Pointlessness is a problem that can damage employee motivation beyond repair. The go-to solutions are often pay raises, perks, or even a Braveheart-esque speech in the Monday morning meeting. However, understanding the psychology of motivation is where you can unlock real results as a leader, without the forgettable employee motivation quotes.

In this article, we’ll teach you how to swap pointlessness for meaning with leadership motivation strategies that help you, your people, and your organization grow.

Let’s start building this idea (get it) with a fantastic LEGO-related piece of motivational research.

Employee Motivation Techniques with LEGO

In 2008, behavioral economist Dan Ariely ran a simple experiment to understand what motivates people. It involved LEGO Bionicle robots, and two teams were paid to build the same toy models.

The key difference came when they finished building:

1. Group one was told to put their models on their desk and build an army of Bionicles.
2. Group two saw their models dismantled in front of them after each one was completed.

This was the only difference between the two groups. Both were paid the same and had the same amount of time, and all other conditions were identical.

The result? The first group built, on average, 57% more models than the second.

This shows that visibility and meaning underpin performance and can unlock massive results. Because even a simple task like building Bionicles means something to people if there’s something visible at the end of it. On the flipside, removing meaning stops motivation dead in its tracks, and people tune out.

But how do you apply this to your own motivation strategies?

Leadership Motivation Strategies That Work

Instead of thinking in terms of tasks and deadlines, consider how your people feel about their work. Does it have a sense of value and connect with them, and does it feel permanent?

If not, you may find they might be dealing with the Sisyphus condition of meaningless work, which is when work feels pointless, like rolling a boulder uphill to watch it tumble down immediately. This effort without progress is key to accepting your life in an absurd reality, according to Albert Camus, but it isn’t really what you want from your team at work.

Here are three employee motivation techniques to avoid it:

1. Make Work Visible

Share project progress however you can, so they don’t vanish into the void. Shout about it, talk about it, and do everything to show your people that their effort builds something real.

2. Give Recognition in Real Time

Recognition is a key motivator, so don’t save praise for annual reviews. Instead, make acknowledgement a part of the everyday process, and celebrate it instead of waiting for positive outcomes at the end of the quarter.

3. Connect Everything to the Big Picture

Your people are the backbone of your organization, not just figures in a report or campaign. Remind them of this at every opportunity so they understand what they’re doing is part of something bigger, rather than pointless.

These are core aspects of the psychology of motivation because humans are wired to seek meaning and recognition from their work. Failure to meet these needs is a recipe for poor performance and a serious lack of motivation.

Why Employee Motivation Isn’t About Posters or Perks

Firstly, if you’re the kind of leader with glossy motivational posters featuring mountain peaks and bold font slogans, it might be time for a rethink. Don’t get us wrong, some employee motivation quotes are great, but many are simply LinkedIn fodder that don’t really serve a purpose.

Instead, you should stop relying on tired cliches and motivate your team through action. This means removing pointless work from people’s to-do lists and tying individual tasks into a collective meaning. It also means recognizing progress and making it as visible as possible.

This is what real leadership is all about, but how do you make the changes within yourself to unlock change in your team?

Why Leadership Journaling is Key to Employee Motivation Techniques

You can’t motivate others unless you're motivated, and you can’t get motivated if you don’t understand your weaknesses. So, sit down with your leadership journal and dig into invisible patterns that could be holding you back.

Prompts for this kind of soul-searching exercise can include:

• Which individual tasks are cut off from the collective organization, and how could they be linked to the bigger picture?
• How can I identify progress as it’s happening, instead of waiting for a big payoff?
• Which results vanish into the machine of the organization, and could they be made visible to those carrying them out?

It only takes ten minutes a day to get the gears moving, so get started as soon as you can. You can also check out our complimentary journaling prompts for further inspiration.

Final Thoughts

People don’t want to work and go home unfulfilled. They want to be part of something meaningful and contribute to something bigger than themselves. So, if you want to know how to motivate your team, focus on creating visibility, recognition, and meaning, and ditch the corny pep talks and eye-rolling employee motivation quotes.

Doing so helps your team understand that their work matters, which doesn’t just keep them motivated. It makes them unstoppable.

Find Out More

Take our Leadership Assessments to dig deeper and understand your leadership style and how you can improve. You should also check out episode 31 of the Stop Managing, Start Leading podcast, where we discuss the psychology of motivation in detail and the pointlessness that could be holding your team back.