The Gray Rider Real Estate Company - Case Study Example

 EMPLOYEE MOTIVATION THE GRAY RIDER REAL ESTATE COMPANY, USA Introduction: The Gray Rider Real Estate Company is a famous construction firm with markets for buildings and complex structures. The company is committed to customer satisfaction, first-class service, safety and a responsible approach to the environment. The 2006 revenue of the company has been approximately $ 5.9 billion and has over 30,000 people employed worldwide. The Gray Rider Real Estate Company has an excellent record, in recent years, in creating shareholder value by providing value-added engineering, construction and service skills to customers for whom infrastructure quality, efficiency and reliability are critical. With Over 100 new graduate entrants every year , The Gray Rider Real Estate Company has been Voted the most admired construction company in the 2005 Management survey and is Winner of many Quality in Construction Awards(http://www.worldrealtynews.com). Thus, success of an organization like The Gray Rider Real Estate Company has been on account of the apt application of the various concepts of organizational behaviour like Motivation, Decision Making, Group Behavior, Communication, Power and Politics, Organizational Structure, Organizational Culture, Human Resources Practices and Change Management. Specific employee’s attitudes relating to ‘job satisfaction’ and ‘organizational commitment’ are of major interest to the field of organizational behaviour and Human resource management (Fred Luthans, 2005). This is because of the fact that only a satisfied employee can have organizational commitment. ‘Organizational commitment’ is an attitude of an individual with a strong desire to remain a member of a particular organization with willingness to exert high levels of effort on behalf of the organization, accepting the values and goals of the organization. Incidentally, Organizational commitment can be expected only from a satisfied worker and a satisfied worker is always a motivated worker. If there is no conflict between group goals and personal goals of a member in a group, i.e. goals of an employee and an organization in which he/she works are complementary and not contradictory, then the employee is motivated to work for the goals of the company, because, by doing so, he will be achieving his own personal goals (Fred Luthans, 2005). Organizational behavior is interdisciplinary in its nature with deep roots in psychology. The concepts of Motivation in The Gray Rider Real Estate Company have been elaborated in this study. Motivation in The Gray Rider Real Estate Company: Motivation refers to the way in which wages, drives, desires, aspiration, strivings, or needs, controls or explains human behaviour (Mc Farland, 1974). Motivation is the core of management. Motivation can be defined as a process, which begins with physiological or psychological need, or deficiency, which triggers behaviour or a drive that is aimed at a goal or an incentive. (Fred luthans, 2005). Motivation is a phenomenon by which ‘Motives’ based on ‘Needs’ will condition individual’s behaviour. Therefore, if there is no conflict between group goals and personal goals of a member in a group, i.e. Goals of an employee and an organization (in which he works) are complementary and not contradictory, then the employee is motivated to work for the goals of the company, because, by doing so, he will be achieving his own personal goals .Motive is an inner state that energizes, activates, or moves and that directs behavior towards goals (Berelson 1964). According to Psychology, all conscious behaviour of Human beings is motivated. Every individual tends to have some motivational factors known as motivational drives. McClelland classifies motivational drives as “Achievement motivation”, “Affiliation motivation” and “Power motivation” (McClelland, 1971). People with “Achievement motivation” want to attain goals, achieve objectives and advance up to success in an organization. People with “Affiliation motivation” want freedom on social basis like being with friends, ethnic community in their work environment. People with “Power motivation” want to influence people and change situations legitimately. They want power by performance and get accepted in the organization. Thus, motivation is the key factor for individual job satisfaction and the job satisfaction of individuals leads to ‘organizational commitment’ and ultimately the success of an organization. Managerial planning involves a deep understanding of these motivational drives of the employees and understanding motivational drives in turn involves a deep study of the factors influencing these drives “Job design studies” is a new field, which focuses on various job characteristics that motivate employees. Research proves that a motivated and productive employee experiences meaningfulness of the work done, experiences responsibility for the outcome of the work done and has high levels of knowledge of the results of the work performed (Hackman, 1976). Organizational climate in The Gray Rider Real Estate Company is Supportive, which offers the workers a sense of personal importance and responsibility, thus maximizing Organizational commitment of the employees. Here, the employee is motivated and hence, ensures success for himself and assures success for the organization. The staff recruitment statement of The Gray Rider Real Estate Company promises satisfaction from competitive financial packages that stimulate career development for the right person and willing to contribute. That is to say, if an individual has the motivational drive to achieve with a organizational commitment then, The Gray Rider Real Estate Company is the Challenge. Psychological analysis point to “Human needs” as an important factor for motivation and thus, job satisfaction. When a machine malfunctions, managers find the “definite causes” of breakdown in an analytical manner based on its operational needs. Likewise, when a machine operator malfunctions, it is important for a manager to understand the “definite causes” based on his operational needs. ‘Vroom’s expectancy theory’ is a widely accepted approach to motivation. This expectancy model of motivation was developed by Victor H. Vroom and has been elaborated by Porter, Lawler and others. According to Vroom, motivation is a product of three factors. 1) Valence = how much one wants a reward. 2) Expectancy = One’s estimate of the probability that effort will result in successful performance and 3) Instrumentality = One’s estimate that performance will result in receiving the reward. Thus, Motivation = Valence x Expectancy x Instrumentality. Valence refers to the strength of a person’s preference for receiving a reward. It is the expression of the amount of one’s desire to reach a goal (Davis, 2002).For example, if an employee wants a promotion in the organization he is working, then ‘Promotion’ is the factor of Valence for the employee. Valence for a reward differs with each employee. The valence for reward is always influenced by experience and varies over a period of time according to needs. In contrast to the need based models of motivation, where conclusions are based on a group of employees, the expectancy model conclusions are based on individual employee preferences and their changes. According to Vroom, valence is thus, the strength of an individual’s preference for a particular out-come. In order to have a positive valence value, the person must prefer to attain the outcome against not attaining it. Since preferences of people for an outcome can be either be positive or negative, value of the valence will also be negative as well as positive. When a person is not interested in attaining an outcome as compared to the interest in attaining it, then the valence is negative. If an individual is indifferent to the outcome, then the valence is 0. When an individual shows strong preference the valence is positive. Expectancy is the strength of belief that one’s work related effort will result in completion of a task. Expectancies are also called probabilities of the employee’s estimate of the degree to which performance will be determined by the amount of effort put in. Psychologists agree that expectancies are cognitive in nature. Expectancy relates efforts to performance. Since, expectancy is the probability of a connection between effort and performance, its value ranges from 0 to 1. If an employee feels that there is no chance of the efforts towards his desired performance, the expectancy value is 0. If an employee sees successful completion of the task based on efforts, then the expectancy value is 1. Instrumentality the employee’s belief that a reward will be achieved on completion of the task. Here, instrumentality is based on a subjective judgement about the probability of his organization’s recognition of the performance and subsequent rewards on a contigent basis. Thus, Vroom’s Expectancy Theory defines Motivation as the product of valence, expectancy and instrumentality. Therefore, it is high positive valence, high expectancy and high instrumentality, which will create the strongest motivation. The employment principles of The Gray Rider Real Estate Company assures to provide safe and healthy working conditions for all employees in an open, challenging, rewarding and participative environment for all who work in the company. The company employment principles strives to utilize, through selection, training and development, the full talents, skills and abilities of all employees and to provide compensation and benefits which reflect good current local practices and which reward collective and individual abilities and personal performance. The company is committed to the principles of providing a working environment, development opportunities and incentives to promote team effort and commitment to the performance of the Group. This ensures open, competitive access to career opportunities and ensures that no job applicant or employee receives less favourable treatment on the grounds of colour, race, nationality, national or ethnic origin, disability, sex, sexual orientation or marital status. Manpower recruitment for the Company and career progression is determined solely by the application of objective criteria, personal performance and merit of the employees. Recruitment, employment decisions and procedures are monitored periodically and reviewed to ensure compliance with this policy. The Gray Rider Real Estate Company operates across a range of sectors and a number of Trade Unions have been recognized by the company. The Gray Rider Real Estate Company Staff Association represents staff employees in a number of US operating businesses. The Gray Rider Real Estate Company believes that the investments in training and development of the employees is vital to maintain competitive advantage. The company is committed to utilizing, through selection, training and development, the full talents, skills and abilities of all employees. In addition to opportunities to learn and develop ‘through the job’, the organization also runs in-house courses covering a wide variety of training needs including technical, commercial and management skills and health, safety and environment matters. External programmes are also available which offer structured training schemes for apprentices, technicians and graduates. The company encourages employees to pursue, on their own initiative, continuing education and training, particularly when this leads to vocational and professional qualifications relevant to their work and career development (http://www.worldrealtynews.com). According to Shannon Columbo, the average worker of present day no longer has the same lifetime job security that he had fifty years ago and present-day workers have to move between jobs. Thus a dissatisfied worker often changes jobs. He can change jobs easily than before because of the widened market opportunities and more benefits. According to Peter Auer, in spite growing job insecurity, employment stability remains a salient feature of contemporary labour markets in Europe. Chelsia Rice joined Gray Rider Real Estate Company in 2003 and is now a Graduate Quantity Surveyor working on the Alliance project. She terms her association with the organization as a brilliant experience, which has helped her development, both professionally and personally. She feels that her work at Texas, the development center of evaluators caters to her Achievement drive of motivation. Her key responsibilities have been to develop successful long-term relationships with vital customer base to meet their expectations. Thus, responsibility has been a motivator in this case. Recent graduates Christine Allen, Sam Bennett and Dipesh Patel are now all site engineers on the A120 Stansted Project. They see The Gray Rider Real Estate Company as a promising forum for their career development catering their Power Drive of Motivation as defined by McClelland (McClelland, 1971). They see enormous chances to career development around them and clear sense of direction of where they would like to go in their professional career. They see their colleagues as an important factor as their job. This has been rightly described by Herzberg as relationship with peers in his two-factor theory (Herzberg, 1959). Smith studied a Masters degree at Leeds University before joining The Gray Rider Real Estate Company five years ago on a structured training programme. He is a typical case study of Vroom’s Cognitive or thinking individual. He says that he has been very impressed with the company. He assesses the functioning of the business organization while remaining an employee of the organization .He opines that there is a sense of everyone working together towards a common goal. This is nothing but the concept of Organizational commitment discussed earlier in the analysis. He has a high valence factor in his quest for career advancement when he aims to be the Technical Manager in the near future, a high expectancy in his involvement in the increased responsibilities over the years and a high instrumentality in his belief that the company has plenty of goals for him to aim for as explained by Vroom (Rensis Likert, 1961). The application of a motivational model like that of Vroom provides a practical tool for individuals wishing to assume leadership roles, acting through self-interest, adopt courses of action perceived as maximizing the probability of desirable outcomes for themselves (RobertG.Isaa2001). Producing effective work teams : According to William James, self-esteem is determined by the ratio of our actualities to our supposed potentialities, a fraction of which our pretensions are the denominator and the numerator our success. This explains employee behaviour as a dynamic entity whose outcome can be manipulated. Employees form evaluations about themselves and these evaluations of employees have serious implications in organizations. At an organizational or team level, self-esteem is task based. i.e., it reflects an employee’s self perceived (cognitive) level of ability to perform specific tasks. Some employees will find intrinsic value in the work itself, if they have a sense of strong work ethics or competence motivation.. The fundamental shift of industrial relations to the enterprise level and the individualization of the employment relationship have provided ample scope for performance-related pay. Most of the workers believe that those who work hard and produce more should be rewarded accordingly Therefore it is increasingly recognized that performance and skills criteria need to be injected into pay determination to produce effective work teams. Performance based pay has a potential influence on membership behavior. The entrepreneurial and achievement oriented people are more likely to get attracted to the performance related pay and the organization needs such people hence it makes sense for them to relate pay to performance. Handling cultural change: According to Weiner, when employees attribute their success to internal rather than external factors, they have higher expectations for future success, and have a greater desire for achievement with high performance goals. 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