TABLE OF CONTENETS
1. INTRODUCTION
2. SIGNIFICANCE OF MOTIVATION IN EMPLOYEMENT
2.1) TYPES OF MOTIVATION
2.2) MOTIVATION FACTORS
3. MOTIVATION THEORIES
4. CONCLUSSION
5. REFERENCES
1) INTRODUCTION:
Motivation is the particular part of interest in organization to motivate the employees, because of the crucial role it plays in skills learning process in organization. However, the specific kind of motivation that is studied in the specialized setting of education differs qualitatively from the more general forms of motivation studied by psychologists in other fields. In a workplace environment, these questions happen every day. Some work is very repetitive and boring. Some work might sound glamorous and exciting but in reality it might not be as fulfilling as we might think. The question for many businesses is how to get the best from employees, how to encourage and persuade them to do what they are supposed to be doing to the best of their ability all the time. So that, it is strongly proved that motivating the employees is essential key to increase the competitiveness in the organization environment.
Motivation is the key for employees to run the organization successfully, if the organization does not possess the ability to motivate its employees, the knowledge within the organization is not practically used to a maximum. Therefore, it becomes the aim of every successful learning organization to find the factors that enable it to motivate its employees to continuous learning and to take advantage of this knowledge to ensure its living. Many motivational theories have been constructed to find these motivational factors, but the values of the employees in the specific organization are seldom included in the theories. Since a suitable combination of motivational factors only can be created through an understanding of the values in the measured object (i.e. employees), this can be seen as a risk for validity problems in the measuring instrument. A closer survey of the measured object, where such factors as society, organizational culture and personality of the employee are taken into account, is required.
2) SIGNIFICANCE OF MOTIVATION IN EMPLOYEMENT:
Motivation refers to the reason why we do things. A dictionary defines motivation as:
“The psychological feature that arouses an organism to action towards a desired goal, the reason for that action”. (Source: Dictionary.com)
A simple definition of motivation is the ability to change behaviour. It is a drive that compels one to act because human behaviour is directed toward some goal. . Motivation is internal; it comes from within based on personal interests, desires, and need for fulfilment. However, external factors such as rewards, praise, and promotions also influence motivation. As defined by Daft (1997), motivation refers to "the forces either within or external to a person that arouse enthusiasm and persistence to pursue a certain course of action".
Here is the particular importance with the motivation, because the organizations always expect a high quality performance. All the time it is not possible to the employees, so that the training needs and motivation is essential to the employees. Motivation can do such things as they are
1. Direct behaviour towards to particular goals.
2. Its lead to increase effort and energy.
3. Increase their initiation, persistence and activities.
4. Enhance the cognitive processing.
5. Determine what consequences are reinforcing.
6. Lead to improve their performance.
The persons in their employment they usually try to motivate themselves, even though organization can maintain the crucial role to motivate the employees.
2.1) TYPES OF MOTIVATION:
Employees are not always internally motivated; they sometimes need situated motivation, which is found in environmental conditions that the organization creates. Motivate the employee in an organization can take place in two ways. First the persons can motivate themselves by seeking, finding and carrying out the assigned work that gives the job satisfaction as per their needs or at least maintain them to expect their goals will be achieved. The second one is, the persons can be motivated by management in organization through such methods as like pay, promotion, praise, etc.
i) Intrinsic motivation: This motivation is happens when employees are internally motivated to do something because it either brings them pleasure, they think it is important, or they feel that what they are learning is significant. so that, the self-generated factors that influence the persons to behave in a particular way or to move in a particular direction. These factors include their responsibility in employment. That means they feeling like the work is important and scope to use develop their skills and abilities, interesting and challenging work and opportunities for enhance their knowledge in a meaningful manner to employment.
ii) Extrinsic motivation: It comes to when a employee is compelled to do something or act a certain way. What is done to for person to motivate them. This includes rewards such like as increased pay, appraisals, and job designs (in an attractive way).
These both motivation processes are such useful to the persons in a employment. The extrinsic motivators are give the immediate action and powerful effect, but it will not necessarily last long. The intrinsic motivator gives a longer term effect because once they improve their ability and skills it will increase the quality of working in employment.
2.2) MOTIVATION FACTORS:
The employees can be motivated by different factors in a learning organization, such they are
- The works itself that many people believe in their work and feel they are making a difference. that is enough to motivate them
- Recognition - being recognised for the contribution that you are making is something that many of us want and need
- Achievement - seeing the results of what we do and knowing that we had a part in that result
- Responsibility - being given responsibility is something that people enjoy, they respond to being given responsibility
- Advancement and personal growth - part of recognition is the opportunity to be able to advance yourself - to be given more challenging tasks and be seen as being capable of doing such tasks. As an individual advances they develop greater confidence and skill and in doing so feel good about themselves and grow as a person.
3) MOTIVATION THEORIES:
The employees who are committed to achieving organizational objectives generally outperform those who are not committed. Those who are intrinsically rewarded by accomplishments in the workplace are satisfied with their jobs and are individuals with high self-esteem. Therefore, an important part of management is to help make work more satisfying and rewarding for employees and to keep employee motivation consistent with organizational objectives. With the diversity of contemporary workplaces, this is a complex task. Many factors, including the influences of different cultures, affect what people value and what is rewarding to them.
From a manager's perspective, it is important to understand what prompts people, what influences them, and why they persist in particular actions. Quick (1985) presented these four underlying principles that are important to understanding motivation:
- People have reasons for everything they do.
- Whatever people choose as a goal is something they believe is good for them.
- The goal people choose must be seen as attainable.
- The conditions under which the work is done can affect its value to the employee and his or her perceptions of attainability or success.
Motivation theories have continued to evolve and have their roots in behavioural psychology. They provide a way to examine and understand human behaviour in a variety of situations. Ongoing changes in the workplace require that managers give continuous attention to those factors that influence worker behaviour and align them with organizational goals. No one theory is appropriate for all people and for all situations. Each individual has his or her own values and differing abilities. In business settings, managers apply motivation theories to influence employees, improve morale, and implement incentive and compensation plans.
Many of researches describe the importance of motivation the following discussion of motivation theories is grouped according to need, process, and reinforcement theories in an organization.
Need Theories:
Need theories are based on some of the earliest research in the field of employee relations. The premise behind need theories is that if managers can understand the needs that motivate people, then reward systems can be implemented that fulfil those needs and reinforce the appropriate behaviour.
The five levels of needs are the following:
- Physiological: These are basic physical comfort or bodily needs: food, sex, drink, and sleep. In the workplace, these needs translate into a safe, ergonomically designed work environment with appropriate base salary compensation.
- Security/safety: People want to feel safe, secure, and free from fear. They need stability, structure, and order. In the workplace, job security and fringe benefits, along with an environment free of violence, fills these needs.
- Belongingness and love: This is a need for friends, family, and intimacy—for social acceptance and affection from one's peers. In the workplace, this need is satisfied by participation in work groups with good relationships among co-workers and between workers and managers.
- Esteem: People want the esteem of others and they want to be regarded as useful, competent, and important. People also desire self-esteem and need a good self image. In the workplace, increased responsibility, high status, and recognition for contributions satisfy these needs.
- Self-actualization: This highest motivation level involves people striving to actualize their full potential, to become more of what they are capable of being. They seek to attain self-fulfilment. In the workplace, people satisfy this need by being creative, receiving training, or accepting challenging assignments.
Focusing on the needs of retraining for growth and challenge as well as rewards and recognition is important to the quality of work life. Managers can affect the physical, social, and psychological environment in the workplace, and they have a responsibility to help employees fulfil their needs.
Need theory conclude mainly two factors that
- Human needs are either of an attraction/desire nature or of an avoidance nature.
- Because humans are "want" beings, when one desire is satisfied, another desire will take its place.
In Maslow's hierarchical theory. He proposed three need categories and suggested that movement between the need levels is not necessarily straightforward. Failure to meet a higher-order need could cause an individual to regress to a lower-order need. These hierarchical categories are:
- Existence needs: Needs for physical well-being
- Relatedness needs: Needs for satisfactory relationships with others
- Growth needs: The development of human potential and the desire for personal growth and increased competence (Armstrong,2006)
PROCESS THEORIES:
Process theories help to explain how individuals motivation of an employee to select particular behaviours and how individuals determine if these behaviours meet their needs. Because these theories involve rational selection, concepts of cognition are employed. Cognition, according to Petri (1996), "is generally used to describe those intellectual or perceptual processes occurring within us when we analyze and interpret both the world around us and our own thoughts and actions.
The expectancy theory is based on an individual's effort and performance, as well as the desirability of outcomes associated with high performance. The value of or preference for a particular outcome is called valence. To determine valence, people will ask themselves whether or not they can accomplish a goal, how important is the goal to them (in the immediate as well as the long term), and what course of action will provide the greatest reward. An individual's expectation of actually achieving the outcome is crucial to success, and many factors influence this.
The expectancy theory can be applied through incentive systems that identify desired outcomes and give all workers the same opportunities to achieve rewards, such as stock ownership or other recognition for achievement.
The equity theory focuses on individuals' perceptions of how fairly they are treated in comparison to others. The equity exists when people consider their compensation equal to the compensation of others who perform similar work. People judge equity by comparing inputs (such as education, experience, effort, and ability) to outputs (such as pay, recognition, benefits, and promotion).
When the ratio is out of balance, inequity occurs. And inequitable pay can create an impossible situation when implementing salary and incentive systems. According to Daft (1997), Individuals will work to reduce perceived inequity by doing the following:
- Change inputs: Examples include increasing or reducing effort.
- Change outcomes: Examples include requesting a salary increase or improved working conditions.
- Distort perceptions: This occurs when individuals cannot change their inputs or outcomes; one example is artificially increasing the importance of awards.
- Leave the job: Individuals might do this rather than experience what they perceive to be continued inequity.
So the total process theory explains that motivate with the input factors like training, promotion benefits as such like things will most useful and essential process for organization. When administering compensation and incentive programs, managers must be careful to assure that the rewards are equitable; if programs are not perceived as equitable, then they will not contribute to employee motivation.
REINFORCEMENT THEORIES:
A theory of reinforcement explains employee should have time maintenance as well the motivation structured by management. This theory based not on need but on the relationship between behaviour and its consequences. In the workplace, these theories can be applied to change or modify on-the-job behaviour through rewards and punishments.
This theory takes into consideration both motivation and the environment, focusing on stimulus and response relationships. Through his research, Skinner noted that a stimulus will initiate behaviour; thus, the stimulus is an antecedent to behaviour. The behaviour will generate a result; therefore, results are consequences of behaviour.
"The quality of the results will be directly related to the quality and timeliness of the antecedent. The more specific the antecedent is and the closer in time it is to the behaviour, the greater will be its effect on the behaviour. The consequences provide feedback to the individual" (McCoy,1992)
If the results are considered positive, then the behaviour is positively reinforced. When the behaviour is positively reinforced, the individual is more likely to repeat the behaviour. People tend to have an intrinsic need for positive reinforcement. And when behaviour is ignored, the behaviour tends to go away or become extinct. The four types of reinforcement are the following:
- Positive reinforcement: The application of a pleasant and rewarding consequence following a desired behaviour, such as giving praise.
- Negative reinforcement: The removal of an unpleasant consequence following a desired behaviour, such as a manager no longer reminding a worker about a weekly deadline when the worker meets the deadline. This reinforcement is also called avoidance.
- Punishment: The application of an unpleasant outcome when an undesirable behaviour occurs to reduce the likelihood of that behaviour happening again. This form of reinforcement does not indicate a correct behaviour, so its use in business is not usually appropriate.
- Extinction: The withdrawal of a positive reward. If the behaviour is no longer positively reinforced, then it is less likely to occur in the future and it will gradually disappear.
Taylor's ideas also led to the idea of 'piece rate': this means paying people for what they produce. The motivation for the employee is to work at full capacity (as determined by the observation of how the work is done) all the time to make sure the employee maximises their pay. This idea is based very much on the theory that a worker is motivated by money and pay.
The all theories are shows that, the need for motivation to a person in employment.
4) CONCLUSSION:
From the argument clearly conclude that motivation is the essential need to the employees to enhance their abilities, it is also important to the management, to provide the training needs to motivate the persons. Motivation is particular need to the persons to involve into the organization culture. Persons having the motivational spirits only can achieve the desire goals successfully.
5) REFERENCES:
1) Michel Armstrong`s. (2006). “A hand book of Human Resource Management Practice”, 10th edition, kogan page published in London. p.p: 251-269.
2) Daft, Richard L. (1997). “Management”, 4th ed. Orland, Fl.: Harcourt Brace.
3) Quick, Thomas L. (1985). “The Manager's Motivation Desk Book”.7th edition, New York: Wiley.
4) Petri, Herbert L. (1996). “Motivation: Theory, Research, and Applications”, 4th ed. Pacific Grove, pCA: Brooks/Cole.
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8) http:/ www.pep-web.org