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How to motivate your team as a manager

You can't hand people motivation, but you can remove what drains it and give them more of what drives most people: work that moves forward, a say in how they do it, a chance to get better, and someone who notices. In practice that means clear goals, visible progress, specific thanks, real decisions handed over, and fixing the problems that annoy people every day. Ask each person what keeps them going; the answers differ more than you'd guess.

Below: what the research on motivation says, questions that find what drives each person, a weekly routine, how to use progress, recognition, autonomy and growth, the basics you have to fix first, what kills motivation, how to handle the one person who's checked out, what to do when morale is low, and a four-week plan.

What research says actually motivates people

Three bodies of work, decades apart, point in a similar direction.

• Herzberg's two factors. Frederick Herzberg's 1968 Harvard Business Review article "One More Time: How Do You Motivate Employees?" split work into things that cause dissatisfaction when they're bad (pay, policies, conditions, relationships with the boss) and things that create motivation when they're present (achievement, recognition, the work itself, responsibility, growth). Fixing the first stops people being unhappy; only the second makes them want to do more.
• The progress principle. Teresa Amabile and Steven Kramer studied about 12,000 daily diary entries from 238 people in knowledge work. On the days people felt most motivated and positive, the most common event was making progress on meaningful work, even small progress (HBR, "The Power of Small Wins", 2011).
• Self-determination theory. Psychologists Edward Deci and Richard Ryan found people are most driven when three needs are met: autonomy (some choice), competence (getting better at something) and relatedness (connection to others). Daniel Pink's book Drive (2009) popularised a similar trio: autonomy, mastery and purpose.

What this means for you: perks and pep talks matter less than the daily experience of the work. And money matters mostly when it feels unfair, which is a basic to fix, not a motivator to pull.

Find out what drives each person

The same thing that lifts one person bores another. Public praise delights some and embarrasses others. Ask, in your 1:1s, over a few weeks, not all at once:

• "What part of your work gives you the most energy? What drains it?"
• "Think of a week at work you really enjoyed. What happened?"
• "What would you like to be doing a year from now?"
• "How do you like to be thanked: in front of people, in private, in writing?"
• "What's one thing that gets in your way every week?"
• "If you could change one thing about how we work, what would it be?"

Write the answers down. A short note per person, looked at before each 1:1, is enough. More questions like these are in one on one questions to ask employees.

A weekly routine that keeps a team motivated

Run the Monday and Friday parts inside your normal team meeting; you don't need a new one.

Make progress visible

If the progress principle is right, your most useful job is making sure people can see their work moving.

• Break big projects into pieces that finish within a week or two.
• Keep a visible list (a board, a shared doc) where finished work stays visible, not just disappears.
• Say what the work led to: "The fix you shipped cut support calls on that issue to almost none this week."
• Protect focus. Constant switching between tasks means nothing ever feels done.

The reverse matters too: Amabile and Kramer found setbacks weighed heavily on people's days. When a project is cancelled or blocked, say why, and give the team something they can finish.

Want a short lesson and the words for one of these habits each morning? Take the 2-minute quiz and get a 10-minute lesson and one script a day, for the talks you lead.

Recognition that works

Vague praise ("great job, everyone") fades in a minute. Specific praise names what they did and what it changed:

A few rules:

• Thank effort and method, not only results, especially on hard projects that haven't landed yet.
• Give credit by name to your own boss, and tell the person you did.
• Match the way they like to be thanked.
• Spread it. If the same two people get every thank-you, the rest notice.

Our guide on how to give positive feedback to an employee has a three-part sentence for praise and ten vague lines rewritten.

Give people a say

Autonomy doesn't mean no rules. It means choice inside clear limits:

• Set the outcome and the deadline, let them choose the method.
• Ask for their plan before you give yours.
• Hand over whole pieces of work, with the authority to decide. How to delegate as a manager has five levels of authority to pick from.
• Where you can, give some choice over when and where they work.

Micromanaging is the quickest way to take autonomy away. If you're checking more than you agreed, ask yourself what you're worried about, and say it to them instead.

Give people a next step

People stay motivated when they're getting better at something. For each person, agree one thing they're working towards this quarter: a skill, a type of project, a responsibility. Then make room for it in their actual week, not only in a review document. A stretch task, a chance to shadow someone, leading a meeting, training a new hire: these cost little and count.

Fix the basics first

Herzberg's point was that some problems block motivation however inspiring you are. Check these before anything else:

• Workload: people who are overloaded don't need a pep talk, they need less work.
• Tools: broken equipment, slow systems and missing access wear people down daily.
• Clarity: people can't be motivated towards a goal they don't know. See how to set expectations with employees.
• Fairness: pay, rotas and who gets the good work. If pay is out of line and it's beyond you, say honestly what you're doing about it.
• The manager: you. People are more willing to work hard for someone they trust.

What kills motivation

• Changing priorities without saying why.
• Asking for ideas, then never using any.
• Rewarding the loudest person, not the best work.
• Letting a poor performer slide while others carry the load.
• Meetings that could have been a message.
• Praise only at review time.
• Taking work back when it isn't done your way.

The fourth one surprises new managers. Strong people notice when someone else isn't pulling their weight, and their motivation drops if you do nothing. Dealing with it is part of motivating the team: see how to manage an underperforming employee.

When it's one person, not the team

If one person has gone quiet or flat, ask before you assume. Privately:

Then listen. The cause may be work (bored, overloaded, passed over) or outside it (health, family, money). If it's outside work, offer what your workplace has (time off, an employee assistance program) and don't push for details. If it's work, agree one change and check back in two weeks. If it shows up as missed work or a negative tone, it may need a different talk: how to handle an employee with a bad attitude.

When the whole team's morale is low

After layoffs, a lost project or a long crunch, a cheerful speech can make things worse. Start by saying what happened and that it was hard. Ask the team, in a meeting or one by one, what would help most right now. Then pick one or two things you can actually change in the next two weeks, do them, and say you did. Small, kept promises do more than big plans after a hard stretch.

A four-week plan to motivate your team

Wondering whether your style motivates people or wears them down? The free leadership style quiz takes about two minutes and names your style, with the habits it tends to skip.

Questions about motivating a team

What is the best way to motivate a team?

Make progress visible, thank people specifically, give them a say in how they work, and fix the daily annoyances that drain them. Ask each person what keeps them going.

How do you motivate a team without money?

Recognition, real responsibility, chances to learn, and visible progress all cost little. But if pay is unfair, those won't make up for it for long.

How do you motivate a team that doesn't want to work?

Find the cause first. Ask what's in the way. Overload, unclear goals and unfairness are more common than laziness.

Do team events and perks motivate people?

They can help people connect, but they don't fix the daily work. Do them after the basics, not instead of them.

How do I motivate my team as a new manager?

Listen first, fix one or two small things people raised, give specific thanks, and keep every promise. Motivation follows trust.

Next: read how to build trust with your team as a manager, take the free leadership style quiz, or browse all our guides for new managers.

Sources

• Frederick Herzberg, "One More Time: How Do You Motivate Employees?", Harvard Business Review, 1968 (reprinted 2003): https://hbr.org/2003/01/one-more-time-how-do-you-motivate-employees
• Teresa M. Amabile and Steven J. Kramer, "The Power of Small Wins", Harvard Business Review, May 2011: https://hbr.org/2011/05/the-power-of-small-wins
• Richard M. Ryan and Edward L. Deci, "Self-determination theory and the facilitation of intrinsic motivation, social development, and well-being", American Psychologist, 2000.
• Daniel H. Pink, Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us, Riverhead, 2009.
• Teamwork, "11 ways to motivate your team": https://www.teamwork.com/blog/11-ways-motivate-team/