Organizational life is full of historical myths: some are positive and pull people together while others are negative and drive people apart. No matter what you do, myths are going to circulate. The challenge is to support the myths that work to your advantage and expunge the ones that don’t.

Leaders can use positive myths to give followers a feeling of relevance and importance, create spirit and commitment, build community and instill loyalty to the company. Stories about people who have achieved great things can inspire others to do their personal best and reach even higher. But to truly work, myths must be authentic.

Fabricated myths that have no basis in truth divert energy and distract from the current mission. Healthy, verifiable myths help to build community while upholding the trust your followers place in you.

Contrary to popular belief (an unverifiable myth) there is no correlation between motivation and productivity. Highly motivated workers can perform poorly and a demoralized workforce can break performance records. 

Individual morale and collective spirit are raised simultaneously when leaders and followers become aware of what they don’t know and are motivated to learn new skills and practice new ways of doing things. The motivational sequence that follows will help determine when people who work together are motivated to discover what they don’t know:

Level 1: Coworkers are aware of what they don’t know and are motivated to learn how to do things differently.

Level 2: Coworkers are aware of what they know and are motivated to apply their new skills.

Level 3: Coworkers are unaware of what they know and need little motivation to practice their skills automatically.

Level 4: Coworkers are not aware of their lack of knowledge and have no motivation to learn new skills.

 Individual attitudes are learned from authorities, changed by friends and enforced by associations on the job. Team members who complain about each other reinforce negative attitudes. Which is why fostering new, more positive attitudes in the workplace is a collective responsibility. Leaders and followers each have a significant role to play in building community spirit.