Negotiating Movement

Abstract

It is one thing for a leader to determine a direction for the organization, it is quite another to cause people to actually move in that direction. Moving people toward a goal, a traditional function of all leaders from national presidents to factory superintendants, is the aim of the fifth daily task of leadership—motivation. Motivation, derived from the Latin word “to move,” is basically a force within persons that incites them to act. Individuals are not robots. They have their own separate will to take action. The task of any leader is to find and apply the means that will trigger—that will incite—others to take the desired action for the benefit of the organization or group. Human actions may be driven by external forces such as governmental orders or by internal factors, factors within each of us that cause us to act in particular way. That internal trigger is called “motivation.” In fact, motivation is the internal driving force behind all our actions.