Motivation and Culture in Redgate Software Company - Essay Example

Motivation and Culture in Redgate Software Company & Section # of Contents Introduction Motivation and culture are two most important aspects of an organization. Through motivation, a manager or supervisor can obtain best results from his or her subordinates. In the same sense, organizational culture is very much important for an organization to thrive. In this report we are going to study motivation methods and culture of organization. To conduct this analysis, Redgate Software Company has been selected. This analysis report aims at conducting analysis on Redgate Software Company and its organization culture and motivation techniques. Further, this report will highlight some ways Redgate can attain best results by improving the culture of organization and methods of motivation of employees. 1.1 Introduction to Redgate Software Redgate Software has been selected for this analysis report because it is a highly advanced and state of the art technology company in the world it was founded in 1999 in England by Neil Davidson and Simon Galbraith. It is based (headquarters) in Cambridge, England and its motto is “ingeniously simple tools”. At the end of 2012, the number of employees of Red Gate Software was 290. Red Gate Software was named after Via Porta Rossa (Red Gate Street) situated in Florence (Italy). The name of this place was selected because Neil Davidson was used to live in that street. In 2010, Redgate Software acquired HyperBac from Quest Software. Simple Talk is a famous online technical journal of Redgate and it provides support to MS .NET and MS SQL Server developers. There are a lot of products of Redgate Software. 1.2 Objectives of the Report The main objectives of this report are to shed light on the importance of motivation skills and culture of organization to get best results. Moreover, another objective of this report is to study the motivation style and culture of Redgate in detail. Then in the end of the report we would like to relate the theory with practice by combining the important of motivation skills and culture of an organization with the motivation skills and culture of Redgate. 2. Analysis It is important to discuss the importance of motivation and culture for an organization before we discuss the problems related to motivation and culture in Redgate. In analysis part we will discuss motivation and culture in general and then we will discuss the motivation and culture related problems at Redgate. 2.1 Motivation Techniques Motivation is a very important tool for a manager or supervisor. Motivation is necessary to get best results from employees. Motivation is a important to make sure the right way to address an issue is adopted. Motivation can be defined as a theoretical construct used to explain behavior. Motivation is in fact the representation of needs, actions and desires of employees. There are many theories that try to explain the process of motivation. Moreover, there are many types of motivation. 2.2 Culture of an Organization Culture of an organization is a very important aspect of an organization. Organizational culture can be defined as the behavior of employees of an organization within that organization and the meaning employees attach to those behaviors. Culture of an organization refers to set of values, beliefs and principles of organizational members. It can further be attributed as combination of product, technology, history, market, national culture, types of employees, and management style. 2.3 Motivation in Redgate Redgate is a state of the art and technologically advanced company. It is a medium sized company with a friendly style of management. Motivation is an important tool for managers in a company like Redgate. Despite the best possible use of motivation skills, there are many motivation related problems facing Redgate at the moment. These motivational issues are present in management and also in lower staff. These motivational issues exist due to many reasons. One of the most important motivational issues facing Redgate is unclear expectations or requirement. In this motivation problem in Redgate, managers and supervisors does not make proper expectations with the employees and does not associate due requirements from the staff. Due to this motivation issues evolve and the results of the work of employees may not match the goals. Another important issue regarding motivation in Redgate is the lack of adequate materials. This problem evolves in Redgate when they get too much projects and they have to work heavily. Due to loads of work, many new hired employees and interns face shortage of equipments like, computers, printers and internet access. Due to this equipment shortage problem, employees feel undervalued and they get frustrated that the company is not providing them with necessary equipments. On the other hand, the productivity of the organization also suffers when employee are unable to complete work on time. Another important issue that causes motivation issues in Redgate is the personal business investment problem. This problem can be explained by the example that when management is going to make a decision with the consultations of management, it does not involve lower staff in consultation process. Due to this, lower staff also feels undervalued and assumes that there is no value of opinion of lower level staff. Another motivation problem evolves in Redgate due to lack of employee rewards or pay. This problem evolves when company does not pay to employees as per their education and skills. Another problem associated with this problem is the issue of bootstrap. Bootstrapping is a phenomenon in which employees remain at a post for long time and without further promotion. These problem cause serious motivational issues thereby making employees frustrated and frustrated by the passage of time. 2.4 Culture of Redgate Culture of Redgate is very good and friendly but there are still some problems that are affecting the performance of the employees badly. One of the most important issues in the culture of an organization evolves due to the presence of culturally diverse employees. Diversity issues are common in organizations in the UK where people from all over the world come and work in organizations. So being a UK based company, Redgate is also culturally diverse company. People from different religions are working in Redgate. Moreover, people with different color, culture, creed, and ethnicity are not easy to manage. Due to these problems Redgate is facing many issues dealing with employees. One of the main problems facing Redgate is based on the principle of confrontation vs. consensus-building. This problem evolves because the communication style of a person depends on his cultural background. For example in Japanese language, there are 19 words to say ‘no’. Moreover, people with Asian background always try to build consensus and they always try to avoid direct confrontation. So it shows that it is easy to motivate an Asian. On the other hand, Americans are bold and they like to speak and listen things that are based on logic no matter someone like it or not. Another cultural problem faced by Redgate is due to the principle of high-context vs. low-context. This problem stems from the management styles of the people from different cultures. For example, people from Western Europe manage teams and employees in a different way. Moreover, people from Asian background manage people in a different way. Similarly, people from American background manage teams and employees in different style. The people who belong to Western cultures like to behave friendly with their team members. On the other hand, people from Arabic backgrounds like to adopt authoritarian style of management. Another important issue related to culture of Redgate takes its roots from the religious background of the employees. Some employees are more conscious about their religious believes whereas some employees do not believe in any religion. So due to these extreme believes, some conflicts are evolving in Redgate and causing many problems for the organization. people these days do not pay more attention to religion but amazingly, the big events of all nations are associated with religions. Like Christmas and Easter of Christians is a religious event. Hanuka of Jews is a religious event. Eid-ul-Azha of Muslims is a religious event. Holi and Diwali of Hindus is a religious event. So during the season of these religious events, people confront with many events of bullying and hate speech which causes damage to the culture of the organization. 3. Recommendations After discussing motivation and culture in Redgate, we are now in a position to suggest some important tips to Redgate to achieve best results by making the use of motivation skills and culture of the organization. We have discussed some motivational problems of Redgate in the analysis part. These problems are very important to address to keep their employees motivated. First of all they must provide all necessary tools and equipments to their employees to avoid frustration of employees and to avoid waste of time of employees. Moreover, the managers and supervisors in Redgate must expect from the employees as per the goals of the business. On the other hand the management of Redgate must involve the lower staff in the decision making process. This is a best way to reduce the frustration of the employees and to motivate them to work in the best interest of the organizations. Monetary benefits are good tools to motivate people. Redgate should try to avoid bootstrapping and it must provide benefits and promotions to workers as per their education and skills. They also need to make some changes in the culture of the organization. It is culturally very diverse company. People from different countries and regions are working in this company. The work force of Redgate is also diverse in terms of religion and believes. Due to this diversity many conflicts and problems can evolve. So they need to keep an eye on diversity related issues to make their environment good. Management style of the management must be good enough to work with people from different cultures because people from different regions and cultures need different ways to be motivated. 4. Conclusion At the end of this case study report, we can conclude that there are many distinguishing features of an organization that differentiate one organization form the other. This differentiation with respect to other organization can either be positive differentiation or it can be negative differentiation. Among the most important distinguishing features, organizational culture and motivation are among the top in terms of importance. Motivation and Culture are very important aspects of an organization. It is very important for business students to study motivation and culture of an organization in detail. We have discussed the importance of motivation and culture in an organization. We have seen that there are many problems related to motivation and culture in Redgate. Motivation is an important tool of management of their management. Among motivation problems at Redgate, the problem of the lack of equipment is of utmost importance. This problem has two effects. One effect is the waste of time of employees due to non availability of resources. The second problem is the frustration of the employees that they are not provided with equipments to work. People also get discouraged in this company because they have no say in decision making. Some of the employees are provided with the due monetary benefits and promotion. Moreover, managers do not expect much from the workers. All these problems discussed here must be addressed at the earliest to motivate employees. Among the culture related issues, the issues that evolve due to diversity at workplace are of utmost importance. They must harvest such kind of culture in which no one offend people from other cultures and beliefs. The presence of people from different cultures result different management styles and working styles. So due to this reason managers and workers must also consider the rules of the organization first and put the rules and regulations of the organization top on the priority list. They must train employees to promote the culture of mutual cooperation and to put all personal biasness and differences behind. References Redgate Software. (2012). The Book of Redgate. http://www.red-gate.com/assets/our-company/about/assets/book-of-red-gate-2012.pdf Read More