5 ways to manage and motivate your team

Liz Makin Author

Jul 27, 2026 |

A look at some of the key ways to manage and motivate your team

If you have team to manage you will know how challenging this can be. For any organisation to maximise productivity and provide a high quality service it is essential that team members feel well managed, encouraged, motivated and inspired on a daily basis.

We therefore thought it would be helpful to look at some of the key ways to manage and motivate your team:

1. Make your team members feel valued. The power of praise is often overlooked by managers but recognising and celebrating achievement inspires and motivates team members. This can be achieved in many ways including expressing thanks, giving praise, recognising achievement, explaining how they make a difference and making sure their remuneration is in line with their contribution. 

2. Communicate regularly. Ensure there is a constant flow of communication between you and your team through regular team and one to one meetings and ad hoc check ins. Update your team on organisational performance and management decisions that have been made. Listen to team members and acknowledge their opinions, ideas and feedback.

3. Set clear team and individual goals and plans. Make sure your team are aware of the organisational vision, goals and plans, as well as the team and their individual goals, objectives and plans.  Review progress regularly as a team and individually towards the goals and plans.

4. Review progress and performance regularly. Performance management is often overlooked my managers but is key to overall performance. Review progress and performance on a regular basis through team meetings, team member appraisals and individual one to ones. Providing constructive feedback is key to performance management and is used as a supportive communication tool to address specific issues or concerns. State the purpose of your feedback, describe what you have observed and your reaction give the individual an opportunity to respond, ask and offer specific suggestions or solutions and summarise everything discussed to avoid any misunderstandings. Ensure your approach is consistent and fair between team members.

5. Focus on learning and development. Your team will feel more valuable when they are learning and enhancing their skills and their training and development will benefit the the organisation too. Tailor learning and development to suit individual team members, through on the job training, shadowing, delegating, coaching and mentoring or more formal training.

So, which areas do you need to work on to better manage and motivate your team?

Do you want to explore more about people management?

If you want practical tips and strategies to to develop your people management skills to be a better manager in your life and at work our people management online courses are for you.

Take a look at our people management online courses by clicking on the links below:

People management skills for life & work

Conflict management for life & work

How to deal with difficult people in life & work

You can take a look at our range of online personal development courses and bundles, including current special offers, at https://onlinecourses.makinithappen.co.uk

Categories: : Communication, Online courses, People management, Personal development, Soft skills