News Release

You Don't Have To Be a Tough Guy to Motivate Your 'Apprentice'

"You're Fired!" Sir Alan Sugar's immortal catchphrase was once again directed at unsuccessful candidates in the fourth series of The Apprentice, recently concluded on BBC Two.

This high flying self-made billionaire is portrayed as a tough no nonsense individual who fires people who don't come up to the mark.

Other 'tough guys' were recently referred to by Ruairi O'Kane in an article in the Sunday Times. He reports that bullying bosses who copy the behaviour of the celebrity chef Gordon Ramsay and Simon Cowell, the X Factor judge, have been blamed for a doubling in the number of employment tribunal cases over the past year.

We've all heard the old cliché, 'nice guys don't finish first' and, Edinburgh based Alan Fairweather, 'The Motivation Doctor' believes that the media and our culture send the wrong messages about how to manage people. This makes it difficult for Business Owners, Managers and Team Leaders to motivate their staff and run their business.

Fairweather goes on to explain, "I believe there are four reasons why there are many poor and mediocre managers; one, because it's such a difficult job; two, nobody shows you what to do or gives you the right training; three, the media and our culture send the wrong message and four; some people are just not cut out to be managers."

Alan Fairweather's new book, How to be a Motivational Manager, is a down-to-earth guide for Managers and Team Leaders. It reveals how to motivate your team, get results and do it in the easiest, least stressful way possible

It introduces three vital factors in team motivation that don't include the 'tough
guy' approach.

The book was written by Fairweather to develop the skills of anyone whose job involves supervising others.

He understands the challenges faced by business people and knows how hard it is to motivate a team. He's used the skills described in this book with great success; and as he points out – "you don't, in fact, motivate other people; you create the environment where they motivate themselves," this book will show you how to do that.

Readers will learn how to spend quality time with their team members, build relationships and gain a better understanding of each individual.

They will also learn how to give feedback and coach employees, particularly when facing poor performance. And finally, they discover how, by believing in their people, they can utilise the skill, knowledge and experience that's already within their team.

Fairweather points out that a team's performance is determined by the relationship they have with their manager. Don't be misled, this isn't some kind of 'touchy-feely' approach; it shows managers how to deal with 'difficult' employees and any other kind of unproductive behaviour and still keep the team motivated.

The overall aim of the book is to support the Customer Service activities of the readers business, generate more sales and make life easier.

You don't have to be a tough guy to motivate your 'Apprentice' you just have to be 'tough enough to care.'

About the author: Alan Fairweather, The Motivation Doctor, has for the past fifteen years been turning 'adequate' managers and team leaders into consistent top performers. After a successful career as a manager he founded his business in 1993 and works with people and organisations consulting, speaking and running training programmes in the UK and Asia. He specialises in how to motivate people at work so that they deliver business results.

How to be a Motivational Manager is published by How To Books Ltd
http://www.howtobooks.co.uk/ and is available at £12.99 in major bookshops and online retailers across the country. ISBN 978-1-84528-225-7

If you would like to arrange an interview
or receive a review copy please contact Alan 07767 050462 alan@themotivationdoctor.com

www.themotivationdoctor.com

Alan has written a number of articles and is happy to contribute to your publication. Please see the list below for titles and word count.

• The 3 Secrets of Team Motivation: 527 words
  
• Discover How To Motivate Your Manager: 1219 words
  
• Why aren't you using feedback to motivate your team?: 419 words
  
• One Way to Deal with a Difficult Employee: 385 words
  
• 5 Action Ideas to Deal with Difficult People: 613 words
  
• Three Steps to Stop Absence and Make People Happy at Work: 937 words
  
• A Must Do Tactic That Will Improve your Team Motivation Skills: 474 words
  
• Team Motivation – are you tough enough to care?: 439 words
  
• Feedback – how to make it effective: 1116 words
  
• Poor Performance – fix it by coaching: 661 words
  
• Managing People – no more Mr Tough Guy: 914 words
  
• Pick People Who Think: 495 words
  

Power to Your People

I don’t know a thing about you, but I’ll bet if you’re a manager, then you probably think you’re pretty good at your job. Some managers seem to think that they should know everything about the job that their team members do, and be better than them at doing it.

I can remember, in the past, working for managers like that; they gave the impression that they knew everything and were far better than I would ever be at doing the job. This, of course, didn’t motivate me at all.

The Motivational Manager accepts that members of their staff may be better at doing the job than they are. Their staff may be better salespeople, better at customer service, better administrators or better engineers.

I’ve had salespeople working for me who were better at selling than I was, however, that made me no less a good manager.

Sir Alex Ferguson, the manager of probably the world’s most successful football club, Manchester United, had a pretty undistinguished career as a footballer. He did at one time play for Glasgow Rangers but could hardly be described as a star footballer; he is now, of course, a star manager.

If you manage or supervise other people, have confidence in yourself. Accept your limitations and don’t feel bad if you don’t initially know the answer to every question.
Ironically, it isn’t motivational for your staff, if you come up with the answers to all of their problems or queries.

Encourage your staff to come to you with solutions, not problems.

If you spend your time solving problems; you’ll spend your time solving problems!

When someone in your team asks you what they should do, even if you know the answer, reflect back the question. Ask them what they would do; ask for opinions. What do they think is the best course of action; why do they think it’s the best? What are the consequences of this action, for the customer, the business and the team member?

Empower, support and congratulate them on their decision. If they feel that they’ve made the decision, they will have more confidence in themselves and be more motivated to do the job even better.

What you’re essentially doing here is utilising the knowledge, skill, experience and motivational power that is already with in your team.
Believe me, once you apply this, you will have a highly motivated team who respect and trust you as a manager.