How to Grow a Team
The Nine Motivators Every Team Leader Needs to Understand
“Not finance. Not strategy. Not technology.
It is teamwork that remains the ultimate competitive advantage,
both because it is so powerful and so rare.”
— Patrick Lencioni, The Five Dysfunctions of a Team
Understand that High-Performing Teamwork is the Result of Growth and Not Edict
Most teams are assembled on the basis of relevant and complementary skill sets to meet a shared mission by accomplishing defined actions. And while common understanding of goals and strategies can bring a group together, the group may never actually undergo the transformation necessary to become a team.
Why?
Often because of managerial time constraints, less-than-optimal carrot and stick approaches to motivation, and simply not knowing what one does not know. Sometimes it’s due to philosophical and practical distinctions between team leaders and group managers — where leaders grow the potential of others, nurturing a growth-oriented mindset, and managers get things done, utilizing a goal-oriented mindset.
Both approaches are necessary to transform a group (a bunch of people with a particular competence or skill) into a high performing team who sustainably delivers a competitive advantage. Your visionary insight into how individual people tick plus operational expertise are crucial elements for organizational effectiveness and cultural health.
Insight into your team members’ inner drivers coupled with skilled and meaningful action is key.
Learn the Formula for Growth:
Information + Application = Transformation
According to extensive research and in correlating with Abraham Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs, we now know the nine motivators that are innately a part of us as individuals in varying proportions.
This information can revolutionize your insight into what is or isn’t energizing your team, equipping you to help them engage with their full potential.
Our inner drivers, when fulfilled, lead to engagement and happiness and success as part a team — but if unfulfilled, lead to a de-energized state that breeds negativity, relational conflict, lack of trust, and disengagement.
So how do we discover this inner world of our team members and address the complexity of the individual, while also uncovering the energizing or de-energizing effects the individuals have on one another? And how can we use this information to improve the performance and productivity of the team?
Motivational Maps®, is helping leaders in the gain insight into building high performing teams by measuring the full spectrum of human motivation. It delivers not only a framework for understanding, but also provides the application necessary to rewrite the ingrained norms of “how to motivate” so that the roots of disengagement can be addressed.
Instead of struggling to chase and change behaviors as a matter of symptom management, team leaders can now focus on understanding motivational drivers — the root causes — and work toward relevant solutions to the real issues impeding team cohesion, growth, and productivity.
Team Map Profiles not only quantifiably define the motivation level of a team, but also provide a non-threatening shared language to address areas of demotivation and support change.
Below is a high-level peek at the nine motivators comprising the individual profile of every member of every team. Unlike personality characteristics which are fairly fixed in a person, the profile does not categorize or label people, but reflects the unique blend of all motivators.
Each of us is motivated to varying degrees by each of the nine motivators. The key is knowing which are internally ranked the highest and lowest so that priorities and career-related decisions and roles connect to one’s greatest internal need.
The Nine Motivators of Motivational Maps®
| Inner Motivator | Energized By | Ways Managers Can Help Motivate |
| Searcher | Meaning & Make a Difference | Communicate the bigger picture, deliver regular feedback on how they are making a difference |
| Spirit | Freedom & Independence | Avoid micromanagement, co-create clear boundaries, simplify bureaucracy |
| Creator | Innovation & Change | Involve in idea generation, solving problems, & projects needing originality |
| Expert | Expertise & Mastery | Provide training & development, opportunities to mentor others and share knowledge |
| Builder | Money & Material Satisfaction | Communicate how performance and reward are strongly linked, define clear plans & goals |
| Director | Power & Influence | Give responsibility, delegate key tasks & authoritative role |
| Star | Recognition & Respect | Involved in high profile/visible projects, publicly recognize achievement |
| Friend | Belonging & Friendship | Seek out involvement, ask: ‘what do you think?’ |
| Defender | Security & Predictability | Regularly communicate, put expectations in writing, provide extra support through periods of change |
Do you think you may need more insight into what makes your team tick?
Would it help to start by discovering what motivates you?
This information plus application will lead to the growth and transformation you seek!
Discover more at exceedinglife.com/motivational-mapping
To your team’s growth vitality!
