Motivating Without Money

Jorge Nelson

8 February 2001

________________________________________________________________

Date: Thu, 8 Feb 2001 11:55:12 -0400

From: Jorge Nelson <nelson_jorge@HOTMAIL.COM>

Subject: Money doesn't matter!

To: HEAD-NET@TC.UMN.EDU

Another source of great information is Ed Deming's "Out of the Crisis",

http://www.deming.org/resources/books.html , a classic in adopting the new

philosophy for continuous improvements in organizations. It really works...

He took Japan after WWII from creating junk to world-class quality

manufacturing and he tells how it was done in this great read.

Hope this helps! Warmest regards, Jorge

HOW TO MOTIVATE TEACHERS WITHOUT USING MONEY[1]

The teachers who work for your school are naturally motivated. All you need

to do is to utilize their natural ability, which you can do without spending

a dime. That's right! No money. In fact, money can actually decrease a

teacher's motivation and performance. The first step in utilizing your

teachers' natural abilities is to eliminate your school's negative practices

that zap away their natural motivation. The second step your school can take

is to develop true motivators that can spark all your teachers into being

motivated. By decreasing negative zapping de-motivators and by adding true

motivators, you will tap into your teachers' natural motivation. Your

teachers' natural motivation relies on the fact that all people have human

desires for affiliation, achievement, and for control and power over their

work. In addition, they have desires for ownership, competence, recognition,

and meaning in their work.

The following is a list of ten motivation zapping organizational behaviors that will demotivate your teachers.

· Create an atmosphere full of school politics.

· Develop unclear expectations regarding your teachers' performance.

· Create a lot of unnecessary rules for teachers to follow.

· Plan unproductive meetings for teachers to attend.

· Promote internal competition between teachers.

· Withhold information critical for teachers to perform their work.

· Provide criticism instead of constructive feedback.

· Tolerate poor performance so your high performing teachers feel taken advantage of.

· Treat teachers unfairly.

· Underutilize the capability of your teachers.

The following are examples of true motivators that will help your teachers

tap into their natural ability to be motivated. Remember; implement these

true motivators without spending money. Instead of focusing on money, focus

on how you can make some changes within your school.

· If your teachers do routine work add some fun and variety to their routine.

· Provide teachers with input and choice in how they do their work.

· Encourage responsibility and leadership opportunities within your school.

· Promote social interaction and teamwork between teachers.

· Tolerate learning errors by avoiding harsh criticism.

· Promote job ownership.

· Develop goals and challenges for all teachers.

· Provide lots of encouragement.

· Make appreciation part of your repertoire.

· Develop measurement that shows performance increase.

By eliminating de-motivators and adding in no cost motivators you are

tapping into your teachers' natural human desires to perform at their

maximum level of motivation and productivity. The following are the human

desires that you are tapping into.

· Desire for activity

· Desire for ownership

· Desire for power

· Desire for affiliation

· Desire for competence

· Desire for achievement

· Desire for recognition

· Desire for meaning

That's it! Remember; don't work to change one individual at a time. Work to

change your school to decrease the de-motivators and thereby increase your

teachers' natural ability to self-motivate themselves.

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