The old school of telling kids and people what to do or the “my way or the highway” methods, whilst proven to be a poor way of getting the best out of people, surprisingly still prevail. 

Basic psychology myths when things are not working and going wrong that all one has to do is try harder, or emotionally blackmailing and “shaming” people, amazingly are still used as tools to motivate. 

Why is this? 

There are several reasons! 

The myths that supposedly motivate!

Invalidation: Steer away from invalidating others. In short this means never attack them personally or dismiss their ideas, statements as irrelevant. Instead question their viewpoint and ask for their reasoning or evidence and then offer an alternative. If they don’t agree it is unlikely you will persuade them through battering them with more and more reasons why you make sense, so let them find out the hard way if that is the outcome.

Shaming and guilt tripping: Never shame others to manipulate them into doing what you want. Whilst it can work it leaves a bad taste or even worse affects their self-esteem. As an example - “Do you realise how stupid you look when you play like that?” “You know how much we spend on your education and all you can manage is a C?”

Emotional blackmail: Never emotionally blackmail to motivate - There are countless examples  - “If you really loved me you would…..buy me that, try harder, lose weight etc. This only makes people feel like shit and trains them to be ridiculously hard on themselves to please.

Fear 

I won’t say never use fear but be careful in using fear. 

Sometimes it has to be used as a last resort and consequence for continued poor performance.

If you go through several supportive training steps, and have the person clarify their understanding of a job and still they continue to under perform then perhaps they don't value the job or want the job or whatever, then the fear of dismissal would be a last consequence.

So, what does good teaching and motivation look like? It is founded on a curiosity to bring the best out of others by stimulating people to find answers, helping them find clarity by asking good questions or especially with children showing and demonstrating the right way and letting them learn by copying, with constant encouragement until they succeed. 

The golden rules to teaching and motivating are:

Ask good questions.

Encourage people to experiment for themselves and allow them to make mistakes and learn.

Get permission to give a strong opinion or to share your expertise with a question such as this “I have experience of this situation so would you like me to share my solution?” Or “How would you like to try something?”

Once you have built trust then occasionally you can draw on that trust for efficiency and say something like “I would love to share the ins and outs of this but right now you just have to trust me and do what I ask!” Stick around the 80/20 mark to keep the trust.

Thanks

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