious circle: people who lack self-confidence can find it difficult to become successful.

After all, most people are reluctant to back a project that’s being pitched by someone who was nervous, fumbling, and overly apologetic.

On the other hand, you might be persuaded by someone who speaks clearly, who holds his or her head high, who answers questions assuredly, and who readily admits when he or she does not know something.

Confident people inspire confidence in others: their audience, their peers, their bosses, their customers, and their friends. And gaining the confidence of others is one of the key ways in which a self-confident person finds success.

The good news is that self-confidence really can be learned and built on. And, whether you’re working on your own confidence or building the confidence of people around you, it’s well-worth the effort!

https://www.mindtools.com/selfconf.html??utm_source=Twitter&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=mtpage