Grant professionals choose this career for a variety of reasons, and as with any other career that involves writing, have unique routines to motivate them to dig in on their writing work.

What is your go to routine or activity for motivation? Running? Reading? Working in a coffee shop?

As we started the new year, I had the opportunity to create some new routines and thought about what was the routine that I wanted to use to start off each business week as well our team’s 2-week sprints. I’ve written before about how having a treadmill desk in my office is a great way to move during the day, but also to motivate me and find inspiration when working on a big project. (Interested in learning more about my treadmill desk setup? You can read more here.) The treadmill desk is still a central fixture in my office, but as our team has grown, so has my perspective and creativity about how we can measure our motivation and happiness in our work.

One of the recent exercises we went through as a team during a recent planning meeting was to all take an Enneagram quiz online. I had been introduced to the idea of using the Enneagram to think about team composition during a closing plenary that Marc Pitman gave this past fall at the Nonprofit Storytelling Conference. Marc walked the participants through how understanding your team members and colleagues’ Enneagram number could help you think about how you work together and approach decision making together. As we went through our team’s Enneagram results it was fascinating to see the different Enneagram types in the team also grouped toward specific types of motivation in their work.

All that being said…what is it that you find motivates you to dig in on your big projects?

Is it…

• Physical activity
• Collaborative interaction with colleagues
• Music
• Quiet and mindfulness exercises
• Noisy coffee shop settings
• Scheduled work
• Recognition of your achievements

Regardless of your answer, your understanding of what helps motivate your work, and embracing that answer is what helps define your #lifeasagrantpro.

…and we’d love to hear about it! Share what motivates you in the comments below or by sharing images of what motivates you in your work on social media using the hashtag #lifeasagrantpro.