Maslow's hierarchy of needs

It's vital that you, your team members, as well as other managers, understand and agree on their responsibilities. This means defining what responsibilities people have, and where they begin and end for each person.

This clarity is important because it sets everyone's expectations accordingly. This sounds simple and easy but in reality, it is exceedingly difficult. There are several reasons why it's more difficult than it looks, and not the least of these is because people's needs change all the time!

Specifically, we are talking about higher-level needs, as defined in Maslow's hierarchy of needs, of which you can see a representation in Figure 1.2. These are essentially emotional needs, which sit above the basic physiological needs such as air, water, food, sleep, and shelter. Our basic physiological needs change all the time, from our choice of food to where we live, so, as you would expect, the higher level needs also change. Moreover, these higher needs are complex and deeply personal:

An example of applying the concepts from Maslow's hierarchy of needs can be dealing with a friend, because what you do to make them happy is different depending on their physical and mental state.

If they're sad, they may need a shoulder to cry on. If they're happy, they may need someone to share and celebrate with. If they're tired, you might provide them with somewhere to rest. Sometimes, however, what they really need is the opposite of what you might think! Your very tired friend might need some fresh air and exercise to reinvigorate them, rather than you simply providing them with somewhere to rest!