What is the Best Way to Get a Team Motivated and Engaged?

With changing times and fast-paced, competitive lives, it is increasingly becoming tough and challenging to keep employees suitably motivated and engaged. Managers, especially have their task cut out for them as they have a greater responsibility towards their employees to keep them motivated and engaged. They have to find novel ways to lead their teams effectively and ensure they are able to perform as per or beyond expectations. They have to be a role model for them, conduct themselves in such a way that they feel motivated and affect their productivity significantly.

While conducting your duties as a leader or a manager, you will come across a lot of challenges that you may have to deal with the utmost care and handle them delicately. One of the issues that are fast becoming a major concern for the 21st century managers is having a hard time keeping teams engaged at work.

As a manager, you may hold high hopes for your team and want teammates to work in close tandem with each other and work collaboratively towards the productivity of the organization. This seems to be an uphill task is the employees are not engaged enough to fulfill their workplace goals. So, the question arises. What is it that a manager must do to change this situation to his favor? Here, we bring you some of the most amazing and positive ways that can help employees engaged in the workplace.

Setting Realistic Goals

Many times, when setting goals, managers go overboard with their expectations and set goals that are borderline impossible. Employees see such goals with apathy and do not feel able to meet them. Instead, setting realistic but slightly challenging goals might do the trick. The goal is achievable while at the same time challenge the abilities and skills of the employees which motivates them to work hard and achieve the goals. Such goals also give them a sense of direction which helps them effective and efficient task accomplishment. They will surely put in their best efforts and pour their heart and soul into work. Thus, setting realistic, attainable, and challenging goals can help keep teammates engaged and motivated at work.

Recognition of Excellence

The role of a manager is slightly challenging. He has to ensure that all his employees are contributing to the common goal with their individual efforts. He also has to keep track of the performance, employee engagement and achievements of team members. This, in turn, helps in bringing a remarkable improvement in their performance from time to time. Recognition of good work and a few words of encouragement can help do the trick and employees feel a lot motivated to work harder and achieve many more goals. It is important to reward the employees who go above and beyond to achieve their goals.

Placing a lot of trust in them

Another very important way to keep your employees’ motivation high is by placing trust in their abilities. Many times, the major concern that keeps people unhappy at a workplace is the lack of trust managers have in their employees. This creates a vitiating environment where it is impossible to get positive results. In the managers fail to trust their employees, it can result in dissociation from work and the willingness to do it. Even in tough times, a few words of trust to the employee can do wonders and change the whole scenario. Just signaling your trust to your subordinates honestly can keep them happy, content and motivated. Try to have an honest conversation and open communication with them which will prove the trust you place in your abilities.

Handle Mistakes With a Positive Approach

If your employees have made a wrong judgment or committed a mistake, view them as an opportunity which will help them learn. Reprimanding them may result in a lot more negativity which is not good for their morale. This gentle prodding will help them to trust you and take a learning lesson from the mistake. Building trust is an on-going process and is certainly not possible overnight. So, be patient and give it time to develop and flourish.

Keep a Tab on Productivity

After setting attainable, achievable, and challenging goals, the next step is to keep a tab on their performance and the progress they are making towards the achievement of goals. This is a key determiner as far as overall organizational productivity is concerned and secondly, it will also help you understand if the goals set by you are enough engaging and motivating for them. This keeping a tab on their progress will also allow you to make changes in these pre-determined goals if they aren’t productive or challenging enough.

Plan and Implement Team Building Activities

Another sure-shot way of keeping team members suitably engaged and motivated is by planning and implementing a variety of team building activities. These activities work as an icebreaker and break down the unseen barriers erected by employees. When meaningful communication starts flowing among them, it encourages them, motivates them, and fosters creativity and innovation. Rope in professional service providers who can organise high-end team building activities as per results you are seeking from them. These activities scheduled from time to time help teammates learn to work in close collaboration, know more about each other, start trusting and respecting each other and start working collectively towards common organizational goals. It has a lot of impact on overall organizational productivity.

Open and Clear Communication

Open and clear communication with employees is another way managers’ can keep them motivated. They will find themselves more engaged at work when the flow of communication from top to bottom is smooth. It will instill a sense of trust among employees. Managers can start by taking frequent feedback from them and ensure their confidentiality.

It is these positive and impactful ways through which managers can help team members to be on board and in perfect tandem with the entire team, reaching out to meet organizational goals. Following these ways can help managers to ensure high work productivity and employee performance.