(And what 60 years of research actually tells us)
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“My people just aren’t motivated.”
Most leaders say this at some point. I have said it myself.
What we rarely consider is that this statement is usually a diagnosis error, not an accurate description of the problem. After spending years sifting through research in psychology, organisational behaviour, and neuroscience, I kept finding the same uncomfortable truth: the way most leaders think about motivation is fundamentally wrong — and well-intentioned practices are making things worse.
Here are seven of the most common mistakes, and what to do instead.
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1. Treating motivation as a personal trait
We talk about motivation as if people either have it or they don’t. But motivation is not a personality feature — it is a response to conditions. Goals, role clarity, decision rights, workload, fairness, and trust all shape how motivated someone feels on any given day.
If the system is broken, asking for more motivation is the wrong question.
Better: Design work so that motivation can actually exist.
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2. Using control to drive performance
Pressure, bonuses, surveillance, and tight targets can produce short-term results. What they reliably undermine over time is ownership, initiative, and learning. People do not disengage because incentives are too low. They disengage because autonomy has been taken away.
Better: Replace control with clear expectations, trust, and room to make real decisions.
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3. Confusing motivation with enthusiasm
Engagement scores. Energy in meetings. Positive vibes. These things matter, but they are not the same as motivation. Psychologically, motivation is about the direction, intensity, and persistence of behaviour — and crucially, the quality of that motivation.
“I have to do this” and “I want to do this” look identical from the outside. They perform very differently over time.
Better: Pay attention to behaviour and ownership, not just mood.
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4. Thinking it is your job to motivate people
Many leaders feel responsible for injecting motivation into their teams. That is not how it works. Motivation is not something you deliver. It emerges when the right conditions exist.
The more useful question is not “How do I motivate my team?” but “What is getting in the way of them motivating themselves?”
Better: Stop trying to provide motivation. Start removing what is blocking it.
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5. Looking for the universal motivator
Purpose. Growth. Recognition. Money. Impact. Founders often want to find the thing that moves everyone. There is no such thing. Motivation is individual, contextual, and shifts over time.
What drives you as a founder is unlikely to be what drives your head of operations, your product lead, or your newest team member.
Better: Have the conversation. Ask instead of guess.
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6. Projecting your own drives onto others
This is perhaps the most common and least visible mistake. High-achieving founders often assume that what motivates them — ambition, autonomy, speed — motivates everyone. It does not.
When leaders project their own drivers onto others, the result is a quiet misalignment that shows up as disengagement, but rarely gets named as such.
Better: Replace assumptions with curiosity.
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7. Diagnosing a motivation problem when the real issue is something else
Low motivation is often a symptom. The actual causes are usually unclear priorities, a lack of confidence in their own capability, missing resources, or conflicting demands from different parts of the organisation.
Before you question someone’s will, check their working conditions.
Better: Ask what is unclear, what is missing, and what is getting in the way — before drawing conclusions about attitude.
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The most important shift in thinking about motivation is this:
Leaders do not create motivation. They create conditions where motivation has a chance to exist.
That is a smaller role than most leaders expect — and a more powerful one than they realise.
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What would you add? Or push back on?