4 Employee Motivation Strategies in Human Resource Management

Human Resource Management can be broken down into three HR dimensions – motivation-enhancement, skill enhancement and opportunity-enhancement. Out of the three, motivation-enhancement deals with Employee Motivation and as such can be the most challenging, This article outlines HR strategies to help build Employee Motivation in an organisation.

Employee Motivation Strategy #1: Trust through Autonomy

Trust is one of the most important foundations in building relationships, be it personal or professional. In business, employers need to trust their teams to execute their tasks properly, and with minimal supervision. In turn, employees feel motivated when they are in control of their time and given the freedom on deciding how to approach and complete their tasks. Granting autonomy is one of the best indicators of trust and is a great way to way to nurture the employee-employer bond.

Employee Motivation Strategy #2: Build Self-sufficiency

One of the common mistakes made by leaders and managers is micro-managing their employees, and being unable to let someone work something out for themselves. Employees need to feel that their managers are there to help them when they need it, not do their work with them or for them. This process also builds self-sufficiency and allows employees to learn to tackle challenges on their own, to the best of their ability. This can instil a strong sense of accomplishment, which is an incredible personal motivator.

Employee Motivation Strategy #3: Set meaningful KPI’s

Setting goals and KPI’s can actually be an excellent motivator if done correctly. It’s vital to connect an individual’s goals and KPI’s to the larger corporate objectives or vision, as it makes an employee feel that they are making a valuable contribution towards their company’s success. In addition, it’s important to establish clear, mutually agreed on goals and KPI’s, instead of ones dictated from above. The employee buy-in into setting their performance objectives lets them know their input is valued, which in turn motivates them to work harder towards achieving them.

Employee Motivation Strategy #3: Don’t Pigeonhole Employees

Monotony is the bane of performance and productivity. The Human mind is incapable of doing repetitive tasks without stagnating. An excellent motivator is to let employees know that they can be open about pursuing other interests outside the scope of their day-to-day responsibilities, and that management will support them. Other HR strategies such as up-skilling or job rotation can help employees identify new skills and strengths that can be applied to their current role or help them identify new areas where they can make a stronger contribution to an organisation.

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