Motivating volunteers: choice, praise, ownership

A best-selling author and internationally sought-after speaker and consultant, Michael Timms teaches practical leadership strategies that drive high-performance. He earned an M.B.A. from Utah State University, and was a consultant with Deloitte and an HR leader in the construction and manufacturing industries, prior to forming his own consultancy. Michael is the author of How Leaders Can Inspire Accountability and Succession Planning That Works.

Links

Watch the video and share your thoughts in the Zion Lab community
How Leaders Can Inspire Accountability: Three Habits That Make or Break Leaders and Elevate Organizational Performance
How to Claim Your Leadership Power | Michael Timms
MichaelTimms.com
Transcript available with the video in the Zion Lab community

Highlights

Michael talks about the principles of accountability within the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. The discussion focuses on how leaders can foster a culture of ownership and high performance among volunteers without relying on the traditional levers of corporate consequences.

00:01:46 – The Challenge of Motivation and Accountability
00:02:18 – Introduction of Michael Timms and His Expertise
00:02:53 – Michael Timms’ Background and Approach to Accountability
00:03:59 – Accountability in a Faith Context
00:04:32 – Defining Accountability
00:06:18 – Understanding Results in a Church Context
00:09:23 – Starting Points for Accountability in Organizations
00:11:06 – The Role of Leaders in Accountability
00:12:20 – Key Behaviors for Modeling Accountability
00:14:21 – Setting Expectations in Leadership
00:16:43 – Importance of Feedback and Communication
00:20:03 – Clarifying Purpose and Results
00:21:36 – Establishing Expectations for Team Dynamics
00:24:24 – Addressing Accountability Breakdowns
00:26:45 – Three Habits of Personal Accountability
00:29:02 – Motivating People in a Volunteer Organization
00:30:26 – The Power of Positive Feedback
00:32:12 – Giving Ownership to Team Members
00:34:12 – Scenarios for Accountability in Activities
00:39:17 – Handling Blame in Accountability Conversations
00:41:39 – Avoiding Micromanagement in Leadership

Key Insights

Redefining Accountability: Timms defines accountability as taking ownership of results and focusing on the actions necessary to achieve the right outcomes, rather than using it as a euphemism for blame or punishment.

The Power of Modeling: Accountability begins with the leader; if those in positions of authority do not own their mistakes or seek feedback, others in the organization are unlikely to do so.

Defining Results: In a faith context, “results” should be defined broadly—such as bringing people closer to Christ—and then distilled into specific goals, such as building testimonies or improving how members feel about their Sunday experience.

Setting Clear Expectations: High-performing teams agree on general guidelines for how they will work together—such as preferred communication methods and response times—before diving into the work.

Three Habits of Personal Accountability: Michael highlights three essential behaviors for leaders: avoiding blame, “looking in the mirror” to see how they contributed to a problem, and “engineering the solution” by fixing broken systems or processes.

Motivation Through Ownership: Motivating volunteers is best achieved by giving them a say in outcomes, providing frequent positive feedback to trigger a sense of progress, and granting them true decision-making power within councils.

Leadership Applications

Requesting Feedback: Leaders can improve performance by sincerely asking those they lead for feedback on how to make it easier for them to achieve their goals.

Systemic Problem Solving: When a task is not completed, Michael suggests leaders should ask “where did the process break down?” rather than “who dropped the ball?” to reduce defensiveness and improve future results.

Standardizing Procedures: Implementing standard operating procedures for recurring events—such as meeting agendas or baptismal services—helps ensure consistency and reduces the mental load on volunteers.

The award-winning Leading Saints Podcast is one of the top independent Latter-day Saints podcasts as part of nonprofit Leading Saints’ mission to help Latter-day Saints be better prepared to lead. Find Leadership Tools, Courses, and Community for Latter-day Saint leaders in the Zion Lab community. Learn more and listen to any of the past episodes for free at LeadingSaints.org.

Past guests include Emily Belle Freeman, David Butler, Hank Smith, John Bytheway, Reyna and Elena Aburto, Liz Wiseman, Stephen M. R. Covey, Benjamin Hardy, Elder Alvin F. Meredith III, Julie Beck, Brad Wilcox, Jody Moore, Tony Overbay, John H. Groberg, Elaine Dalton, Tad R. Callister, Lynn G. Robbins, J. Devn Cornish, Bonnie Oscarson, Dennis B. Neuenschwander, Kirby Heyborne, Taysom Hill, Coaches Jennifer Rockwood and Brandon Doman, Anthony Sweat, John Hilton III, Barbara Morgan Gardner, Blair Hodges, Whitney Johnson, Ryan Gottfredson, Greg McKeown, Ganel-Lyn Condie, Michael Goodman, Wendy Ulrich, Richard Ostler, and many more in over 800 episodes.

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