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Tips for Motivating IT Workers?
RexCelestis asks: "I work for a small (35 employees) tech company that provides consulting and software to law firms of all sizes. Last year, our company moved from rewards based on the fulfillment of personal goals to a more general reward, based almost strictly on sales. Outside of the sales staff, very few of us have felt motivated by this plan. As we near the annual meeting, I'd like to offer a few alternative methods to help motivate employees outside of sales. Can anyone offer any suggestions to help drive a development team, support staff, and/or consulting group towards greater success?"
You really have to look at two factors here:
If you don't want crime to pay, let the government run it.
As someone who has done military training in leadership and motivation, let me tell you that I have found most traditional management "motivation" strategies to be quite flawed. Permit me to elaborate with suggestions for improvement:
Accomplishment/Completion bonuses/prizes/etc:
Not a bad idea, but more designed to be coupled with something else. Continue reading for suggestions.
Performance evaluations:
You have to be careful with these. Most workers hate knowing that their performace is being evaluated constantly. These are most effective when the environment is positive. Eliminate the negative focus and focus more on positivity and learning.
Take for example, if a small part of a project was scrapped 2 days in due to the worker finding it too difficult or not-feasible. Instead of wrapping your head around why they wasted 2 days of company time on something impossible, focus on what they may have learned from what they worked on, and if any of their new knowledge may further the rest of the project in any way.
Be sure that evaluations are done in a relaxing environment. Offer coffee and donuts or other light fare, keep the door open, and seat them in a comfy chair. It goes a long way - and that's experience talking. If they've had outstanding performance, then consider offering a prize/bonus (nothing too expensive/elaborate though).
Effort rewards:
These are used synonymously with performance evaluations. These don't have to be anything too significant, and can be given to a team as a whole. If the team has shown some good performance for the past week or so, take them all out to dinner at some place nice but casual (optional: pool-tables, karaoke or other games may help enhance the fun). Tell them to leave their PDA's and laptops at home, and come just to relax and have a good time. This quite often raises team spirit and can also raise their respect for management. If you feel that an individual deserves a reward, give it to them privately, and make sure it isn't worth too much bragging about.
One-on-One:
Much like a performance evaluation, but different. Instead of monitoring individual performance, only monitor team performance. With a One-on-One, you speak to each team member individually, and have them report to you on how they think they are doing. With this, they can set their own goals, and put plans in place that fit with them, which eases their levels of stress. As with a performance eval, keep the environment relaxed and follow the guidelines mentioned in for performance evaluations.
General tactics:
Here are some general leadership and motivation tactics to help out:
* Don't assign impossible tasks. As well, don't assign a task and then change it without due reason. Undue changes will cause your workers to lose confidence in your abilities.
* Comfort counts. If during the summer months your workers are constantly overheating, spend the money to get each of them a desk-sized oscillating fan and offer them cold drinks periodically. During winter months, offer them coffee to warm them up from the cold. Minimal expendadures such as those can do wonders to raise productivity.
* Keep yourself motivated. An unmotivated leader will demoralize everyone.
* If someone is in a slump, work with them to get them back on track. Maybe they just need a talking to, in which you should remind them of their past successes. Perhaps they need a little time off. Being treated well and like a human being will garner a sense of loyalty. Nothing can be more valuable to a company than a loyal worker.
Good luck. If you need any more tips, feel free to email me.
Frink: Nice try floyd, but you were designed for scrubbing, and scrubbing is what you shall do.
You want your people to work harder? Make them:
1. understand how what they are doing impacts things
2. give them projects that they enjoy
3. encourage them to make their own projects
4. set aside money to encourage things:
"steve, I wanted to let you know we appreciated you staying late and working on x last week, so we put $300 extra in your paycheck"
5. have them interact w/ people outside of dev. If your developers interact with customers they understand how what they're doing impacts things and they get to see the rewards of people being satisfied by their good work.
Oh, and say "Thank you".... a lot.
6. Lastly: Ask them what you could to to make their job better and more productive.
RandomAndInteresting.comdefending the world from stupidity since 1979
"Managing programmers is like herding cats", so think "cats":
Also have a look at Googles way of motivating their "cats".
Tux2000
Denken hilft.
The last place I worked at had a bonus scheme, the only problem was that performance levels were set impossibly high and the resulting bonus worked out at about 5% of your pay. I finally realized that it wasn't worth the stress, gray hair and ulcers so I just did my job and didn't bother busting a gut for little reward.
Here's a hint, if you want to setup a bonus scheme then ask your staff what they want as rewards.
Ed Almos
The more corrupt the state, the more numerous the laws. - Tacitus, 56-120 A.D.
Say hello to your employees every morning, individually, greeting them by their name. Take fifteen minutes and walk the cube farm, stopping at each employee's cube. Say hello. Banter for a moment. Do not discuss work in these rounds unless it is an emergency; it will spoil the effect.
When an employee does well, recognise this. You don't have to give them anything physical, but a public "thank you" at the next departmental meeting can be very valueable, especially if your boss is there.
Don't do stupid shit. For example, if you've been providing broadband to people's homes to enable working remotely, don't cut it off while still spending $$$ on conference calls. It pisses people off. If you need to cut (hey, it happens), cut evenly.
Provide your employees with some space to socialise, and don't prevent them from doing so. It makes the workplace more bearable.
Offer to take employees to lunch once in a while. Don't make it a CLM if they decline.
Greet new employees with a welcome luncheon. Send off departing employees with a farewell luncheon. It gives everyone a chance to say hello and goodbye.
Don't hold meetings unless they are needed and productive. Nothing kills morale like wasting time in a meeting where nothing pertains to you.
Find a way to dispatch your employees' complaints efficiently, effectively, and reasonably. If it is something you can't do anything about, at least give the employee a sympathetic ear.
Go to bat for your people.
www.wavefront-av.com
The best technical people aren't motivated by the same things as salesmen and managers. Sales people (in general) can use their personality and people skills to win money. The eye is on the money and the skills develop to support that. That is fine, business needs that. However, managers tend to reflect owners desire for the business to make money and apply incentives like everyone were salesmen. Managers (in general) are eye on the money/budget with business skills. (before I get blasted for this - yes, I know there are other incentives for each job, have done each and enjoyed the other benefits - doesn't change the needed business focus)
No salesman would *EVER* invest the time and effort to develop the skills of a techie for just the money. No one would twist their brain that badly just for the pay that techs get.
The best technical people don't give a crap about money beyond a point. As a technical person, I need enough money to support my family, have a cool (note that word) house, eat well, provide my toys, and make me feel appreciated. I personally have grown to hate bonuses because they feel too much like putting a price on my pride. I dump heart and soul into something just to have someone that doesn't know squat about what genius I invested say "here's $5, that thing you created is sure nice". I might as well have my wife say "I had a great time tonight dear, here's $10 - if you can do even better next week, I might give you $15..." You want to give me more money? Great! Don't quantify my work with it.
You want to give me something that means more? Give me something that isn't quantified. Ease the pain of my addiction to technology. Give me something that makes it up to my wife and kids that they lose me in thought to figuring out a sticky algorithm at the dinner table. Give me time off with them. Give me toys that will amuse me with something other than work. Give me something to do with the arts or food or travel. Something that gets me out of my rut so I can come back and freshly jump back into it with vigor.
I love my work, am addicted to it and would do it even if I didn't have to get paid for it.
(notes - 1:not the same as if I wasn't paid for it 2:I wouldn't do it for free for you but I sure would for open source or for myself)
Don't saddle me with crap that doesn't give me the buzz that I get from my tech stuff. I'm not here to wheel and deal, piss testosterone, compete for leader of the pack, meet deadlines, conquer the world and play political games. I want to create, show off, see cool stuff and work with other people that understand that. I want immediate gratification from my work - to see my stuff do what I told it to. I want the end user to squeal with delight like a little kid when they see that my work just did more than they expected. I want my peers to say "that is so cool! how did you do that?" I want see stuff that my peers do that blow my mind and give me ideas.
All that being said and having been a manager, the best things IMHO that you can do to motivate your tech employees is...