There are two elements needed to succeed in business. The first is a good strategy – making sure you’re heading in the right direction and focusing on the most valuable opportunities. The second is how well you do your work. You must perform with speed, positivity, efficiency and drive to achieve great things. You need to get your mind right. You need to maintain a high level of personal motivation to win. If you’ve been finding it hard to stay motivated, here are some techniques that can really help you.

1. Make a Genuine Commitment to Personal Excellence.

If you look at how most people work, they certainly have a commitment to getting the job done, but not necessarily to doing things in an excellent manner. I have found that by simply making the decision to do everything as well as you can, in the time available, you not only get better results but your self-respect, self-image and personal motivation increases significantly. You are simply choosing to be outstanding no matter what.

2. Remind Yourself Daily of Your Strong Points.

In my experience coaching practice owners I would say that many say at least 5 negative things to themselves for every 1 positive. As a result you often feel defeated and not good enough and this has to stop. Spend 2 minutes every morning reminding yourself of why you are (or can become) superb at your career. Simply focusing on your strong points every day will create a far more powerful sense of self, which will lead to dramatically higher motivation.

3. See Yourself As Unstoppable.

What I am suggesting here is a subtle variation of how many practice owners see themselves. In my experience mentoring I’ve found that lots of practitioners work hard to envision themselves as successful, but then find they fail often in the course of their daily work. This gives them a conflicted self-image. I believe that by changing your view of yourself, you can remain positive and effective, even in difficult situations. It may seem a minor change but try it for a month and you’ll see a huge lift in your motivation.

4. Congratulate Yourself Every Evening.

Ambitious people rarely give themselves a pat on their back for the good things they’ve achieved. Instead they tend to focus on the 1 or 2 things they haven’t completed. Obviously over time this will lead to a loss of motivation. Performance will soon suffer as a result. But there’s a simple way to counter this negative tendency and that is to remind yourself every evening of all the good stuff you got done. Just take 2 minutes before you go to sleep and list your achievements of the day, however minor. You’ll be surprised how many you come up with.

When you get into the habit of doing this every evening your sense of achievement will escalate rapidly, your self-image will improve and your drive and motivation to do well the next day will be powerful. It’s important to realise that motivation doesn’t just happen. You need to work at it.