Heidi Saucier

What’s your mantra?

From Merriam Webster:

Mantra (noun). A word or phrase that is repeated often or expresses the beliefs of a person or group.

I recently finished the book Fear Is My Homeboy by Judi Holler. I enjoyed her perspective of taking on fear and learning about her experiences. Throughout the book, she challenges the reader to take several actions that help with this. One of these is to create life and business mantras as an act of self-love. These sayings can be used to counter fear and doubt when they attempt to be the louder voices.

Mantras can apply to many situations. They can be simple sayings or favorite quotes to motivate you and move you forward to success.  Some people have phrases directed at themselves such as “you are capable and worthy of change.” Others may consider ones to help them through a tough situation. A friend recently posted on social media about a bad experience her family is facing. She specifically shared mantras that they are focusing on to help them get through what’s happening. All of them are positive perspectives despite the challenges they are currently facing. No matter what you choose, mantras should be positioned to encourage and bring positivity to help center you. For leaders, you can also choose mantras with your team to motivate and guide them as they work on projects and key goals.

When I read this section of the book and started considering mantras to use, I immediately thought about one of my favorite quotes. In my early days as a trainer, I discovered one by Wayne Gretzky that is often used when talking about sales. “You miss 100% of the shots you don’t take.” While typically shared with salespeople, emphasizing the importance of taking every opportunity to get a deal closed, it also can be used for personal and professional goals. As I’ve shared in other posts, I am continuing to move forward with decisions for better health. If I don’t make the effort, I’m going to miss the benefits. Professionally, I use this quote when thinking about networking and trying new approaches for my team to support our unique audience of learners.

As previously mentioned, you can also make a list of simple statements that you can declare when you’re in a tough situation and need motivation or encouragement. These can be things like “I am a leader,” “I am capable of success,” or “I’ve got this.” Even if you don’t believe the statement in the moment, I’ve found that still declaring your mantras helps you push through the struggle and continue to move forward with the goal or task.

For me, I’m going to continue to take those shots. Because if I don’t, I’ve already missed the opportunity.

What mantras or sayings help you as a leader? Are there quotes that keep you going? Share in the comments!

Heidi Saucier

Motivation makes a difference in online learning

Understanding motivation is one of the most important things we can do in our lives, because it has such a bearing on why we do the things we do and whether we enjoy them or not. ~Clayton M. Christensen

One of the topics I studied in grad school is motivation, particularly in online learning. I thought I’d share with you some of the thoughts I included in a past assignment, revised to reflect current time, to give you some points to consider.

As human beings, we have all been motivated to act in different areas. It may be to start a new hobby or pick one back up again that we paused doing for a time. Perhaps it’s finally taking the initiative to reorganize the basement. Or maybe it’s looking at the health benefits that can motivate us to activate a gym membership. When it comes to learning, motivation is an important element that continues to be studied. Educators and researchers have looked at how learning can be further developed to motivate individuals to participate in key courses and maintain engagement throughout the learning experience.

Motivation is a key element of learning that includes online and blended learning environments. With technology advancements in the workplace and an increase in companies moving to global teams and flexible working arrangements, more employees have the need to complete required and optional training outside of the traditional classroom setting. When considering design of remote and on-demand computer courses for employees, motivation factors should be considered. Established theories can be reviewed to identify those factors and increase learner motivation for both required and self-directed learning opportunities for workers.

For teaching and learning, motivation is an important component. Learners, whether in school or the workplace will respond to concepts and activities that they are interested in learning more about or that are connected to their personal goals, aspirations, and experiences. Teachers and trainers are therefore challenged with delivering relevant and engaging content that keeps learners involved and excited about what is being taught.  

From the courses and research I completed in my doctoral program, I learned the importance of  considering the types of motivation that should be addressed when researching retention outcomes and team development in remote settings. For companies offering hybrid or full remote working arrangements to attract and retain talent, training teams will need to focus on curriculum that not only can be delivered remotely but will keep learners engaged throughout the entire course. This will require identifying the interests of learners and the appropriate type of motivation to address for each course, building relevant scenarios into courses that can be applied back on the job, and considering activities that provide opportunities for intrinsic and extrinsic incentive to further motivation learners to take an active part in learning.

In my current role, our team develops training for an external audience that is not required to complete any of our courses or attend the webinars we offer. For us, our goal is to address their learning needs from the perspective of making it easier to do business with us. We take feedback we receive from learner surveys and discuss with SMEs to consider their work setting and what they need to be able to do to submit the requests and information to us that tie to those roles. One thing we’ve discovered is that their roles have become increasingly demanding and many are being cross trained to perform additional tasks outside of what they were hired to do. Their time is limited and they do not want to spend extra time reviewing a training course to find that one thing to help them work with us. To address this, we have continued to move towards micro-learning modules that offer just-in-time training that doesn’t get in the way of the entire work day.

Understanding the types of motivation that can be connected to workplace learning will provide insight and potential connections to how a learner’s motivation may be related to course retention rates and transfer of learning on the job. Are courses that are relevant to an employee’s career development found to be more engaging? How does the level of learner engagement in the overall course design affect employee motivation? Are employees that are more motivated by career development scoring higher on specific courses? Is learning transfer happening despite the motivation levels of an employee to use the knowledge and skills gained from a particular course? Does leadership support during learning transfer affect motivation? These are key questions that are not new, but ones we continue to ask as we look at the future of learning in a hybrid work world.

For those in learning and development, how have you been able to motivate learners to participate in your training courses? What opportunities have been presented to you to increase motivation? Share your experiences in the comments!