The Greatest Management Secret of the 21st Century

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greatest management secret
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Are you ready for it? Today, I want to share with business leaders the greatest management secret of the 21st century!

I’ll never forget when I was promoted to Vice President of Sales at the wholesale distribution business where I worked. I was given a short course on managing people by my boss. The essence of that very short course was to make sure employees leave personal problems at home, so when they come to work, they can focus on sales — and only sales. I was young and clueless about understanding motivation, so I tried this advice.

Needless to say, it did not work out very well.

Nobody leaves their personal lives at home, and nobody leaves their business lives at work, even if they want to. If you want to build a culture of highly engaged people, you must get personal.

You need to find out what motivates your employees. What gets them out of bed in the morning? What contributions do they want to make to work, community, and the world?

Management is not one size fits all. Each person is valuable in their own unique and wonderful way, and they need to be managed in a way to bring out their best. Winners in life and in business come from different backgrounds, conditioning, and with different personality types and, therefore, must be treated as individuals.

The hardest lesson I learned in those early days about motivating employees (especially the salespeople) was the importance of understanding how individuals are motivated. I continued to throw more money and incentives at people, wondering why it wasn’t working. Then I learned from Paul J. Meyer, founder of Success Motivation Institute, that long-term management success comes from caring for the total person.

This was a game-changer for me.

Paul taught me that the foundation of our lives is these six areas of the Wheel of Life:

  1. Family and home
  2. Financial and career
  3. Mental and educational
  4. Physical and health
  5. Social and cultural
  6. Spiritual and ethical

You will only unlock the total leadership potential, engage your employees, and achieve maximum business success if you acknowledge their life as a total person.

Everyone has uniquely different wants and needs. When we help them to achieve their goals, we achieve greater alignment and engagement. Ultimately, we all want to be part of something that matters. Successful cultures embrace the total person and help them become the best version of themselves for their family, work, community, and, ultimately, the world.

I challenge you to get to know your people, their wants, and needs and to help them achieve their most important life goals. Only when we relate to the total person can the employee’s full potential and engagement can be unlocked, creating a win-win for everyone involved.

Learn more at Achievable.com.

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