If you are a leader, manager or a technical lead, bringing out the best in people is your number one priority. Your primary job is to enable your team to perform at their best and you seek out ways to do that. In my pursuit of the same as a Tech lead, I came across a good read and would like to share my nuggets and my thoughts about the book- "Bringing out the Best in people" by Aubrey Daniels.
If you have been reading psychology or behavioral analysis, some of the concepts in this book are easy to understand. Except the technical terminology antecedent, consequence, PIC table etc which need to be familiarized.
Before delving into a few concepts in this book, lets familiarize ourselves with these terminologies.
Antecedent:
As per Wiki, An antecedent is a stimulus that cues an organism to perform a learned behavior. When an organism perceives an antecedent stimulus, it behaves in a way that maximizes reinforcing consequences and minimizes punishing consequences.
Consequence:
It is the result that follows after a behavior or action
My top ideas from the book
- Be aware of Antecedents and Consequences present in your team/company. Antecedents set the event which results in behavior or action. After the behavior team member will receive consequence ( reward or punishment). This is called ABC model
- Ex: What are the stimulus available for your team members to take up tasks, execute projects and complete them on time with quality?
- Is it because they are paid to do? Or are they motivated enough to do great work and help the team or company? Are they excited about the challenging task?
- What are the consequences of doing a job? Do they have sufficient consequences to reward employees for a great job? or They are punished immediately with next task or more tasks?
- Are their victories celebrated? Are they given opportunities to talk about their achievements in the team meetings?
- Performance Management is providing and controlling antecedents and consequences. Analyse the antecedent and consequence based on Positive/Negative, Immediate/Future & Certain/Uncertain
- When giving rewards, don't make the tangible rewards the highest priority. Instead the tangible rewards should help employees remember their achievements
- For example, if you have budget to give costly rewards for great performance, then great. But if you don't, even you can give small rewards and present them to make them feel good. You may say, "Dear Suresh, this is a gift for your to help you remember your achievement".
- Let the performer bask in the glory. The presentation ceremony should not be just receiving for performers, rather participatory. For example, instead of saying this award is for your so and so achievement and be done, ask employee how difficult or challenging that achievement was?
- Model for performance problem solving
- Pinpoint
- Record
- Measure
- Feedback
- Consequate or Reinforce
- Evaluate
If you are using a different method of motivating your employees, do write in the comments.
Love,
Vish
