Motivation Shots from The Doc

Do you have belief in your abilities as a manager?

Belief is dependent on how we control our mind and the conversations we have with ourselves. Belief in yourself is what drives your motivation and that in turn generates the energy to succeed. A manager who doesn’t have belief in themselves or in what they are doing is going to find life very difficult. Of course it can be challenging to retain a belief in yourself when you’re under pressure from your manager and your team.

Some years ago I was working for a brewery in the UK. (Yes I did get lots of samples to take home) One day my manager, the Director of Sales, handed me a new challenge. The customer service telesales team were doing a mediocre job but had the potential to do much more, as far as bringing in more sales. He told me to sort it out.

I inherited a totally de-motivated team of fourteen telesales agents and a supervisor. Their job was to phone customers in hotels, bars and restaurants and process their orders for beer, wine and other drinks.

John, the distribution manager I was taking over from, briefed me on my new team. “They’re a truculent bunch and they’re always whingeing. There are always two or three of them off sick at any one time, and you’ll never get them to sell promotions.”

As you’ll gather, it took a great deal of self-belief on my part to turn this team around. I was continually hearing from them, and sometimes my manager – “You can’t do that Alan,” or “That’ll never work,” or “We’ve never done it that way before.” I had many discussions with my manager and other senior managers regarding things I wanted to do to improve this team.

I won some battles and I lost a few. However I held onto my belief that I could make this team successful. It took me about six months to start turning things around – but I did it using the skills and techniques that you’ll find in – How to be a Motivational Manager.

It’s tough to hold onto belief in yourself when your manager and your team are telling you about all the things you can’t do but you must get that positive self-talk going and believe in yourself.

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