Motivation in the Workplace - Research Paper Example

Motivation in the Workplace Introduction One of the greatest assets in an organization has been noted to be human resources and that a vital component of management should be motivation of this resource (Bal, Jong, Jansen & Bakker, 2011). Motivation of human resource leads to maximized performance and achievement of higher corporate success. Thus, this paper seeks to define motivation in the context of workplace. Since the focus would be on industrial/organizational (I/O) psychology which defines the study of organizational and work setting behavior and the application of principles, methods and facts on psychology to groups and individuals in a work setting according to Gardner & Wright (2009), theories that influence motivation would be analyzed. The focus would be on the two categories of motivational theories; content and process. There has been no single definition of motivation universally adopted in the context of workplace. But Teck-Hong and Waheed (2011) define it as conditions in an individual or the environment which influence persistence, direction and strength of relevant organizational behavior, holding organizational constraints and individual abilities constant. This thus encompasses the decisions on why, how and when efforts would be allocated to an activity. While reviewing the similarity and distinction in constructs between personality and values, Parks and Guay simply adopt the definition of motivation as “an energizing force that induces action” (2009, p.679). These researchers appreciate motivation as a psychological process that involves arousal, intensity, direction and persistence in voluntary action for specific goals. A similar postulation by Lee and Tan (2012) appreciates that psychological empowerment would affect the intrinsic motivation of an employee. Importance of Motivation Of the three components that make up individual creativity (motivation, creative thinking skills and expertise), Lee and Tan (2012) singled out motivation as being the easiest and fastest to achieve. In their study to determine the factors that affect creativity and performance of an employee at workplace, these researchers noted that intrinsic motivation would trigger stimulation of high level creative effort and persistence at work. Extrinsic rewards complement intrinsic motivation to realize achievements of organizational goals and builds efficiency among employees. In human resource management, a complex set of factors interrelated to each other have been noted to motivate humans and include need for affiliation, money and desire for meaningful work. It has been observed that employees would seek varied goals, have diverse talents to undertake their work and thus add unique values to the organization (Gardner & Wright, 2009). This conceptualization of employees as possessors of potential talent implies that managers have to find appropriate ways to best tap into them. This would be achieved by understanding the theories that shape up motivation in humans at workplace, as Aworemi, Abdul-Azeez and Durowoju (2011) in their definition of motivation appreciated the interaction between humans and the environment. Theories of Motivation Aworemi, Abdul-Azeez and Durowoju (2011) categorize motivation theories in workplace into two; content and process theories. According to these researchers, content theories examine on what motivate humans, that is, what arouses or energizes behavior. These famously include the Maslow’s need hierarchy, McClelland’s three-factor theory and Herzberg’s two factor theory. On the other hand, process theories examine the specifics in motivation process and include the Vroom’s expectancy theory and self-efficacy theory among others. Content process theories. Maslow’s need hierarchy sums up various human needs into five essential categories arranged hierarchically. At the bottom of the hierarchy would be psychological needs including food, water, shelter and air. This would be followed by safety needs that describe the need for a secure and stable environment free of pain, illness or threat. Belongingness would encompass interaction with people, love and affection. Self esteem would be realized through social esteem such as recognition and respect from others and personal achievement. Self actualization ranks top in the hierarchy which describes the self-fulfillment need (Kroth, 2007). As noted by Rast and Tourani (2012), the theory postulates that people would be simultaneously motivated by several needs but the strongest source of motivation would be the lowest unsatisfied need. The Herzberg’s Motivation-Hygiene theory, also referred to as the two-factor theory analyzed the importance of motivation in a given workplace by focusing on job satisfaction levels among employees in an organization (Rast & Tourani, 2012). The theory analyses the nature of workman and its potential of arousing dissatisfaction and satisfaction. Motivators that would arouse satisfaction have been implied by Teck-Hong and Waheed (2011) as recognition, responsibility and achievement in their study of satisfaction in the retail sector in Malaysia. Discrepancies in motivators would cause employee dissatisfaction, referred to as hygiene factors (Bal et al. 2011). Examples of these include managerial style, organizational policy and relations with other employees. Hygiene factors indicate the importance of managers in focusing of what employees should do and in case of discontent, the conditions should be changed. Finally, the McClelland’s Learned Needs theory adopts a psychological principle appreciating nurture being equally important as nature (Rast & Tourani, 2012). This means that the activities one interacts with would be as important as the birth qualities. The theory encompasses the need for achievement, n-ach, need for affiliation, n-aff and need for power, n-pow. In a workplace setting, the need for achievement and power postulates that challenges would trigger motivation and consequently causing risk taking for achievement of goals. Yong (2010) gives an example in this context that when one exceeds the given job description, n-pow would recognize the need to control the environment through managerial control for example. The need for affiliation promotes conformity and need for approval hence indicating a less proactive and pluralistic motivation, contrary to the unitary nature of human resource management. Process theory. Considering pre-university students as subjects in a workplace, Yong (2010) describe the development of Vroom Expectancy theory as thoughtful category of motivation theory research. The expectancy theory could be explained in terms of its four components. First, outcomes which describe anticipated consequences of a behavior at work could lead to pay rise, fatigue or the likes. Valence describes the degree of attractiveness of outcome and could include additional workload, good pay or feeling of achievement. Effort performance encompasses the subjective probability of an individual which suggest that effort would result in performance, for example working an extra day for a marketer could mean more sales. Lastly, performance-outcome describes the belief in an individual that performance could cause an outcome such as poor performance causing dismissal. Simply put, motivation levels would be dependent on an outcome’s valence which could be attained through efforts geared towards performance and this performance resulting in the desired outcome. Therefore, other than basic needs, individuals get motivated through having reasonable expectation that their action would cause achievement of desirable goals with the strength of this particular desirability being referred to as valence by Kroth (2007). Acknowledging the limitation in the expectancy theory where the subjectivity of effort and desirability could result in lack of corporate identity, Rast and Tourani (2012) introduce a refined version of the theory referred to as self-efficacy. This describes the confidence or belief of an individual on the possessed capabilities for execution of a specific task in a given workplace as noted by Luthans, Avey, Avolio and Peterson (2011). In terms of motivation, before employees make a choice and initiate effort, they would exhibit tendencies of evaluating and integrating information on their perceived capabilities. The way that the work behavior of an employee would be initiated, the expended effort and the period when the effort would be sustained would be determined by self efficacy. Conclusion Therefore, motivation would be considered as a vital tool in human resources management for enhancement and improvement of the knowledge and ability at workplace leading to better performance. In spite of various researchers evaluating motivation theories, motivation still remains an emotional and subjective issue that would not wholly fit into one of them. As such, managers have the role of selecting appropriate ideas from each theory that exhibit tendencies of supporting organizational objectives and aims. References Aworemi, J. R., Abdul-Azeez, I. A. & Durowoju, S. T. (2011). An empirical study of the motivational factors of employees in Nigeria. International Journal of Economics and Finance, 3 (5), 227 – 233. Bal, P. M., Jong, S.B., Jansen, P. G. W. & Bakker, A. B. (2012). Motivating employees to work beyond retirement: a multi-level study of the role of I-deals and unit climate. Journal of Management Studies, 49 (2), 306 – 331. Gardner, T. M. & Wright, P. M. (2009). Implicit human resource management theory: a potential threat to the internal validity of human resource practice measures. The International Journal of Human Resource Management, 20 (1), 57 – 74. Kroth, M. (2007). Maslow – move aside! A heuristical motivation model for leaders in career and technical education. Journal of Industrial Teacher Education, 44 (2), 5 – 36. Lee, L. & Tan, E. (2012). The influence of antecedents on employee creativity and employee performance: a meta-analytic review. Interdisciplinary Journal of Contemporary Research Business, 4 (2), 984 – 996. 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