The 4 Basic Motivations of Employees

I find that employees are often motivated by some combination of these four basic things.

Four sources of motivation

1. Money – how can I get a raise?
2. Power – how can I get more control?
3. Status – how can I look better in front of my colleagues (titles, premium office, best parking spaces, perqs, etc etc)
4. Popularity – How can I get people to like me more by being the good guy?

Some of these motivations are obviously less than great and distract our employees from becoming great leaders.  When you identify a destructive motivation in an employee, take some time to coach them to better performance.

You will find that when employees are upset, one of these four motivators is usually at the bottom of things somewhere.