The Relationship Between Leadership Behaviors and Employee Motivation - Research Paper Example

The Relationship between Leadership Behaviors and Employee Motivation 0 Executive Summary The current study aimed to determine if leadership behaviors are significantly correlated with employee motivation. Using a sample of 45 employees selected through purposive sampling from 3 companies, the results show that all leadership behaviors have been agreed to. Leadership behaviors overall were positively correlated with employee motivation. These suggest the continued practice of transformational leadership behaviors, to yield positive outcomes of productivity, retention, and high morale. 2.0 Introduction 2.1 Background Leadership is vital for any group to work effectively and cooperatively with each other and with other groups. As defined by Robert House (2004), leadership is the ability of a person to inspire and motivate his or her fellow group mates into contributing to their group’s success and efficiency. And so, leaders must use their power to shape the behavior of their members and as such, motivation is a vital aspect of leadership (Schaffer, 2008). Motivation is the degree wherein a persistent and appropriate effort is contributed so that a goal can be accomplished (Nader, n.d.). Leaders need to motivate their members since people who are motivated exert more effort into accomplishing goals (Tyler, 2002). They do this by creating a working atmosphere wherein people desire to be involved and feel devoted to doing their tasks (Horner, 1997). When a leader is able to influence his subordinates to work towards a common vision; is able to manage the performance of his subordinates well; and form a sense of equity in the way he rewards his people, among others, then all these cause an increase in staff motivation. The latter, in effect, allow for staff to manifest increased productivity; performance of tasks beyond their duties; and sustained commitment to the organisation. These desirable outcomes suggest that studying the relationship between the two is worthwhile. 2.2 Problem The current paper aims to determine if there leadership behaviors influence motivation. 2.3 Objectives The objectives of the paper are as follows: 1) To ascertain perceptions of employees on their superiors leadership behaviors. 2) To determine employees level of motivation on their job. 3) To ascertain if there is a significant relationship between satisfaction with leadership behaviors and employee motivation. 2.4 Scope The research aims to determine the level of satisfaction of employees on the leadership of their immediate boss. Moreover, it is delimited to 15 employees only, sourced from Company X, Y, and Z. Moreover, the instrument used in the research has been self-constructed, and has undergone content validation through a subject matter expert and the computation of Cronbach’s alpha for the subscales, to measure reliability . 3.0 Review of Related Literature 3.1 Motivation Theories From these concepts, the interconnectedness of leadership and motivation is seen. And as explained by Jacobsen (2001), behaviors in a workplace cannot be analyzed if the two aspects are not considered since leaders and followers are part of a single interrelated network. A lot of researches confirm to this, and they have various explanations as to how leaders impact the motivation and performance of their members (Humphreys & Einstein, 2004). But Nader (n.d.) warned that looking at motivation theories in isolation might not be sufficient in understanding human behavior since people are different from each other. Hence, he suggested combining theories to see patterns that may be helpful in such task. Herzberg’s theory (1964) is a well-known motivation theory. He differentiated elements in a work place into two large categories, those that bring satisfaction and those that do not. Herzberg labeled the satisfaction-giving elements as motivators, while the dissatisfaction-causing elements as hygiene factors. This theory connects leadership and motivation since it is the goal of leaders to reduce hygiene factors and increase motivators so that he or she can create an atmosphere that boosts followers’ performances. Other motivation theories concentrate on people’s needs, hence the name need theories. Four well-known theories are under this: Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, Alderfer’s ERG theory, Murray’s manifest needs theory, and McClelland’s theory of needs. These theories depict the needs of people for particular results, and so they behave in ways that are appropriate for the fulfillment of these needs. Given this, leaders must be able to create an atmosphere where people can fulfill their basic and more advanced needs (Horner, 1997; Nader, n.d.). Maslow’s pyramid of needs theory assumes that every person has various needs that determine their behavior. The pyramid contains five categories of needs arranged in a hierarchy. The five needs under Maslow’s theory are 1) physiological needs, the most basic, 2) safety needs, 3) relationship needs, 4) esteem needs, and lastly, 5) the need for self-actualization. People start fulfilling their most basic need and move on toward the most satisfying. If a lower need is not met, people behave in a way that allows them to restore the balance of their needs (Nader, n.d.; White, 2008; Zulehner, 2009). Alderfer’s ERG theory is similar to Maslow’s in that people have various needs arranged in a hierarchy. In contrast to Maslow, Alderfer presented three needs: existence needs, relatedness needs, and growth needs, hence the acronym ERG. And unlike Maslow who believed that a need is not motivational anymore if it has been met, Alderfer theorized that people can jump from one level of need to another, and they can be simultaneously motivated by various needs any time (Alderfer, 1969; Horner, 1997). In contrast to the pyramid of needs and the ERG theories, the manifest needs theory of Murray (1938) recognizes the vastness of people’s needs, and that each person has a different set of needs as others. This is because people experience different environmental factors that activate certain needs. Same as with Murray’s theory, McClelland does not place motivation in a value scale since he believes that people have stable and unchanging personalities that they acquire while they were young. And so, he does not contend with the issues of growth; instead the behavioral consequences of need are discussed. The three areas of need that McClelland defined are 1) need for achievement, 2) need for affiliation, and 3) need for power. People are motivated to perform well in jobs that correspond to their needs (Nader, n.d.; Zulehner, 2009). Other motivation theories include the expectancy theory, equity theory, goal setting theory, and reinforcement theory (Horner, 1997). The expectancy theory believes that people behave in certain ways because of the probability that their actions would result in valuable outcomes (Vroom, 1964). It also calculates total motivation as the sum of intrinsic and extrinsic motivation. And so, leaders must design interesting activities for their members to stimulate intrinsic motivation, and they must organize social environments so that extrinsic rewards may be given with efficient performance. Meanwhile, the equity theory recognizes the motivation of people to balance their input-output ratio with others, while the goal setting theory suggest that people are motivated to attain aims, and their intentions powers their actions. So, leaders should make appropriate goals since it determines the behaviors of workers. Lastly, the reinforcement theory suggests that behavior is influenced by consequences. And so, leaders can motivate people by providing positive and negative consequences (Castelli, 2008). All the motivation theories presented have different notions, but each contributes to a better and general understanding of human actions. Each theory has its own strengths and weaknesses regarding the influence of leadership on motivating people. What is evident from these theories is the shift of attention from the leader to the followers, even though these theories are designed for leadership work. Hence, these theories suggest that leadership is not only about the person in charge but it also includes his or her environment and the people under him or her (Horner, 1997). 3.2 Leadership Theories Using these motivational theories as grounds, leadership theories have been developed over the past years. This includes transactional leadership and transformational leadership. Several studies have been comparing the efficacy of the two, and more studies have sided with transformational leadership as being more effective. However, some scholars believe that the success of applying the two theories is situation-dependent (Rowold & Rohmann, 2009). Transactional leadership regards leaders to use their power upon their followers so they can complete tasks. It relies on clearly defined interaction between the leader and followers. The job of the leader is to define performance goals and clarifies the job of the follower. If the goals are met, then that is the only time the leaders give out rewards (Horner, 1997; Rowold & Rohmann, 2009). Meanwhile, transformational leadership involves identifying means to motivate people by satisfying needs and engaging them more fully in their work. Research on this type of leadership has been increasing for the past twenty years. Transformational leaders are more adept to handling changes and being innovative. They are able to build stable relationships with their followers and encourage the development of every person (Burns, 1978; Horner, 1997). It was identified that transformational leaders are more successful in motivating their followers since they create inspiring visions of the futures, which includes highly desirable goals and values such as the needs indicated by the motivation theorists (Rowold & Rohmann, 2009). Fours aspects build the foundation of transformational leadership, which are known as the 4 I’s of transformational leadership. First is idealized influence, which entails putting the needs of the followers first and being role models for them. Second is inspirational motivation. This is about formulating a vision of future states and creating challenging goals. Inspirational motivation intends to provide meaning and challenge to the performance of followers. Third is intellectual stimulation, which promotes intelligence and problem-solving skills upon leaders. Last is individualized consideration or the treatment of followers as individuals and not just as part of a group (Bass & Avolio, 1994; Dionne, Yammarino, Atwater, & Spangler, 2004). It has been noted that transformational leadership successfully motivates followers, such as in the study of Geijsel, Sleegers, Leithwood, & Jantzi (2003) regarding the effect of transformational school leadership on letting their teachers commit to school reform. Their results showed that transformational leadership affects teachers’ commitment and extra effort. The most important aspects of the leadership style that contributed to such effects are inspirational motivation and intellectual stimulation. However, despite the various sources on the success of transformational leadership on follower motivation, there are only few researches that have studied how the process form leadership to motivation occurs. Ilies et al. (2006) proposed that transformational leaders bring about follower motivation through an affective mechanism that induces positive emotional experiences in followers and through cognitive mechanisms, which includes inspirational motivation. These mechanisms influence three components of follower motivation, namely, direction of action, the intensity of effort, and effort persistence. The affective mechanism brings about follower motivation by inducing positive emotional experiences. These positive experiences cause change in the behavior of followers by influencing them to exert extra effort on important work. Meanwhile, the cognitive mechanism starts by creating a vision for followers. This vision leads to goal setting, wherein the identified goals match with the values of the individual followers. This, in turn, results in integrated or identified motivation, a type of motivation that resembles intrinsic motivation. And so, followers gain more commitment to the goal of the group as well as greater pursuit for it (Ilies et al., 2006). Rowold and Rohmann’s (2009) results agree to this. Their study sought to identify the role of transactional and transformational leadership in non-profit organizations and to see the effectiveness of leadership styles. They assumed that leaders use emotional expressions to motivate their group. Their study concluded that positive emotions such as joy, pride, admiration, and enthusiasm are brought about more by transformational leadership, while negative ones are connected to transactional leadership. Also, transformational leadership is more effective than transactional leadership. 3.3 The Connection between Leadership and Motivation House’s path-goal theory explains leadership and motivation. For the theory, a leader’s most important job is to clarify to followers the means on attaining goals. Since leadership is about motivating people to increased performance, a leader must focus more on attaining job satisfaction for his followers and on creating a way on how followers can gain rewards for their work (Ilies, Judge, & Wagner, 2006; Nader, n.d.) Leadership and motivation are highly connected to each other. The success of both is dependent upon each other. A good leadership style is needed to motivate followers to perform the goals of the group, while follower motivation is needed so that a leader can be successful. As to why this is so, several theories have been presented. Combining these together, it is the leader’s goal to elate a creative vision of the future, one in which the positive effects of their goals are clearly seen. Besides this, a leader must address the needs of his or her followers, as demonstrated by the various motivational theories. By doing so, followers gain meaning for the work that they are doing, and positive emotions are developed within them. These effects motivate them intrinsically and extrinsically. And thus, it boosts their performance and the group’s goal is accomplished (Ilies et al, 2006). 4.0 Methodology The research is quantitative in nature, since this allows for more systematic primary data gathering since they are expediently deployed and analyzed (Bernard, 2006). It adopts a descriptive, correlational research design. The reasons for this type of design are described. It is descriptive since there is an attempt to describe the current levels of leadership behaviors and motivation. Moreover, it is also correlational because the research aims to ascertain if there is a significant relationship between leadership behaviors and motivation. 45 employees from Companies X, Y, and Z, were chosen through purposive sampling, which requires that certain criteria be met before a respondent may be included in the sample (Arquette, 2006). The inclusion criteria are as follows: 1) should have worked in the company for at least a year; 2) must be at least 21 years old; and 3) must have expressed explicit willingness to participate in the study. Prior to the deployment of the questionnaire, it has been content validated, with the help of a subject matter expert. The computation of a reliability coefficient, Cronbach’s alpha, shows .83 and .85 reliability coefficients, for the subscales of leadership and motivation, respectively. These indicate that the subscales are reliable (Arquette, 2006). Content validity ensures that the instrument measures what it was set out to measure (Diamante, 2003). Descriptive statistics were computed, including frequency and percentage distributions, means, and standard deviations. Pearson r was utilized to establish the relationship (Friedman, 1999) between leadership behaviors and motivation. 5.0 Data Analysis and Findings Table 1. Breakdown by Gender Frequency Percent Valid Male 30 66.7 Female 15 33.3 Total 45 100.0 67% of the sample is composed of males, and the remainder is females. Table 2. Breakdown by Age. Frequency Percent Valid 26-30 21 46.7 31-35 21 46.7 36-40 3 6.7 Total 45 100.0 Majority of the respondents at 47% are 26-30 years old and 31-35 years old, respectively. 7% are between 36-40 years old. Table 3. Breakdown by Tenure. Frequency Percent Valid 1- Read More