Okay, so… You’ve got the culture; you’ve got the great people, the ideas and the motivation – but wait!

NO time!

The company I work for is a smart, creative and progressive company that copes with the ebbs and flows of creative industries. We have product development meetings and regularly get together to solve problems – or to generally figure out how to do things just that little bit better.

Each of us is an expert of some sort or another; some more-so than others, of course. We’re each open minded, happy with our jobs and get a thrill out of overcoming the challenges we face every other day.

Skills are distributed, the team works together and we get on with our boss’, and their ideas. We’re not restricted in our work – well, other than the client’s brief that is.

So what’s the problem?

What about time, money, workload even?

Sometimes a team can have all the right ingredients, but lack the available resources to move forward. Or, at least at a pace it’s capable of.

We’ve been a little slow recently as far as PD is concerned; luckily we’ve got loads of work coming in.

What’s even better than that is that even though we don’t have the time just now, we’ve not lost sight of our goal – to change for the better.

Sometimes you’ll hear from business leaders – we just don’t have the time or the people to do things differently. Just make sure that’s true, and it’s not an idle excuse.

Not having the time is no excuse to give up, to ignore it or procrastinate; for the truly innovative work to the bone and at least keep ahead of the pack.

Inside Out - Motivation the right way round

People are motivated from the inside out; providing external gratification like giving them DVD players etc will help someone that is currently motivated stay that way. But if someone feels undervalued at their core, then no amount of trinkets and prizes will do. Only by helping that person overcome their state can we move on to making them happy. Allowing them the rush of recieving material goods will do now good for them, or your team in the long run.

People are people; they are always people. This is not to say that they are all the same. Just that it doesn’t matter where they are, what they are doing, or how much they are being paid. They are still people, and should be treated that way.

You can have different opinions, you can have different methods, and you can have different priorities. But as long as you all genuinely share the same common and specific goals, you are a team.

People are not mushrooms. Mushrooms grow well if you keep them in the dark and feed them hourse manure, people on the other hand do not.