Customer Reviews

SuperMotivation: A Blueprint for Energizing Your Organization from Top to Bottom

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This is the best book on motivation I have ever read. The author does an outstanding job of integrating theory and practice. Particularly fascinating is the distinction between "task" and "context." If you only read one book on motivation, this should be it!

If you want to increase employee motivation in your company, don't try to fix your workers, fix your organization. Most motivation initiatives treat motivation as a problem of the individual employee and try to inspire them to work harder. The better strategy, says author Dean R. Spitzer, is to do something to change the work conditions that de-motivate employees.

The first step to increasing employee motivation is to identify and eliminate the things that de-motivate employees. Here are some common workplace de-motivators:
· Office politics. Why work hard if politics is what gets you ahead?
· Unclear expectations.
· Unnecessary rules.
· Poorly designed work processes. Employees who have nothing but boring, repetitious tasks will be very de-motivated.
· Unproductive meetings without a clear purpose.
· Lack of follow-up.
· Constant change.
· Internal competition.
· Withholding information.
· Discouraging responses. The desire to innovate can be suppressed by managers who say no to everything.
· Criticism.
· Tolerating poor performance. Why bother to perform well if bad work is tolerated?
· Being taken for granted. Nobody likes being unappreciated.

After you have eliminated de-motivators, here are some other suggestions for building motivation into your organization.
· Involve employees in planning.
· Reengineer processes to motivate workers. Reduce repetitious, boring work. Encourage teamwork.
· Communicate openly and positively.
· Show your commitment to training.
· Evaluate work performance objectively.
· Increase non-monetary awards and recognition for work well done.

Spitzer clearly identifies one of the most fundamental problems in business today - motivation, or should I say a a lack of. Supermotivation is something that virtually any business needs, especially entrepreneurs who are in the enviable position of setting it up right from the start.

As a corporate "escapee" (paroled after serving 14 years in various companies, including several Fortune 500) I've witnessed firsthand the inept attempts of management. For example, new PC's and applications are constantly dumped on employees with little or no training. This is something that Spitzer addresses in Supermotivation.

Also, Spitzer knows that super motivation comes from within. One Regional Vice President of a Fortune 500 company where I worked once tried to motivate the company's associates by calling on us to exert discretionary effort. Unfortunately he obviously didn't read this book. To unlock maximum potential, associates need to be inspired from within.

Supermotivation is comprised of 12 easy to read chapters:

For entrepreneurs, every person needs to be at the peak of his or her game. There's not much time to get up to speed. That's why a book like Supermotivation can help get it right from the start.


Michael Davis, Byvation

---> To swing for the fence, entrepreneurs must avoid the shark-infested red water and sail into the deep blue sea.

Dean Spitzer has accomplished something remarkable in this book: He has identified fundamental problems that plague employees and organizations while providing effective and permanent solutions that cannot fail. SUPERMOTIVATION has the real potential to transform any organization.