Sustaining team motivation is one of the hardest parts of being a manager. I have tried a number of approaches over the years, but the framework I have found most effective is Self-Determination Theory. It helps us understand where intrinsic motivation actually comes from.
The foundations of Self-Determination Theory
SDT is a theory of motivation developed by the psychologists Edward Deci and Richard Ryan. The core idea is simple: people are inclined by nature towards growth and development, but certain psychological needs have to be met for that potential to surface.
Traditionally, SDT speaks of three basic psychological needs:
1. Autonomy
People want to be the origin of their own actions. Instead of micromanaging my team, I set the goals clearly and leave the "how" largely to them.
- On projects I am outcome-oriented; I don't meddle much in the details of the process
- Instead of "do it like this" I ask "we need to reach this goal — what would your approach be?"
- I allow flexibility about working hours and methods
2. Competence
People want to feel effective and capable. I make sure my team members take on work in the areas where they are strong, and I keep offering opportunities to grow.
- I notice and acknowledge wins immediately
- I set goals that stretch but stay reachable
- Through regular feedback we identify the areas to develop together
- I set aside resources for learning and skill-building
3. Relatedness
People need to belong to a community and to form meaningful bonds. I build the team culture deliberately.
- I encourage open communication within the team
- We celebrate shared wins
- I take an individual interest and genuinely try to get to know my team members
- I create psychological safety — room to experiment without fear of making mistakes
The fourth need: internal rivalry
Alongside SDT's three basic needs, I have discovered a fourth source of motivation from my own experience: internal rivalry.
This is not the ordinary competition you get into with other people. It is something far deeper and more powerful: the rivalry you enter into with the failed version of yourself that lives in the minds of the people who underestimated you, who thought you couldn't do it.
All of us have had people in our lives who didn't believe in us, who couldn't see our potential, who thought we would not make it. Maybe a teacher, maybe a former manager, maybe an elder in the family… This source of motivation comes from the desire to prove them wrong.
What is internal rivalry?
This motivation is born from the tension between two things:
- Your real potential and abilities
- The "failed" version of you in the eyes of those who underestimated you
The stubborn urge to clear those imagined obstacles in spite of everyone who said "they can't do it"… That is an incredibly powerful source of motivation.
How do I trigger internal rivalry in my team?
This is delicate, because the wrong approach can create a toxic environment. Here is how I go about it:
I listen to their past: I try to learn what my team members have been through in their careers and which obstacles they have cleared. When I spot the moments where nobody believed in them, I help them turn that into a source of strength.
I highlight the "nobody expected this" wins: I call out the moments when team members exceeded expectations. Things like: "Remember? Everyone said this project would take six months, and you shipped it in three."
I encourage them to push their limits: The question "what would you want to show the people who thought you couldn't do this?" sometimes releases an enormous amount of energy.
I create moments of personal proof: I hand out slightly risky but achievable projects — ones where everybody gets to say "I can pull this off." For team members nobody believed in before, these projects become a chance to rewrite their own story.
Other supporting theories
These three needs of SDT (plus the one I added) are not alone. Several psychological models line up strongly with the same structure:
McClelland's Human Motivation Theory: David McClelland identified three basic drives that motivate people: the need for achievement, the need for power/influence, and the need for affiliation. This trio overlaps with SDT's framework too. The need for achievement maps directly onto competence and internal rivalry, the need for power onto autonomy, and the need for affiliation onto relatedness.
There is a developer on my team I'll call A., for instance. The need for achievement dominates their motivation. When I clear space for them to crack a hard technical problem, I watch them not stop until they have the solution. That is exactly the achievement drive McClelland was describing.
Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs: Abraham Maslow's pyramid rests on similar logic. To reach the higher-level needs (esteem, self-actualisation) the needs for safety and belonging have to be met first. Which is to say: without the foundations of SDT's relatedness and autonomy, motivation that draws its power from competence and internal rivalry cannot be sustained.
I observe this on my team as follows: a new joiner first has to feel safe and know they belong to the team. Only then do they start showing their real potential. Where there is no psychological safety, people cannot reach deep sources of motivation like internal rivalry at all.
Everyone is motivated differently: a dynamic, individual approach
Here is where I want to make a critical point: these four needs are not distributed in the same proportions for every individual.
For some of my team members autonomy matters above everything. I tell them "what" and leave them the "how", and they do wonderful work. Others want more direction and structure; autonomy makes them anxious.
Some of my team members draw enormous strength from internal rivalry. A question like "if that manager at your old company who didn't believe in you were here, what would they think now?" launches them like a rocket. For others the same approach only creates stress; they draw their strength from relatedness and trust.
That is why I keep an actively running feedback mechanism. I hold regular one-on-ones with every team member and observe what motivates them. I keep updating where they sit on the motivation spectrum, and I keep my methods dynamic.
B., for example, has been on the team for three years. Early on I noticed that giving them a lot of autonomy left them adrift. More structured goals and regular check-ins worked better for them. But two years later their confidence had grown; now they work far more independently and enjoy the autonomy. Needs change, and so does my approach.
Not everybody is motivated by the same methods — some draw strength from rivalry, some from safety, some from support. What matters is reaching the goal together. I decide how to motivate my team based on the team's dynamics; I don't apply a fixed recipe.
The principle that doesn't change: never turn your back
Now, alongside all the approaches that change from person to person, comes a principle that changes for nobody: never turn your back on anyone.
When my team members make a mistake, I stand beside them. Nobody actually needs hostility from the person they report to. It motivates no one.
I have seen managers in my career who were hostile towards all of their staff, and I have been managed by them. The conversation inside the team usually goes like this:
Is he afraid someone will take his place, or is he this hostile and sarcastic with everyone because deep down he knows he doesn't deserve the position?
Managers like this humiliate team members who make mistakes in meetings, make sarcastic remarks, keep you permanently on the defensive. This approach doesn't merely create a toxic environment — it dries up every source of motivation. Autonomy disappears (fear of criticism at every step), the sense of competence ends (you feel inadequate all the time), relatedness breaks (there is no trust), and even internal rivalry stops working (because the adversary is inside the building).
When a team member of mine makes a big mistake:
- First I try to understand: "What happened — can you walk me through it?" Curiosity, not blame.
- We work out a solution together: "All right, how do we fix this now?" We own the mistake jointly.
- We turn it into a learning opportunity: "What did we learn here, and what could we do differently next time?"
- I make my support felt: "Don't worry, we all make mistakes. I've got your back."
Last year AJ missed an important bug while delivering a critical project. The PO was furious, and there might have been real financial damage to the company. A manager I once had at another company would have humiliated AJ, and the whole team with him, in a meeting.
What did I do? I met AJ one on one and listened. I learned that he was going through a very stressful period and that our code review process wasn't solid enough. I apologised to the client myself, we fixed the bug together, and then we improved our code review process. After that episode AJ's trust in me and his commitment only grew. Because he knew I would stand beside him.
This sustained, mutually decent approach is the cornerstone of motivation. Without trust, no motivational technique works. If people think they will be punished when they make a mistake, they won't take risks, they won't innovate, they won't show their real potential.
I motivate myself with the same methods
Here I should make an honest confession: I motivate myself with these methods too.
On hard days, in the moments when my energy drops, I remind myself how autonomous a position I am in. I make the decisions, I set the strategy. That autonomy gives me strength.
I often think about how important a thing I am part of. I contribute to my team's growth, I play a role in the company's success, I add value to people's careers. That relatedness and sense of purpose keeps me standing.
I am aware of my company's willingness to give me the space where I can demonstrate what I am capable of. They trust me, they give me projects where I can use my abilities. That sense of competence feeds my motivation.
And most of all: in spite of everyone who said you can't. I remember the managers early in my career who didn't believe in me, the former boss who said "we'll never sell this, I don't think you can pull it off", the CTOs who said "it's already obvious you won't succeed." And every day, I prove them wrong to myself.
Here is the real beauty of it: to be motivated this way you don't actually need a good manager.
With awareness, by bringing to the surface what it is that triggers us, we can of course motivate ourselves. I try to teach my team members this too:
What motivates you most? Being autonomous? Feeling competent? Belonging to the team? Or proving something to someone? Know these triggers, and use them in your favour.
Once we are aware of our own sources of motivation, we can compensate for the motivation we don't get from outside. You may have a bad manager, but you can create your own pockets of autonomy. You may go unrecognised, but you can find ways to measure your own competence. You may not be able to bond with the team, but you can light the fire of that internal rivalry.
That is in fact why I wrote this piece: to teach something not only to managers but to everyone. Motivation is not something other people owe you. Motivation comes from within, and you can find the ways to feed it.
Continuity…
Motivation is not a matter you settle with a single conversation or a bonus scheme. It demands constant attention, genuinely knowing your team members, and creating an environment that meets their psychological needs. That is the message for leaders.
But there is a message for everybody else too: you can motivate yourself the same way. Know what sets you in motion, focus on those triggers, and start your own motivation engine.
To my mind the strongest teams are the ones where every member says "I can do this" and genuinely believes it, knows they won't be left alone when they make a mistake, and — most importantly — is aware of their own sources of motivation.
This piece is not a manual; it is the expression of an awareness distilled from my own experience. Which is why the title isn't "How do you motivate your team?" but "How I motivate my team."
Every manager, every leader, every employee has to move along the route they have internalised themselves. Trying to apply other people's templates or off-the-shelf recipes to the letter takes a manager further from being authentic.
When you try to motivate people with call-to-action steps lifted from "the good manager's handbook", the effort usually damages the bond of trust. Because technique takes the place of sincerity, and affectation takes the place of what is natural…
And the smell of affectation is the sharpest of all bad smells.