Motivation and the Blame Game

Awhile back in the Peanuts cartoons, Snoopy had broken his right leg. And with his white cast, while he was hanging out on top of his dog house, Snoopy began to think about his situation and said; “My body blames my foot for not being able to go places. My foot says it was my head’s fault, and my head blames my eyes. My eyes say my feet are clumsy, and my right foot says not to blame him for what my left foot did . . .” Snoopy looks towards the audience and confesses, “I don’t say anything because I don’t want to get involved.”

Today while speaking on motivation and habits of thought to a group of professionals we had a dialogue about motivation. Motivation has 3 arenas it can really be generated from:

1. Fear/Force: This type of motivation is external and it is temporary. When a manager forces their people to work late hours or do something unexpected, or else! This type of motivation will only work while the manager is standing over their people. And since it is external, it becomes temporary, and as they say; "When the cat is away the mice will play."

2. Incentive: This type of motivation is the most common motivation source I find in business. Often companies use incentive bonuses, trips, rewards, or recognition to provide motivation for reaching a particular level of production or sales. This is also external and temporary. Which means when that incentive is gone the motivation to keep up the same level of work is also gone.

3. Attitude: Or habits of thought, is a type of motivation that is both internal and permanent. Which means, when it comes to performance or excellence your attitude (which is controlled by you) is your source for motivation.

When either Fear/Force or Incentive are removed, people will begin to blame and point fingers at the lack of force or incentive as the reason for a lack of motivation. Things begin to slow down, and eventually people and managers get tired and just like Snoopy want to avoid the whole thing and stay out of it.

But the managers, companies, employees, or individuals who can successfully develop the attitudes of themselves, and those around them, will find the secret to permanent motivation and a true and pure way to avoid the blame game.

When we are motivated by our own internal attitudes there is nobody left to blame, no more excuses to make, and no more responsibility to dodge. We are forced to take ownership of our thinking, our attitudes, and our motivation.

Behavior is always shaped by attitude, change the attitude and begin the process of improving results.

-Jon Bohm