“If you want to build a ship, don’t drum up the men to gather wood, divide the work and give orders. Instead, teach them to yearn for the vast and endless sea.”
– Antoine de Saint-Exupéry
Here’s a controversial statement – as a leader, your energy and belief in the project vision is more important than the project plan.
People say they work for money, and that is most definitely true. It just isn’t the whole story. People want to be proud of what they accomplish. They want to be doing something important. Eventually, they want to look back on their lives and feel they made a difference. Pride is a strong, strong motivator.
It’s really important. For a team, it makes them feel good about themselves, their work and the people around them. And don’t forget to lead by example and show them how much you care. Be a cheerleader for the mission and for them.
And now the obvious problem….
No one wants to build a backend system designed to make hedgefund managers another million dollars, or a B2C website that sells Chinese knock-offs of name-brand items, or an app that tricks people into clicking adds. Hopefully you don’t work on something shitty and getting people motivated is just a matter of being positive and selling the long term gains to your users.
Unfortunately, there will always be times when this just isn’t practical. And let’s be very frank about this – No one is inspired by the real motivating force of every project at every single company: Increasing shareholder value. So leaders often need to get creative, dig deep and find something for the people to latch onto. Entire companies have gotten pretty good at this game.
Try guessing the company with these mission statements/slogans:
Company 1
They say: “To inspire and nurture the human spirit”
They do: Sell the most cups of a legalized stimulant to the chronically overworked and under-slept
Company 2
They say: “To give people the power to build community and bring the world closer together”
They do: Capture the most personal information possible about their users to manipulate their behavior for improved ad monetization.
Company 3
They say: “Growth for a Better World”
They do: Literally make poisons that give people cancer.
It’s amazing what you can get people to believe about their work. No matter how little, pointless or evil your product/project/service is, you can always find a way to tell the story of doing something great.
But what if you can’t? What if there is literally nothing redeemable, creative, or beneficial at all in what you are about to do? Well…. Do you like the people you work with? You can always fallback on the team itself!
- “We’re in it together”
- “They don’t think we can make it”
- “Everyone is counting on us”
- “We never miss our deadlines”
People will gladly work on something terrible if the alternative is letting their team down.
Man, that was depressing to write.
Answer key, if you need it:
- Starbucks
- Monsanto. Or Philip Morris. Or Nestle. Or Exxon Mobil. Or Dow Chemical.