It’s been said that people like change they just don’t like to be changed. In our fast-paced world, change is inevitable. If you want to do something better, you have to do something different, and that requires change.

In order to change your behavior, you need to change your attitudes. For the sake of this discussion, let’s define an attitude as a habit of thought. Since habits can be good or bad, let’s define a good habit as one that helps us reach a goal and a bad habit as one that gets in the way of us reaching a goal. By that definition, most habits are good because they are automatic and reflexive, which saves us time. We don’t have to stop and think about each move when we have committed something to habit. 

It’s obvious that we can’t demand that people change their attitudes. Any change in attitude must come from the internal understanding and acceptance called insight. Insight precedes change and change precedes improvement. As people gain insight and understanding, points of view and perceptions of situations become their own. When people’s attitudes are based on depth of insight, they have a quality of permanence. Your effectiveness in helping people make attitude changes depend primarily on the extent to which you help them gain insight into the reasons such changes are desirable. 

The best place to start is to look at your own attitude toward change. People who accept change find excitement and new experiences, challenges and dimensions. When you exhibit your belief in and commitment to continuous growth, your associates will also want to grow. 

As you attempt to change attitudes, you encounter at least three basic reasons for people resisting change: 

1. Fear  : People are afraid of change because it represents the unknown. Not having had a particular experience before, they’re afraid they might be incapable of performing effectively under new rules of behavior. They need the encouragement and reassurance your attitude and your support can give. 

2. Indecision  : People who have held certain attitudes for years can’t suddenly change their attitudes without, by implication, admitting they have been wrong. People have a need to be right. It’s part of their self-esteem and self-confidence. Therefore, they need to be shown that any new attitudes they adopt are right and shown in such a way that the old attitudes don’t necessarily seem to have been wrong. To really profit from this process, people must develop a philosophy and learn to verbalize the virtue of the planned changes typically termed growth or personal development. 

3. Lack of information  : The reason most people don’t change is simply because they don’t know what direction to take. They have no idea what changes to make, or what to change. They need help in defining their goals, and in this regard, you can be a tremendous help to them. The more you’re willing to help them discover what their goals can be, the more rapidly you will see the desired changes in their attitudes. 

Remember that motivation is not manipulation, and the principle underlying your attempt to change attitudes must be the desire to help people grow in the areas of their best interests. It’s far easier to develop people in the way they’re inclined to go than it is to attempt to lead them in a direction for which they’re poorly suited in terms of their aptitude or temperament. It may surprise you how much cooperation you will get when you show an interest in people and their future. That, in itself, is a most important step in changing attitudes. 

Motivating Employees To Change Behavior 

As a leader and manager, one of your primary responsibilities is to get your employees to produce desirable results through specific behaviors. To do this, many times you have to get them to actually change their behavior patterns. The key principle to understand in changing employees' behavior is that you can't change it for them; they must change it themselves.

With that principle in mind, the following is how to motivate employees to change their behavior: 

To help you identify the desired behavior, apply these principles:

A.  Behavior is something the employee does. Attitudes and feelings aren't behavior.

B.  The outcome or result of the behavior must be positive and help you and the employee reach your goals. The behavior must also be meaningful to the employee.

C.  The behavior must be specific and easy to understand. For example, scheduling interviews, closing sales, calculating cash receipts, etc.

D.  The behavior must be easy to measure accurately.

A.      The specific behavior you want.

B.       The benefits of mastering the behavior.

C.       The consequences of not executing the behavior.

A.      Score keeping must be seen as helpful and positive.

B.       Accurate score keeping motivates people to do better. Personal biases of management are removed. Results are rewarded.

C.       Score keeping can make work fun.

A.      How did the employee do in mastering the behavior?

B.       What went well?

C.       What went wrong? How can it be corrected?

A.      Reinforce the desired behavior. With reinforcement, the employee will adopt the new behavior. Without it, the past behavior will return.

B.       In the absence of a positive and/or negative reinforcement, you will get behavior at a level just above the point of punishment or the minimum acceptable.

C.       When negative behavior is exhibited by an employee: 1. Give a warning and explain in depth the new behavior you expect; 2. Give frequent feedback on the spot. Don't wait! Don't store up criticisms; 3. Be sure the feedback you give is appropriate.

Form the habit of complimenting your employees for their accomplishments to reinforce the desirable behavior. Even though an inept employee behaves as you want about 80 percent of the time, most managers tend to reinforce behavior in the opposite ratio. They typically give four reprimands or criticisms for each compliment. 

A.      Use intrinsic (internal) rewards as opposed to extrinsic (external) rewards.

B.       Give positive "strokes" for positive behavior quickly and often. Give strokes honestly and unconditionally. Don't give them and take them away by adding comments such as "that was great, but I know you can do better."

C.       Don't penalize the employee you're rewarding by adding work to their jobs unless you're certain they want added responsibilities and duties.

Evaluate the results of the behavior. Did you and the employee succeed in reaching goals? Where do you go from here? In motivating you employees to change their behavior, one of the key criterions is that you and the employee both agree that the behavior needs to be changed and that both know exactly what the desirable behavior is. By having this clear understanding, you're both able to continuously monitor and observe the actual behavior. This allows you to deal with it immediately and make the proper adjustments. What most employees tend to do is "keep the water muddy" by not having this clear understanding with their managers. To effectively help employees change their behavior, clear understanding and accountability is an absolute must.

Use these principles to get the most out of yourself and your people.

Relating Personal Goals to Organizational Goals

Members of your organization spend more of their waking hours on the job than any other place and it's only natural that they can expect to satisfy most of their basic needs in that environment. Because they do, their personal goals and your organizational goals become inseparably meshed together.

In addition to the needs for the things money can buy, your team members also have social needs (for acceptance and appreciation) that depend to some extent on the people they work with for fulfillment. Their ego, security and self-fulfillment needs are also tied to the work environment.