Motivation and the 3 Ps

Motivation, as I like to say, is not a benefit, rather it is a feature of the work experience. What does this mean? It means that it is quite difficult to sell motivation either as a product or a concept to senior people who buy training and people development stuff. Yes, of course, everyone wants motivation in a general sense; everybody would probably agree that motivation is better than de-motivation, but motivation per se is tainted with being 'fuzzy', 'optional', not 'core' when it comes to what organisations need to become competitive and successful.

If, then, it is a feature, what is the benefit that all organisations want and will pay good money for? These are the three essential Ps.

The most important of these for all businesses is P for Profit. Without profit the business cannot survive. But what creates profit? In virtually all organisations of any size profit is a direct result of the people who work in it. They work and are paid a wage; the wage they earn needs to be covered by their work and any excess work becomes profit.

The more excess work over and above their cost to the business results in more profit. (Of course, a business is going broke where the costs of the staff exceed the value they are able to add). There is a word we use to characterise this work and especially the excess – the second P: productivity. Highly productive members of staff produce more than their cost, and so produce profit.

But what makes a highly productive member of staff? Who are highly productive members of staff? If we remember the Pareto Principle we will be clear that these highly productive individuals can be up to 16 times more productive than their less successful counterparts. Sixteen times! That is a staggering achievement especially if we are dealing with, as we frequently are, people being paid the same standard salary. Further, and awfully, the Pareto Principle also clearly means that 20% of our staff produce 80% of our profit, and sadly, 80% produce only 20%. The challenge, then, is to skew this law so that it works more in our favour: imagine how much more productivity and profit would be possible if instead of 80-20, we had 70-30 or even 60-40. In other words, we doubled the number of staff who were actually seriously productive?

But how do we find these 'productive' individuals? Do we, at interview, ask them the question, Are you productive? Because we know the answer: everyone says, Of course I am!

No, we have to go back a stage if we want profit, if we want productivity, to ask about the third P: this is the source of the productivity and then the profit. The third P, the third benefit, is Performance; we need high performing men and women, and this concept of performance is much more specific and measurable than whether or not someone is productive or likely, even, to produce profit for the organisation.

And who are the high performing people? Well, they are characterised by three outstanding features. First, they have a clear sense of direction. Can they explicate that convincingly? Second, they have the relevant knowledge and skills and openness to learning that indicates high achievement levels. On their own, however, neither of these two features are enough. The core feature that guarantees that the member of staff will perform at a high level is: Motivation!

Thus, it is short-termism that leads business leaders to discount motivation in their profit equations. The kind of people you need are those who are motivated. And to find that out you need the right tools.