Motivation Bite Size - Staff Development

I had an interesting meeting with a senior manager last week. The comment that stuck with me was, "We are investing in training at the moment purely to help keep our people motivated during the recession".

That comment alone tells you a lot about this motivational nugget. Many people are motivated by training and personal development. The acquisition of new knowledge and skills helps to make them better at their jobs and perform at a higher level while also enhancing their CV and improving future job prospects. By sending staff on training courses a company is sending out many positive signals:

- We care about our people
- We want our people to succeed
- Things ain't so bad, we still have money to spend on our staff

But of course, training courses are a whole lot more effective if people also know why they are attending, see the relevance to their job and have a clear link between the training course and their development plan.

And it's not just training courses that help staff to develop. Other tools in the staff development mix include:

- Coaching (by a manager or an expert)
- e-Learning
- Attending industry seminars, conferences and workshops
- Sponsorship of professional study
- Exposure to new experiences and opportunities

At every part of the staff development process an individual manager can make a real difference and the net result will most likely be improved motivation, improved capability, improved confidence and improved performance.


Simon Cooper heads up ELC Training Solutions and is author of the best selling leadership development book, Brilliant Leader.

Motivation Bite Size - Recognition

Most people come to work wanting to do a good job. And when they do a good job or try their best to do so, it is vital for their manager/leader to recognise their efforts and achievements. In short, it is incredibly motivating when people receive deserved recognition and incredibly de-motivating when they don't.

And here’s the thing, it is also incredibly easy to recognise effort and achievement and yet, many managers/leaders do not do enough of it, enough of the time. When the pressure is on to get the job done, as it invariably is, it is all too easy to focus on correcting errors and mistakes, adjusting and improving output or simply to place more demands on staff. Nobody is suggesting these things should not be done but let’s not forget the old adage – a little bit of praise goes a long way!

The easiest way to recognise effort and achievement is by conducting regular one-to-one review meetings and highlighting areas where performance has been good or exceptional. But there are other less formal ways too. A simple ‘thank you’, ‘well done’, ‘you’re a star’ or ‘I really appreciate the effort you have put in here’ all tick the recognition box. If you have the budget, the odd gift (maybe presented at a team meeting) won’t go amiss either. And if someone has really gone the extra mile, why not send them a simple thank you card to show them that there effort is appreciated. Do not underestimate the impact of someone receiving a thank you card from their boss in the post, especially when that person has put in extra effort or produced exceptional results.

Perhaps the only note of caution in all this is to ensure you are being fair and objective with the whole team. Don’t leave yourself open to accusations of favouritism but at the same time, those working the hardest and producing the best results deserve to be praised.

Recognising the effort and achievement of your staff is incredibly easy to do. Are you doing enough of it?


Simon Cooper heads up ELC Training Solutions and is author of the best selling leadership development book, Brilliant Leader.

Motivation Bite Size - Job Satisfaction

One of the greatest motivators in the workplace is job satisfaction - that feeling of actually enjoying the job that you do and looking forward to coming to work in the mornings. But what are the main contributors to job satisfaction?

The starting point is normally, are you good at your job? Does your job suit your skill set? Does it enable you to play to your strengths and minimise exposure to your weaknesses?

Secondly, does it interest you? If you enjoy analytical work, are you given plenty of opportunity to exercise this? If you like to be challenged, does your job challenge you? If you like meeting new people, does your job enable you to do so?

Another aspect to consider is, do the company, your manager and your immediate work colleagues share similar values to you? You can be good at your job and find your work interesting but if you are asked to work in contrary to your core values and beliefs, you are unlikely to derive a lot of job satisfaction.

In fact, job dissatisfaction can be a primary cause of stress.

As a manager or leader of people, what can you do to facilitate high levels of job satisfaction among your people?

It begins of course, by recruiting the right people. Hiring people with the right skill sets but also, people who share the values and attitudes that are consistent with your working environment. In many cases, there is the opportunity to adjust the job content among team members to ensure both optimum performance and job interest. Are you playing to the strengths within your team? There is also the opportunity to understand people's values and attitudes and to create an environment where these are broadly matched - if you have hired the right people in the first place. Job satisfaction will also be influenced by many of the other motivating and de-motivating factors that we will look at in this series.

In short, creating high levels of job satisfaction will generally come down to three core leadership actions:

1. Hiring the right people.

2. Creating workflows that play to their strengths.

3. Establishing and maintaining an open and honest communication channel with your people.


Simon Cooper heads up the Experiential Learning Centre and is the author of the best selling leadership development book, Brilliant Leader.

Motivation Bite Size - Job Security

In tough economic times when job insecurity is a concern for so many people, the prospect of job security is high on the motivational scale. When jobs are plentiful, this is much less of an issue.

But as leaders and managers of people what can we do to positively affect people’s job security?

The first thing is to focus on helping your people to become high performers, making them a valuable asset to the company. This will be particularly relevant if an organisation is using a matrix methodology to select employees for redundancy.

The second thing is to help your people to develop new skills and capability. This will not only enhance their performance capability and reduce the chances of redundancy but also, it will help them to find a new job should the worst happen.

Of course, a really effective people leader will not wait until tough economic times to implement these actions – they are a core part of the leadership role. And if you have been paying due attention to performance and development issues during the good times, your staff will have much better employment prospects right now than those less fortunate souls who have been working for an ineffective manager.

And if the worst does happen and you need to lay off any of your staff members, do everything you can to support them through the process, including generating job leads via your network and providing some level of career counselling at the point of exit. You might also want to stay in touch with them as they could form a useful part of your network going forward. Providing this type of support is not only a decent thing to do but it will also have a motivational effect on your staff that remain - i.e. having a leader who genuinely cares and tries to support their team members.


Simon Cooper is cheif executive of the Experiential Learning Centre, author of the best selling leadership development book, Brilliant Leader and architect of the Brilliant Leadership workshops.

Motivation Bite Size - Money

To what extent does money motivate people in the workplace?

Certainly, money is the reason why most people come to work in the first place but once they are there, is it really a key motivator? My own experience is that for most people it is primarily a short-term motivator. Consider if your employer awarded you a 25% bonus tomorrow. Sure, it would be nice and you would probably feel pretty motivated but for how long? When would the effects of that bonus wear off and other factors become more important to you?

What about if a new employer offered to double your salary? Would you accept the job without qualification? What if they wanted you to relocate? What if they wanted you to work seven days a week? What if they were financially unstable? I’m guessing that while the extra money would be attractive, it wouldn’t be the sole motivation.

When money does tend to be a primary motivator is when current earnings are not enough to sustain a reasonable lifestyle. If someone is struggling to pay their mortgage or feed their family, money is never very far from their agenda. But once our earnings are sufficient to take care of our core lifestyle requirements, it is rarely the primary thing that motivates us.


Simon Cooper is Chief Executive of the Experiential Learning Centre, author of the best selling leadership development book, Brilliant Leader and architect of the Brilliant Leadership workshops.

Motivating Staff

One of the key challenges facing leaders at all levels is how best to motivate their staff. The reality is that each person is motivated (and de-motivated) by a different set of factors and the leader can exercise an influence over the vast majority of these. While this is a simple concept, identifying what the factors are for each individual and in turn, pressing the right buttons is not necessarily so easy.

Over the coming weeks I plan to pick the most common of these factors and explore how a leader can both identify which staff are affected by it and how to apply appropriate influence over each factor. This series will be called - Motivation Bite Size.

Before beginning that series, I’d briefly like to revisit what all staff need in order to deliver high levels of performance:

1. They need to know what is expected of them – i.e. clear goals, objectives, targets and standards.

2. They need to be capable of delivering what is expected of them.

3. They need support in helping to overcome any constraints or barriers that might prevent them achieving what is expected of them.

4. They need feedback on how they are delivering in relation to what is expected of them.

5. They need to be motivated.

Points 1-4 above all contribute to motivation. If people have clarity, capability, support and regular feedback, they are likely to be generally motivated. Similarly, a lack of any of these will likely contribute to a degree of de-motivation.

But there are also many other factors that contribute to motivation and these will be the focus of the series that follows. Be sure to tune in regularly and feel free to contribute to the discussion.


Simon Cooper is chief executive of the Experiential Learning Centre, author of the exciting new book, Brilliant Leader and architect of the Brilliant Leadership workshops.

Leadership Week - 28 Oct to 3 Nov 2008

Simon Cooper reviews this week's best leadership articles.

Wally Brock continues to inspire with his Three Star Leadership blog. In this week's gem (although delivered as more of a rant at a NYT article) Wally focuses on motivation in tough times. The great thing about Wally's blog is that it continuously encourages the reader to think and in my case, the writer to write.

Chris Young on the Rainmaker blog looks at five common reasons why CEOs do not share their vision. While reading this article it's worth considering whether your CEO shares their vision and more to the point, would it help you as a manager/leader do your job better?

On Leadership Turn, Miki Saxon explores the leadership silver bullet. This revolves around how managers can change their mindset in order to become true leaders. As anyone attending my leadership workshops will know, the development of leadership attitudes, values and behaviours is close to my heart.

On Mission Minded Management, Michelle Malay Carter makes some strong points about management accountability. The overriding impression for me was that shared leadership (of which I am a fan) should not be confused with shared accountability.

On his Community Blog Stephen Covey analyses trust between the leader, the organisation and the staff members. He discusses how easily it can be broken and goes on to explore the steps required to rebuild trust. This is a must read article, especially for anyone who is familiar with Dr Covey's 13 Behaviors of High Trust Leaders.

Why wait a whole week to see my top picks? Every blog and article listed here (and many more) are covered on our Leadership Toolbar - providing you with one-click access to everything you need to keep up to date with the leadership world, as and when it happens.


Simon Cooper is chief executive of the Experiential Learning Centre, author of the exciting new book Brilliant Leader and architect of the unique and powerful Brilliant Leadership workshops.

No Pain, No Gain

There is little doubt that great teamwork delivers better results than a group of competent individuals working independently. But what is it that makes a great team and how does a team leader go about developing a great team?

This issue was addressed several decades ago by Bruce Tuckman with his four stages of team development - forming, storming, norming and performing.

When a team first comes together they are at the forming stage where members are unsure of their role in the team, cannot yet trust the abilities of other team members and therefore, productivity is low. As familiarity grows and team members start to jostle for position in the team, particularly in relation to roles and responsibilities, tension grows, co-operation is low and so too is productivity - this is the storming stage. As team members settle into regular patterns of working with clear roles and responsibilities (the norming stage), their productivity improves alongside increased co-operation and steady working relationships. And this is as far as most teams get to - a steady, co-operative working environment with decent productivity.

The fourth stage occurs when the team reaches the high performing stage where team members actively support and challenge each other to deliver outstanding results. Mutual trust is very high, relationships are very mature, processes are slick and co-operation is absolute. As a result, productivity is exceptional.

The harsh reality is that few teams ever truly reach the high performing stage. Consider for a moment how many times in your career you have been part of a genuinely high performing team that consistently delivered exceptional results. For most people this is a situation they might find themselves in maybe three or four times in their whole career. Some might never experience it. As for leading a high performing team, the averages are even lower.

What then does it take to lead or become a high performing team?

There are of course several factors, including the condition that the team must stay together long enough. In his book, Brilliant Leader, Simon Cooper explores many of the inputs required by a leader to build, develop and lead high performing teams, indeed, he sets new standards in how to do so. But perhaps the most compelling factor lies in the stages of the team's development and in particular, the storming stage.

The storming stage is uncomfortable. There is high tension among team members, passive or active conflict and low levels of trust. The tendency for most team leaders is to manage the team through the storming stage. This usually involves dealing with issues reactively and focusing on individual performance to ensure that everyone is doing their bit. Worse still, many leaders will highlight the weak links within the team and deliver negative feedback in order to encourage improvement. Additionally, they might manage conflicts as they arise or try to avoid dealing with them at all - the ostrich approach.

What many leaders fail to understand is that storming is actually a golden opportunity that enables the rapid progress towards a high performing team. The tension that is created provides energy that, if it can be harnessed properly, provides the momentum for the team to progress to the high performing state. No pain, no gain!

When the team enters the storming phase the leader needs to draw all the conflicts out in the open and challenge the team to resolve these conflicts based on what each member brings to the team both in terms of strengths and weaknesses. The leader should not avoid these conflicts but rather, they need to be embraced and facilitated. And they should try to take the team through this pahse rapidly. This of course, can be easier said than done.

Quite often taking teams rapidly through the storming stage is the focus of our team building events. We design exercises that draw out the conflicts in an open and safe environment. Our expert facilitators are then able to guide the group through these conflicts to help them appreciate each other, co-operate more and play to each others' strengths while supporting each other in their areas of weakness. And of course, team members have a shared experience to use as a reference point.

In our four day leadership workshop, Brilliant Leadership, delegates are actually taken through the four stages each day. So on the second day we create an environment that makes them storm. We take people out of their comfort zone and put them in situations where conflict is inevitable. We create tension among the group. But then we guide them through the process of using conflict and tension to create trust and co-operation. By the time we get to the end of the workshop, delegates are operating as a high performing team and we help them highlight the key aspects of what they have experienced in order to help them apply a similar methodology with their own teams upon their return to work.

Some people might call it high risk learning. Perhaps it should come with a health warning, 'don't try this at home kids'. Certainly, it requires top quality workshop facilitation to handle the environment we create. But there is no doubt that the learning is both extreme and powerful.

Whether it is via a team building event, our Brilliant Leadership workshop or by facilitating a live team, storming in the workplace, the message remains the same - no pain, no gain!


Simon Cooper is Chief Executive of the Experiential Learning Centre, based in the UK but operating worldwide. He is also the author of Brilliant Leader and architect of the unique and powerful experiential workshop, Brilliant Leadership.

To Train or Develop?

To train or develop? That is the question.

Consider for a moment how many managers up and down the country sit down with their staff to review their development needs (often as part of the appraisal process) and end up by simply sending them on a training course. Job done? I think not.

When your staff attend a training course, the best you can hope for is that they return with new knowledge, new skills and some ideas about how these can be applied in the workplace. And if you don’t make any interventions you might, just might, get lucky and find that their diligence enables them to apply what they have learned from the training course and actually get better in the area you had intended.

However, all sorts of things can (and often will) go wrong with this approach. Firstly, staff members might not agree with your assessment of their development needs and will not be either a willing or motivated learner at the training course. Secondly, the training course might not deliver the knowledge or skills you were hoping for, especially if you have simply picked out a one-size-fits-all course from a training catalogue. And even if these first two barriers do not apply, the most common problem with using training courses as your primary development tool is that your staff will often struggle to apply what they have learned when they return to work.

Many human resource departments have developed processes to help overcome these common barriers. There is the development section of the appraisal form. There is often a pre-course briefing form where learning objectives need to be identified followed by a post course debriefing form where learning outcomes and action plans can be captured. But here’s the thing. Many managers see these as forms that need to be completed whereas the most important thing is the conversation that needs to take place between manager and staff member at each of these junctures – the form is merely a tool for helping to record the conversation.

These conversations aside, the most important thing a manager can do if they are truly focused on developing their staff is to make coaching interventions as staff members seek to practice and apply what they have learned. Coaching interventions that are constructive, objective, motivational, timely and learner centred. And let us not forget, coaching does not have to be used in conjunction with training courses, it can also be used instead of them. A good coach can pass on knowledge and develop skills just as effectively as a good trainer can.

Why then, do so few managers proactively engage in coaching their staff, preferring instead to rely on training courses to do the job for them? Perhaps it is due to a lack of appreciation for the power of effective coaching, a lack of time to coach or a lack of coaching skill. All of these are barriers that can be overcome and in most instances, relatively easily.

But this is only the tip of the iceberg when it comes to staff development. The most powerful learning occurs through experience and work assignment where the staff member takes ownership of their own development, supported by effective coaching as appropriate. There are a variety of different types of work assignment that should be considered.

Leap Experiences – This is when high talent staff members with high levels of self confidence are exposed to a completely new and challenging skill set that stretches them to their limit. This is a high risk, high reward learning strategy which if successful, will see the staff member climb a steep learning curve in a short space of time. Well designed experiential workshops offer a form of leap experience with a much lower risk profile and it is also possible to design work based projects that offer leap experiences in a controlled environment.

Good to Great – We often don’t think to develop staff in areas that they are already strong. This can be a missed opportunity when somebody has the natural talent to become exceptional. Having identified an appropriate area, the leadership challenge is to create opportunities in which the staff member is able to advance their skill level by increased exposure to situations which stretch their ability.

Skills Transfer – It is not uncommon for staff members to have already developed the core skill required but struggle to transfer this to a new task. The coaching role here is to help them make the appropriate connections in order to transfer the skill to the new area.

Exposure – One of the challenges often encountered in developing staff is to find sufficient opportunity to expose them to the skill area. This can be particularly true when the development relates to a future rather than current job role. Simulation, secondment or special projects all provide potential solutions in this area.

Confidence Building – Quite often staff members are capable of performing in a new skill area but lack confidence in their own ability. Enabling them to practice in a safe environment with sufficient time to check and correct any errors before the work goes live provides a useful strategy in these instances. You might also look for quick-win opportunities to help build their confidence level.

Marketing – Sometimes a staff member will believe that they are capable in an area which is unproven as far as you are concerned. This can be especially true when considering experience gained in previous jobs or environments outside of work. A useful strategy here is to give them an opportunity to market themselves to you and others by demonstration and example in a controlled environment.

Feedback – Sometimes it is an awareness of a weakness that is required in order to develop the motivation to improve it. This feedback might come from you but can also be driven through multi-perspective feedback. After all, sometimes the leader is not aware of a weakness either whereas others might be.

Assessment – There are times when a general awareness of a weakness is known but the specifics are not. This requires an analysis of the underlying issues, often by an external expert, to identify the specific areas that need to be improved in order for the weakness to be overcome.

Redeployment or Workaround – You cannot put a round peg into a square whole. Sometimes you will have to accept that a staff member simply does not have the underlying talent in a particular skill area to perform tasks requiring that skill. If these tasks are non-critical to the role you might be able to facilitate a workaround by utilising other team members or resources. If they are critical to the role you are best advised to look at opportunities to redeploy the staff member in another role, especially if their general talents and work ethic warranted retaining them in the organisation.

There are then a plethora of development activities that extend way beyond simply sending a staff member on a traditional training course. While training courses have their place in the developmental toolbox, they are best used in conjunction with coaching in order to maximise the return on investment. Coaching can also be utilised independent of any training courses. However, the most powerful forms of development involve engaging the staff member in targeted work assignments or experiential events that enable them to fulfil their potential and deliver maximum return to both the team and the organisation.

To train or develop? Brilliant leaders know the difference focus on developing their staff.

Simon Cooper is Chief Executive of the Experiential Learning Centre, based in the UK but operating worldwide. He is also the author of Brilliant Leader and architect of the unique and powerful experiential workshop, Brilliant Leadership.

Staff Development and Motivation

Of the top motivational forces in the workplace at least six can be either directly or indirectly attributed to staff development – job satisfaction, recognition, empowerment, personal development, promotional prospects and the relationship with one’s manager. Given this, it would be reasonable to expect that staff development was pretty high on the agenda for most managers – but is it?

On the scale of importance versus urgency, it would be fair to say that staff development normally ranks as highly important but very rarely urgent. This is but one reason perhaps why staff development doesn’t always receive the attention it deserves. As such, the solution for many managers is merely to seek out relevant training courses that fall within their budget and place an appropriate tick in the development box – particularly when it comes to completing the forms for the staff performance and development review meetings. Job done – I think not.

If we consider what is required for people to become competent in a particular discipline, it can be broadly broken down into three areas – knowledge, skills and practical application. Effective knowledge transfer means that the staff member understands what needs to be done, how it should be done and why they are doing it. The relevant skills either need to be developed from scratch or alternatively, can be transferred from an existing discipline in which the staff member is already competent. There are very few opportunities for applying the knowledge and skills in practical situations other than on the job.

At best, a traditional training course will deliver knowledge and skills. More often than not though, a traditional training course will deliver primarily knowledge with perhaps the odd role play or skills practice thrown in for good measure. Given this, how can a member of staff become fully competent by merely attending a training course? The reality is that they will only become fully competent if they return from the training course and practice what they have learned. This assumes that they have absorbed all the relevant knowledge from the training course and moreover, are given opportunities to apply this learning in practical situations. Better still, they will receive some coaching and feedback interventions from their manager or an experienced member of the team to ensure that the learning and development moves them efficiently towards a high level of competence.

The astute manager will not only realise the need for a proactive coaching approach to be combined with sending staff on training courses but rather, there are probably more cost efficient methods of the initial knowledge transfer such as e-learning, books, articles, shadowing others, industry seminars and even internal procedure documentation. I must emphasise though that using some of these alternative methods of knowledge transfer still require proactive coaching if the individual is to become fully competent.

Experience tells me that there are many instances where a training course is used as a substitute to coaching – after all let’s face facts, knowledge transfer and skills development can just as easily come from the coach as it can from an external training provider. Sure, a training course can give the impression that the manager is serious about their staff’s development and it can also make them feel valued but unless it is combined with post course coaching, it is somewhat hit and miss whether the individual will be able to apply what they have learned and become competent. But then of course we come full circle – many managers simply do not have enough time to coach their staff as they would like.

Is there a better alternative?

When I set up the Experiential Learning Centre it was just such an alternative that I sought to achieve. Prior to attending one of our experiential events, the initial knowledge component is delivered via e-learning. While we do spend some time at each of our events reinforcing this knowledge transfer, the majority of the time on our courses is spent with delegates actually doing rather than being taught. We have developed a range of high quality simulations and activities for each programme that enable delegates to experience the relevant business skills in an applied situation.

This is supplemented by expert facilitation and timely coaching interventions. And I do not use the word ‘expert’ lightly here. All of our facilitators are experts in the disciplines of the programmes they run. This means that they can provide effective demonstrations, make the right observations, ask key questions and engage in powerful coaching interventions. Moreover, each of our programmes include an analysis of delegates’ strengths and weaknesses and conclude with a detailed action planning sessions so that delegates are fully equipped to transfer their learning upon returning to work.

It would be remiss of me to claim that delegates will not benefit from additional post course coaching and proactive involvement from their manager. However, less time is required as staff members have invariably progressed further along the learning curve than virtually any other method of learning as they have already gained the relevant knowledge, developed many of the required skills and begun to apply what they have learned.

Therein lies the power of experiential learning.


Simon Cooper is Chief Executive of the Experiential Learning Centre, based in the UK but operating worldwide. He is also the author of Brilliant Leader and architect of the unique and powerful experiential workshop, Brilliant Leadership.