How to be a self-motivated employee

Who loves the ugly duckling? Who loves the weakling?

None.

A demotivated employee is clearly a weakling in any organisation, at any given point of time. They are by far the greatest threat to an organisation’s success at large. Not just because they lack the urge to grow and evolve but, because they have been observed to have an algorithmic influence on their surroundings as well. It’s a phenomenon quite synonymous to a contagious disease. You don’t feel anything initially. By the time you realise, you are already a victim.

As per a recent survey, only 1 in 4 non-management employees are fully engaged. And, that clearly means one simple thing. Not many around us are motivated enough to work!

What is motivation?

Motivation is what pushes us to achieve our goals, feel more fulfilled and improve overall quality of life.

Daniel Goleman, the reputed author of several books on Emotional Intelligence, identified four elements that make up motivation:

·         Personal drive to achieve, the desire to improve or to meet certain standards;

·         Commitment to personal or organisational goals;

·         Initiative, the ‘readiness to act on opportunities’; and

·         Optimism, the ability to keep going and pursue goals in the face of setbacks.

What does being self-motivated mean?

Being self-motivated means being ready for driven, focused discussion and behaviour. It also means being sharp and smart enough not to be manipulated and to be open to positive learning.

And clearly enough, being in this state of mind is the actual challenge!

Feeling down or not really feeling the urge to work, and over-exaggerating trivial issues or matters and blaming them to be reasons for the state of mind is a common tendency observed among people lacking motivation. They would not feel like working because the day was cloudy or perhaps because they simply were not in the mood to work!

How to be self-motivated?

Maintain a positive attitude: There is nothing more powerful for self-motivation than the right attitude. You can’t choose or control your circumstance, but can definitely choose your attitude towards your circumstances.

Leave personal problems aside: Work isn’t really the place for your personal problems. To be a success in life, you must know where to draw the line. The work-life balance is essentially important for one’s well-being at large.

Keep learning and evolving: Knowledge has no limits. Keep learning newer things; equip yourself with fresh skills, better thoughts and ideas. The greatest threat to life is stagnation. Make sure you don’t stagnate. Evolution is the truth of life.

Ignite the fire of passion: Passion is a must for success, in any and every sphere of life. You may not always love the job usurped, but that should never be stopping you from giving it your best shot. Even the most mundane of works can be fun, with a pinch of passion.

Indulge in soliloquy: We are after all humans. Not every single day can we manage to be equally high on enthusiasm and energy. We do have our ups and downs. Talk to yourself. Besides being a great confidence booster, it helps reveal the real you.

Confront your challenges and fears: Running away from your weaknesses and fears is never a solution. Face it. Fight it out.

“Cowards die many times before their deaths; The valiant never taste of death but once.” – William Shakespeare

Acknowledge and reward success: Acknowledge your achievements, every bit of it. Because, you deserve it. You should indulge in celebrating success as well as lending a good ear to the lessons of failure. Also, never forget to appreciate the efforts of others that yielded the success at the first place.

A finishing note

It’s important to realize that motivation doesn't just happen. You need to work at it. Work really hard.

“In the end, you’re only as strong as your weakest link.”

The Wet Blackboard and Chalk Theory

Who doesn't remember the blackboard?

The blackboard and the grinding noise of the chalk crawling across it, earliest and indelible memories, right out of one’s childhood.

But, we aren't talking of schooldays or even one’s childhood for that matter. We are talking something substantially concerning, something serious.

You, me, us – we all have come across pages, chapters and episodes in life. We remember some. We forget the rest. Of the ones we remember, we often tend to overlook the minor ones, which seemingly had negligible or no relevance at all.

A classic example of this phenomenon is “the wet blackboard and chalk theory”.

It often happened during the childhood days; the blackboard was wiped off with a wet cloth only to be left clean and shining, flawless and smooth, as if not a word had ever been scribbled on it.

It was perfect.

It was perfect, only until the next words had been chalked on.

Once the board was written all over, did rise the actual problem. Remembered something! Didn't you?

The first words chalked on the wet blackboard were too stubborn to be dusted off. Even after the duster had been rubbed the hardest, they would leave behind a negligible but not non-existent trail.

Slowly but steadily, over the next few hours the trail would only grow all the more prominent. By the end of the day, it would be nearly impossible to decipher anything that was there on the board.

And, wet cloth wasn’t a real solution!

Soon after the first layer of words left their trail, every single layer kept adding negligible but not non-existent trails, rendering the blackboard unproductive by the end of the day. Slowly. But, steadily.

Employees lacking motivation are to an organisation what a fragile piece of chalk is to a wet blackboard. 

The trails are negligible. But, not non-existent. Fractions add up to whole numbers quite much like drops add up to seas and oceans.