Inspiration is the fire that ignites you and makes your team burn with passion!  Over the years of working with teams and leaders, we have seen this truth by observing the incredible results when inspiration is present and the devastating reality when it isn’t.  Inspired teams achieve off the wall results, that only inspires them more.  Inspiration inspires future inspiration!  Heartbreakingly, the opposite is also true.  The spiral into the dark pit of demotivation starts at the point of a lack of inspiration.  Inspiration and a lack of it is also highly contagious and will permeate your entire company in record time.  It is crucial that we are constantly aware of our personal, team and business inspiration levels.  An internal passion for what you do and what your company stands for should be a critical component of our recruitment and retention approach.
 
Before we move on, we need to clarify the difference between Motivation & Inspiration.  Inspiration is an internal sense of excitement toward and passion for something and is long lasting. Motivation is often stimulated by an external source and often short-lived.  Inspiration beats motivation any day!  I would rather employ a team of inspired people who are continually and sustainably self-motivated than a group of people that I constantly have to motivate and keep moving.  You want a team of highly inspired individuals whose passion for what the business does and stands for burns boldly!
 
Inspiration is the foundation of passion.  The definition of passion is “a strong or extravagant fondness, enthusiasm, or desire for something”.   We want people who have a strong or extravagant fondness for our product/service, clients and business.  We want people who are filled with enthusiasm!  And without a doubt, we need people who have a burning desire to see the product/service, team and organisation succeed!  Inspiration is the foundation of all of this . . .  Organisations with inspired people enjoy these benefits, and more!
 
Inspiration drives innovation, new ideas and the continual application of skills.  If you want your business to grow from within, develop a sense of ownership within the organisation and not wait until the leaders come up with all the ideas, make sure your organisation is filled with inspired people! 
 
Inspiration is the critical component of cohesion.  If we are all inspired by and passionate about a common thing, that common thing unites us and gives us common purpose.  Teams that have common purpose work well together as their vision is on the goal, not their individual agendas.  They are more flexible when it comes to decisions being made and buy in to things that the team agrees on.
 
Inspiration always increases levels of personal contribution.  It is phenomenal how energised you feel and the long hours you can put into something you are passionate about.  When people are inspired, they give more toward what they are doing.  The very personal and internal drive creates an insatiable desire to do their best and have huge impact on the achievement of the common goal.   
 
This is how we create high performance teams . . . make sure that you employ and retain inspired people.  Allow them freedom within that inspiration to express their ideas, share them with each other and then show appreciation when they give of their best toward the idea, team and business.  In doing so, you will see the incredible results of inspiration being the fire that ignites you and makes your team burn with passion!