How can Managers Inspire Engagement?

Nitish Mathew
Jul 6, 2021
2 min read

Updated: Sep 13

Why Engagement?

A good manager can remarkably improve the quality of life, productivity and career growth for their team members. A prerequisite is their engagement. Engaged teams work well as a unit, with other teams, and add value to the company. Most teams are together for only a short time- so make the most of it!

How do you bring Engagement?

1. Provide Context And Inspire Purpose

Solidify the team Mission and Vision. The Mission is"Why Do We Exist?" and the Vision is "Where Are We Going?". This should be clear to everyone. Embed it. Repeat it every occasion you get to reinforce. For every new major project, communicate the business value. It is respectful to take time to justify to people why their work matters.

2. Provide Freedom, Consistency and Support With Coaching

Provide People Freedom. Coach them to make decisions and stay out of the way. Do not try to do their job. Do not attend any meeting they are in with their stakeholders. If you are in the same meetings all the time, you may not have coached them to be confident, trust their skills enough and really empowered them. This duplication of effort is a colossal productivity loss. So, delegate, exit the scene and empower. Make clear to all that "This person is empowered to make decisions" and decline meetings. Also, do not override decisions.
Publish Expectations Openly and Stick To Them. Think through and write down your expectations in a public medium like an internal Wiki (e.g. Confluence) for transparency. This forces you to be consistent. People need consistency to operate peacefully. You cannot keep changing the goal post. Email is not useful as it is like writing on sand at a beach - people who happened to be there may see it, nobody in future will.
Ask Questions And Do Not Give Answers. Learn to ask good questions and enable people to find answers. People need to learn. Forcing people to research, think and learn is the manager's job. When people find answers themselves, they will own execution. They now have skin in the game and are motivated to deliver outcomes. Sometimes when you know their answer may be wrong let the person try it out and learn (in a quick and responsible way by the company). Provide feedback with candor and kindness. The company and they will be better for it long term. Develop good judgement on when to do that.

3. Provide Credit And Celebrate Success

Projects are done not when business outcomes are delivered: Projects are done only when you celebrate and reward the people who worked on them. Public recognition is an important aspect of the reward. It helps people build confidence and feel purposeful. It also increases their future prospects within the company and career. For long running projects, it is your job as the manager to create intermediate, even small, tangible deliverables and celebrate!