10 Ways to Inspire Others

Do you inspire your employees? This is an important part of any manager's role. It's not just a nice thing - it's a requirement (although many managers are not held to a high enough standard). Inspiring team members is a requirement because managers are responsible for optimizing performance and retention - and uninspired employees don't do their best work.

So with that, here are a few ideas for how to inspire others. Feel free to add your ideas in the comments.

1. Be a role model of courage. When our managers demonstrate courage, this will inspire us to do the same and we will respect them all the more.
2. Take a stand. Share your perspective and be open. The most inspiring leaders have a strong vision for how things ought to be.
3. Reject politics! Many of us are sick of politics and would gladly follow and respect leaders who rejected the mucky muck - even if we do not agree with him or her all the time. The wishy washy spin speak is nauseating.
4. Listen more, speak less. Show your employees that you value input and collaboration. This applies to your team members and peers - show them you respect and include your peers.
5. Beat your goals and don't rest until you do. Managers who are OK with mediocre performance (even if they can make the case that it's not their fault) are uninspiring. People want to work for successful leaders.
6. Spend time in their shoes. In fact, swap places with your employees every now and then. Show them you want to understand what their world looks and feel like. Bonus: You will learn tons!
7. Reject over the top perks. OK, so you earned the promotion. Don't flaunt your trappings and take a stand to reject perks that separate you from your team. Think about how you felt when you were in their positions. Try to spread the wealth on great experiences like conferences, trainings, product offerings, and other perks.
8. Represent your employee's needs to senior management and with your peers. Take the initiative to make things better. Wow, that will speak volumes about your intention to serve them and this is very inspiring.
9. Be the best expression of your unique style. We are all different, so don't turn into a corporate clone. That said, be the classiest version of you possible. Like a fine grape varietal, be the fullest expression of you.
10. Be inspired by others. Share your role models and why they inspire you.

Have you been a bit too comfortable with things? Uninspiring managers often need to kick things up a couple notches. A big change may not be needed, just fill yourself up with high test fuel.

That said, I have met several managers who flatly reject that they need to inspire others. If that's you, I recommend another career path because you obviously don't understand the power and importance of your management position. Sounds harsh, I know, but I believe this with all my heart. If you don't really believe you ought to inspire people to do their best work, you should not be a manager.

Comments

[Wally Bock]

Great post. In my view it all comes down to the first point. As my best-ever Marine CO said, "There is no leadership except leadership by example."

[Lisa Haneberg]

Wally - if I have to distill it to one, I would agree. Modeling focused courage.

[VASILIS]

what a great post as always!lisa you re a treasure out there in this jungle of having to balance all these different and often conflicting goals.

i ll print it(this post) and try to keep it in front of my eyes all this year.

i m in charge of 12 people in our company in a very sensitive and important department, the numbers are good this year, but looking at our competiion i feel we re miles behind.

all my efforts to understand why we re so poor on serving the consumer(we re a supermarket chain) goes mainly to my disability to make my team really commited to what we do.
in other words i fail terribly to inspire them.

maybe i should quit as you say or i should try harder.

i ll try the latter.

an idea for a post or a book in the future:"why do managers fail?"

cause everybody knows more or less what to do, but so few of us succeed.

[Lisa Haneberg]

Vasilis:

I suggested that managers who do not feel they ought to inspire people think about another career - but I get the sense from your comment that you want to inspire you employees. Where there is a will, I believe there is a way. Good luck!

[Michael Wagner]

I really like #4 - listen more, speak less; though the entire list is insightful.

One I might add as a form of inspiration I've experienced is "don't wait for perfection, praise progress".

To have someone see that I'm making progress and get some praise for it just fires me up all the more to make even more progress.

Thanks for offering up such an energizing list.

Keep creating,
Mike

[Lisa Haneberg]

Mike - I like that. Yes results are important, but so too is valuing progress and growth.