Five secrets to apartment staff: motivation: motivated staff will do the daily work and solve problems in a positive and resident-focused manner. Mensah offers five tips on how to motivate staff.

As with almost every other business sector, the apartment industry has suffered negative effects in recent years. What happens when revenues decrease? Costs must be cut, which usually means letting staff go. This puts a greater burden on remaining management staff, who often must do more with fewer resources. This causes stresses and strains. Tempers flare. People are more likely to call in sick. And worst of all, customer service for residents suffers.

How can this be combated? Simple. Realize the critical role motivation plays within a successful apartment management team. Motivated staff will do the daily work and solve problems in a positive, resident-focused manner.

Following are five secrets to put in place that will motivate staff.

Secret No. 1: Start with Yourself

The leaders in any organization must serve as role models for others. If you act, speak and think in a positive, upbeat, professional manner, this sends a clear message to your management staff that becoming and staying motivated is important.

Show your motivation by returning all phone calls promptly, particularly calls from residents. Keep your word no matter what. Avoid excuses. If you made a mistake, own up to it. Meet deadlines. Anticipate problems before they occur.

This last point is critical. Too often, people see a problem coming, but they don't want to take the time or the energy to fix it then. Instead, they wait until the problem erupts. But by then, it's often too late! How many times have you seen a minor problem escalate into something much bigger and much more difficult to solve?

Secret No. 2: Acknowledge Stress

Stress results from any action or situation that occurs when special physical or psychological demands are placed on a person. In other words, stress is anything that upsets an individual's equilibrium.

Most people suffer the greatest stresses when they feel they're not in control of their life or an aspect of their life. Apartment management staff often feel as if they have scores of bosses--their boss, along with all the residents! That's stress!

Acknowledge to your staff that job stresses in this day and age are practically unavoidable. Attempt, though, also to have your staff turn this stress into motivation. Have a problem that needs fixing? Become motivated to tackle that problem first. Don't procrastinate, because I guarantee that the problem won't go away and your level of stress will only increase until the problem is solved.

Successful sales people have mastered anti-procrastination. If it takes 20 cold calls to land one good appointment, the best salespeople will make these calls first thing in the morning. They tackle what they like least first, and spend the rest of the day on more satisfying tasks.

The greatest power a person has is the power to choose what attitude to hold in any given set of circumstances. Help staff remember this choice of attitude when feeling overwhelmed, and stress levels will decrease, and motivation increase.

Secret No. 3: Have Fun--Enjoy the Journey

With fewer staff and the condition of the economy, it's important to remember to have fun at work. When people have fun, they want to do something--they want to go the extra mile, they want to solve residents' problem.

Try treating the staff to lunch. Since it is difficult for everyone to leave at the same time, have lunch ordered in or take an ice cream break on hot days.

Celebrate successes and milestones. Once a month, attempt to meet as a group, acknowledge service anniversaries, promotions and positive customer feedback. Serve cake and ice cream or other treats.

Hold staff meetings off site. Just getting away from the office can be a mini-vacation for some people. The location does not have to be fancy--it could be a diner, a hotel lobby or a picnic bench at a park. But get out, get some fresh air and see what new, fresh ideas emerge.

Secret No. 4: Life-long Learning

Life-long learning is the only way to remain competitive in the job market. Twenty or even 10 years ago, employees got by on their job-related skills. They knew how to do their job and they did it.

But times have changed. Today's business world is faster and ever-changing. This is especially true regarding technology. Don't believe me? Remember DOS? Remember WordStar? Once, these were computer mainstays. Now they're technology relics.

Encourage staff to expand their horizons by learning as much as possible, on the job and after hours. Host a staff workshop on customer service or another key topic. Reward the person interested in taking evening college classes with partial tuition reimbursement or other incentives. Set aside time each day at the office for online training. (The amount of online learning and training programs is huge and constantly growing.)

The key question is, How transferable are your job skills? Staff who can multitask and perform many duties at work will be more valuable employees, and they will be more motivated employees.

Secret No. 5: Catch Your Staff Being Motivated

People appreciate being appreciated. When you see or hear someone on your management team acting in a motivated manner, compliment them. Tell them how much you appreciate their motivation.

Better yet (and this is closely tied with Secret No. 3), reward your staff as appropriate for motivated behavior and actions. Give Susan a half-day off. Take Sam to lunch. Have pizza ordered in to honor Judy's motivated behavior. The possibilities for acknowledging and rewarding positive behavior and actions are almost limitless once you begin.

Remember, praise helps turns low-motivated staff into winners! Congratulate your staff often for a job well-done ... no matter how small the task. No one is appreciated too much.

Summary

Keeping your staff motivated to provide excellent resident service should be one of your most crucial roles. As stated previously, don't treat this as something you "have to do." Have fun with this. See if you can motivate yourself to increase and retain staff motivation. Remember, it all starts with you.

Albert Mensah is a motivational speaker based in Seattle. He can be reached at 253/639-1686 or e-mail [e-mail].