What Motivates You?

noun: motivation; plural noun: motivations

1. the reason or reasons one has for acting or behaving in a particular way.

“escape can be a strong motivation for travel”

synonyms:

motive, motivating force, incentive, stimulus, stimulation, inspiration, inducement, incitement, spur, reason; informal carrot “his motivation was financial”

o   the general desire or willingness of someone to do something.

“keep staff up to date and maintain interest and motivation”

synonyms:

enthusiasm, drive, ambition, initiative, determination, enterprise;

 

 

What motivates a person? That is a question that a lot of people ask themselves every day. It is also a question that a lot of people claim to have the answer to every day. I spent 24 years in the United States Army, much of it as a leader, and I never figured out every one of my soldier’s motivations to do things or not to do things. I would hear speakers at leadership classes and the speaker would claim they knew the key to motivating individuals.

I started running track over 38 years ago, when I was 8 years old. Over the years I have had a lot of coaches and I have coached a lot of athletes in different sports. Almost every coach I ever had, had a great tool to motivate the individuals on the team, whether it was the track team, wrestling team, swim team, cross country team or multi-sport team. I would listen and take notes and try it out on different athletes.

What I found out many years ago was that not every soldier or athlete is motivated by the same things. A few years ago, around 2001, I heard about this new concept called win-win agreement. We would sit down and have a real conversion with the person and see what motivated them. What myself and other smart leaders around me found out was that if you have 10 different soldiers or athletes, more than likely you would have 10 different things that were motivators.

What motivates you?