Motivating other people is a huge part of leadership. It’s no different for baby room leaders. To support you to motivate others, it can helpful to understand basic types of motivation that might exist among your team and how you can respond to these in practical ways. In this blogpost, we’ll focus on types of motivation and how they might manifest in the baby room. In a follow-up post, we’ll look at practical ways to respond to these motivation types.
People often talk about the difference between intrinsic motivation and extrinsic motivation. Intrinsic motivation is the internal feeling of reward that drives us to do something, while extrinsic motivation is the promise of a reward or sanction that is connected to the outside world rather than coming from within. But did you know that there are different types of intrinsic and extrinsic motivation?
We can break down intrinsic motivation into three different types of motivation (competence, attitude and creativity) and we can do the same for extrinsic motivation (achievement, affiliation and incentive). Let’s take a closer look at how these can manifest in the baby room.
3 types of intrinsic motivation
- Competence motivation – this is about feeling good at what you do and enjoying the process of getting better at something. A baby room professional experiencing competence motivation will want to feel that they’re doing their best. They will be looking for feedback from babies, parents and colleagues to confirm that they are good at what they do and that they are striving to be better. They will feel particularly de-motivated when they feel that they haven’t been as good at the job as they would have liked. A bad day might look like looking after a baby that was struggling to settle and feeling that they were failing at the job.
- Attitude motivation – this is about having a positive impact on the world by changing the way that others think and act. A baby room professional experiencing attitude motivation will be excited by the importance of the work that they do. They will focus on the way that their everyday work impacts on the lives of babies and families. They may seek ways to extend the impact that they have, for example, by helping parents to understand the importance of the earliest experiences in a baby’s life and what they can do to stimulate learning and development. Such a professional will be demotivated if they feel that what they’re doing is not seen as serious and important and they feel dismissed as ‘just’ a caregiver.
- Creative motivation – this kind of motivation relates to opportunities to express yourself creatively. A baby room professional experiencing creative motivation will be drawn to tasks that have a creative element, such as coming up with messy and sensory play activities. They will volunteer to make the play-dough, set up the garden or take photographs and videos for the nursery website. They are looking for a creative outlet. A bad day for them will be one which doesn’t involve finding a creative outlet and instead having to complete lots of routine tasks.
3 types of extrinsic motivation
- Achievement motivation – this is the desire to complete tasks that we have set for ourselves and the joy of ticking off items on our to do list. A baby room professional experiencing achievement motivation will be looking for the opportunity to set clear and concrete goals around their professional development. They will actively seek appraisal because they want others to recognise the har work that they are putting in and the achievement of objectives that they had set themselves. Professionals with high achievement motivation will feel demotivated at work if there is not enough of a focus on goal-setting and they feel that no one is carefully appraising the work that they do.
- Affiliation motivation – this is the motivation to belong to a community and experience friendship with others. A baby room professional experiencing affiliation motivation will be looking to feel that they are part of a positive team culture. They will want to form friendships with colleagues around them in the baby room and to feel that the majority of interactions that happen in the baby room are warm and fun. They will be demotivated if a positive team culture is lacking – if others are cold towards them or others prioritise just ‘doing the job’ rather than connecting with colleagues.
- Incentive motivation – this is about being recognised for your work whether that’s through a payrise or a promotion, or just being publicly acknowledged. A baby room professional experiencing incentive motivation will be interested in the tangible progress they can make in their career. They will want to work for an organisation with a clear progression structure, so that they understand the next step that they are working towards – whether this is a new qualification, a promotion or a payrise to recognise experience. They will feel demotivated if it is not clear to them how to make this kind of concrete progress within the organisation, and if they are worried about getting ‘stuck’ in the role they have and at the same level of pay and recognition.
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