Sometimes we think our job is about just doing our job.

But if that’s the case, I’m going to quickly become bored and uninspired. Even with the prospect of pulling in a paycheck, I’m going to lose interest. Sure, I’ll do the job – I have integrity – but I’m not going to be inspired by it.

As a leader, your job is to help people become inspired.

I find this usually comes from the larger purpose behind the work. Are you making customers’ lives better, really? Are you solving a problem which currently has no good solution? Will society be better because of what you do?

The hardest part of this is figuring out not what inspires YOU, but inspires each person on your team. Often they’re not the same. The best example is that YOUR lifestyle might improve as a result of business success, but your PEOPLE might not see that much improvement at all.

And, to be honest, many folks aren’t all that motivated by “business success” the way you define it. They might be quite fuzzy about profitability and why it’s important.

So work on what excites THEM. Each person.