Companies like VMware are increasingly competing for highly talented, highly passionate people.  As a manager harnessing that passion and directing it to where you need it to be, can be a challenge regardless of that person's age or experience.  Influencing your colleagues and team can be key to capitalising on the power of their passion in these situations.

One of the key skills in doing this is identifying what truly motivates your team.  When you can do that, the emotional responses that come from passionate people are given context and are more easily understood. Without an understanding of someone's key motivations, it's very difficult to work out why they're showing frustration, anger, wonder or delight. Recognising and responding to that is incredibly powerful as a manager.  

At Applied Influence Group we use Steven Reiss's work as a checklist to rate an individual's motivations.  Reiss boiled motivations down into 16 basic desires such as status, family and acceptance.  Asking yourself which of these desires are important to an individual is the first step in working out what really makes them passionate and gives you a competitive advantage in a world where human interaction is increasingly more difficult.