motivation in theory & practice

• two broad approaches available to motivate employees

  • Financial methods (e.g. salary, bonus)

  • Non-financial methods (passing on responsibility or praise)
• Taylor (Scientific Management)

  • Managers should maintain close control and supervision over their employees.

  • Autocratic style of management- managers make all decisions themselves

  • Consistent with Theory X (McGregor) approach to workers - believe workers are lazy and are only motivated by money

  • Motivate workers using piece-rate payment
• Maslow (Hierarchy of Needs)

  • There are five levels of human needs which employees need to have fulfilled at work

  • Only once a lower level of need has been fully met, would a worker be motivated by the opportunity of having the next need up in the hierarchy satisfied

  • A business should therefore offer different incentives to workers in order to help them fulfill each need in turn and progress up the hierarchy
• Herzberg (Two Factor Theory)

  Motivators • Factors that directly motivate people to work harder • Giving responsibility, recognition for good work, opportunities for promotion

  Hygiene (maintenance) factors • Factors that can de-motivate if not present but do not actually motivate employees to work harder • Pay, working conditions, job security
• Employee Engagement

  Intellectual Engagement - Thinking about the job & how to do it better

  Affective Engagement - Feeling positive about doing a good job

  Social Engagement - Takes opportunities to share work-related issues with others at work
• Employee Engagement

  • Employee is positive about his /her work

  • Thinks hard about how to improve

  • Engaged with fellow employees
• Employee Motivation

  • Employee has a will to work

  • Due to work incentives and/or satisfaction from work itself
• Main financial incentives and rewards at work

  Wages

  Salaries

  Bonus system

  Commission

  Profit sharing

  Performance related pay

  Share options

  Fringe benefits
• Profit Sharing

  Advantages

  – Creates a direct link between pay and performance

  – Creates a sense of team spirit- helps remove ‘them and us’ barrier between managers and workers if all employees involved

  – May improve employee’s loyalty to company
• Performance-Related Pay (PRP)

  Advantages – Senior managers can easily monitor and assess individual employee performance during appraisal process – Setting of targets for employees can ensure they are all closely focused to company objectives

  Disadvantages – Discourages a team based approach- can create unhealthy rivalry between managers – Can be difficult to accurately measure performance of some workers e.g. in service sector firms – Incentives may not be larger enough to motivate employees
• Piece-rate Payments

  Advantages – Requires low levels of manager supervision – Encourages high speed production – Provides good incentive for workers who are mainly motivated by pay

  Disadvantages – Workers are focused on quantity not quality – It is repetitive for workers and can be de-motivating – Workers are only used to one set method of production and may resistant change
• Commission

  Main advantage – clear link between sales and remuneration

  Main disadvantages – sales may be influence by factors outside of employee control (e.g. mature product, customer service)
• Main non-financial incentives and rewards at work

  Empowerment

  Praise

  Promotion

  Job enrichment

  Job enlargement

  Better communication
• Job enrichment

  – Involves giving workers more interesting and challenging tasks

  – Seen as more motivating as it gives workers chance to further themselves

  – Herzberg in particular recommended this approach
• Job enlargement

  – Involves giving workers more tasks to do of a similar nature or complexity

  – Job rotation is a part of this