Episode 36
Creating an environment that inspires greatness with Trish Holliday
April 30, 2020
We all know how important it is to engage and motivate employees, and yet many of the efforts in this area have results that are short-lived. Dr. Trish Holliday talks with Diana about how to create an environment that’s inspiring, and she also shares lessons learned from her tenure as Chief Learning Officer for the State of Tennessee.
You can connect with Trish on LinkedIn or through her company, Holliday | Kenning.
Inspiring Greatness: Key takeaways from Episode 36
When it comes to engaging employees, the big question everyone’s asking is: How do I motivate my people? While motivation is important, driving cultural change requires inspiration as well.
Motivation is someone’s desire or willingness to do something—I behave a certain way, and I achieve a desired result. It tends to be temporary. When we motivate people through salary, promotions, etc., they’re always chasing the next milestone.
Inspiration is being mentally stimulated to do or feel something. Inspired employees take on the persona of the organization, and that transfers through to the customer experience. Motivation and inspiration work together.
Here are some questions for assessing whether your workforce is motivated:
Is the organization’s mission aligned with people’s roles within the organization?
Do people feel connected to the mission in their day-to-day activities?
Is the organization investing in people’s professional development?
Do people sense that their careers matter to their leaders?
Is there real-time feedback between employees and leadership to assess what’s working?
Have you made investments to appreciate your people?
Inspiration comes from within, and it’s dependent upon the environment and culture of the workplace. It requires an environment where people can be the best versions of themselves. You create that environment by investing in great managers who have strong relationships with their direct reports.
The biggest trap organizations fall into that hampers their culture is doing things the way they’ve always done them. Instead, operate through a lens of continuous improvement. That being said, change has to be done right to avoid change-fatigue. People need to learn how to embrace it by seeing how it takes the organization to the next level. That requires keeping people informed.
Trish’s top three lessons for learning leaders:
Focus on quality over quantity of learning experiences, and ensure those learning events are all connected to one unifying strategy.
You have to have a strategy. A bunch of disconnected training experiences won’t transform your culture, but connected learning experiences will.
Start from the top. Find out what top executives are concerned about, and pursue those issues. If you create learning based on executive need, it becomes a value-add as opposed to a liability or expense.
When leaders do what we know is right and help people find their place where they can contribute, great things occur.
Inspiration comes from relationships. When we have strong relationships with people, we can help them to shine.
Bonus Content Download
In this episode, Dr. Trish Holliday talked about the power of instilling passion in your team. She shared six factors for an inspiring culture where people feel like they matter.
Fill out the form below to access a free printable to help you remember to apply the six factors.
