The Coach's Mind Manual: Enhancing coaching practice with neuroscience, psychology and mindfulness by Syed Azmatullah

Author:Syed Azmatullah [Azmatullah, Syed]
Language: eng
Format: mobi
ISBN: 9781135051488
Publisher: Taylor and Francis
Published: 2013-09-30T14:00:00+00:00

Motivation without FEAR

As activating the FEAR/Anxiety motivational system is inappropriate as a motivational strategy in the workplace, which of the other basic motivational systems provide the best platform upon which to build motivational strategies? Clearly the GRIEF/DISTRESS systems are not suitable options. Many marketing experts turn to the LUST/Sexual motivation system to promote their products. Historically, testosterone-fuelled aggression has been widely used to motivate highly competitive behaviour reminiscent of sibling rivalry during childhood for gaining adult attention in order to get needs met. This may be useful in military campaigns where individual autonomy is subverted under a hierarchy, and for some critical turnaround/business rescue situations, but this often coercive and competitive approach needs to be tempered at work in situations where collaboration, cooperation and creative problem-solving skills are called for. This leaves us to consider the CARE/Nurturing system, the PLAY system and the SEEKING/Desire system.

Regarding the CARE/Nurturing system, the take-home message from knowledge about this system is that in order to optimise exploratory behaviour a dependable safe haven needs to be created. This requires a high degree of trust to be built over time. Given what we know about the amount of information conveyed through facial expressions and body language, genuine trust depends on authentic face-to-face interactive communication. Unless managers are open to the emotional milieu in which they operate (by developing their emotional intelligence) it is unlikely that sufficient attunement of emotional mindsets will be achieved. Empathetic understanding may not be enough. A state of sympathetic shared feeling about a situation facilitated by the mirror neuron system, achieves a deeper level of connection for problem solving. In order not to remain in this state of ‘confluence’ with another person, risking collusion with their agenda, coaches and managers need to step back from the emotional connection in which sympathy was achieved and engage in ‘cognitive perspective taking’ (Pillay 2011: 223). This involves engaging in counter-mirroring so that you are no longer picking up signals and emulating the emotional state of another person as a subject, but moving into your abstracting PFC and evaluating the situation objectively. Such an oscillating/shuttling technique of moving between subjective contact with another and objective evaluation of the overall context is an essential skill for coaches and an increasingly important skill for senior managers.

On the basis of a well-established CARE system in an organisation, the SEEKING/Desire system may provide the best model upon which to base motivation strategies. Business-game simulation workshops for a variety of scenarios likely to be encountered in the workplace provide an analogous learning space to the PLAY system vitally important for the integration of a newcomer. Optimal motivation to achieve the goals of the organisation depends to a large degree on how the goals of the individual, operating accord ing to their core value system, accord with the goals of the organisation, operating according to its implicit value system. Despite it being known for years that financial remuneration is only a motivator to a limited degree, many companies focus goal-setting and motivation strategies around financial outcomes.

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