Management of Human and Organisational Resources - Team and Concepts Limited - Report Example

Resources Management By: + Executive Summary As China’s economy evolves, growing bigger and more competitive in terms of employment opportunities so are the industries in China, specifically in Hong Kong. Most companies prefer hiring or promoting young employees to take on management roles in multi-generational workplaces. So far, the initiative might work at the expense of losing the motivation and drive put into by elder team members. Elder team members are of great significance to an organization and with the management of a younger individual, retaining the older generation becomes a difficult task without implementation of proper management and motivational techniques. This paper is aimed at delivering recommendations to organizations on how to manage, retain and motivate the older generations in their workplace using human resource management strategies. This paper will use Team and Concepts (TnC) Limited as a case study. Introduction Team and Concepts (TnC) Limited is a Hong Kong-based company founded in 2003 by David K. F. Lee. Team and Concepts Limited deals with software engineering and has specialized in web-based software development. Over the years, TnC has developed EditGrid spreadsheet software to be easily accessible online by personal users and organizations. Since it is a software development company, it needs to keep up with the highly mutating and evolving world of technology thus the company has to monitor their software constantly and meet the requirements set by new technology and by competitor companies in their fields. Due to this, they need to hire young employees who are conversant with the new technology and languages in use today but still have to maintain the old generation uses to aid the young employees in the software’s functionality and development thus it is a multi-generation organization that is facing the challenge described above. Literature review: This section introduces the basic motivation concepts and provides an outcome-based theory of work motivation. Elder team members require motivation when working under a younger individual’s management since the organizations mainly dwell on managing and motivating the younger team members. Four organizational theories (motivational theories) are discussed based on their ease of implementation and benefit to the older generation of workers. Self-Determination Theory (SDT) The self-determination theory (Deci and Ryan, 1985), suggests that behaviour can be categorized as a-motivated, extrinsically motivated or intrinsically motivated. Amotivation refers to a situation where individuals are reluctant to get involved in a situation where there is lack of motivation. Intrinsically motivated behaviour relies on the motivation of an individual based on the interest they have in the activity itself. While, on the other hand, extrinsically motivated behaviour is controlled by external sources and motivation such as awards, praise, money or trophies. Deci and Ryan (1985), continue to describe four categories of extrinsic motivation: external regulation, introjected regulation, integrated regulation and identified regulation. External regulation refers to the type of behaviour controlled by external sources in terms of material awards or constant praise and constraints imposed by other people. Introjected regulation refers to a situation whereby after the internalization of the external sources of motivation, the behaviour is reinforced through guilt and anxiety. Identified regulation gives that are highly valued and are results to less pressure in terms of less guilt and anxiety. Integrated regulation refers to when an individual deems the activities as important and thus require no additional motivation as they willingly perform and act well. Motivation based on the self-determination theory can be implemented in a company can give their elder team members motivation but the organization has to identify the type of employees it possesses. This is because mostly, the elder team member are mature and mostly fall under intrinsically motivated and integrated regulation thus tend to be less demanding for attention and willingly perform their duties without the need for external motivations. On the other hand the company can decide to omit an analysis and hold an annual event that is designed to serve and motivate all the four types of behaviours in the company as described by the self-determination theory since the theory suggests that “people prefer to feel they have control over their actions, so anything that makes a previously enjoyed task feel more like an obligation than a freely chosen activity will undermine motivation” (Robbins and Judge 2008) Locke’s Goal-Setting Theory According to Edwin Locke (1968), the Locke’s goal setting theory states that employees are mostly motivated by clearly defined goals and appropriate feedback. Locke (1968) explains that if a company works hard to set clear and achievable goals, it will have provided a source of motivation for their employees who will work hard to achieve the set goals and thus in turn will increase their performance. This theory shows the relationship between people’s performance and difficult but specific goals. Dr. Gary Latham set out to find the effectiveness of this theory and his results indicate that hard goals tend to be more motivating than easy goals, but it also depends on the clarity, challenge, feedback, commitment and task complexity that the organization had pre-considered and pre-planned in the goals. Locke’s argument is that difficult goals tend to direct and focus an employee’s attention to achieving the goal by energizing the person to work harder and by forcing people to be more effective and efficient as difficulty of the goals increases persistence. Based on this, a company can be more effective in motivating their elder team members by offering them better goals to reach. The company has to pre-plan and weigh the challenge to ensure that it is hard but achievable and that the employee’s receive constant automated feedback from their projects to increase their persistence and to help them focus on achieving the goals. Reinforcement Theory Skinner (1977), proposes the reinforcement theory as a motivational theory that aims at rewarding positive performance and neglecting poor performance. It calls for the shaping the employee’s behaviours in order to increase effectiveness and performance. The reinforcement theory is based on Edwin Locke’s goal-setting theory, but it defers in that it focuses on behaviours rather than cognitive factors. This approach is based on the notion that behaviour is caused by environmental factors. In this theory, behaviour is thought to be established on the consequences and not feelings, thoughts or attitudes. Skinner (1977) observed that in a business setting, focusing on rewarding desired behaviour and ignoring undesired behaviour helps the employees develop positive habits and is more likely to encourage the ignored employees to perform better to receive acknowledgement and rewards. In the implementation of the reinforcement theory, an organization must analyse and identify the rewards that are applicable to each employee and to develop a reward that is generally needed by all the employees since setting rewards that cannot benefit other employees will not motivate the less interested and thus they will continue to perform poorly. The organization should time its reinforcements carefully based on the fact that different strategies yield different results. Rewarding a behaviour consistently will yield better results since it turns the reward to a habit thus is expected to be done each year thus those who fail to achieve in previous times will be more motivated to attain the reward the next year. An organization can implement this theory to encourage its older generation workers to perform better by rewarding them thus each they form a competitive field between themselves and end up trying to outdo each other resulting to increased performance and efficiency. Justice and Equity Theory Organizational justice originates from the Equity theory of motivation, (Adams, 1963:1965) that speculates that judgment of equity and inequity are derived from comparing a person and others based on outcomes (what a person perceives to get such as recognition or pay) and inputs (what a person perceives to contribute, such as effort or knowledge). According to Homans (1961), organizational justice theory offers an organization a model that provides perceptions of equality and fairness that can be used as a reference by those employees who feel are treated unequally or unfairly. The theory combines both social psychological theories and psychological contract models to explain fairness judgments in an organization clearly. There are three topologies that have been defined in organizational justice theory to promote fairness in an organization. They are distributive justice, procedural justice, and interactional justice. The justice and equity theory should be implemented into the companies policies as policies signal what the firm believes in what it considers important thus the fairness and equality statements and rules should be incorporated into the organization’s policies to encourage its employees and promote them and to an enhance employees trust and confidence in the organization. The fairness and equity policies establish what the organization perceives as appropriate treatment while also building the employees expectation that the treatment is official and will be adhered to. (Brown. Et al., 2010) When implementing this theory, organizations should consider the old generation and ensure that they are represented to enhance their trust in the organization’s fairness and equity. Organizations should ensure that the older generation has policies to safeguard them in times of need and to protect them from mistreatment by the young generation in charge. Thus maintaining fairness, equity and order in the organization as there will be no conflicts with regard to mistreatment. Research and Discussion: Questionnaire results should be parted of it - 1350 to 1800words According to statistics from the World Fact Book 2015, China has an age distribution of 47.2% in the 25-54 year bracket and 11.3% in the 55-64 year bracket. This shows that the current employment industry target the majority thus leaving out the older generation in most situations. Team and Concepts (TnC) Limited, has been in existence since 2003 and has tremendously grown to from a small innovation company to a large software development organization. TnC Limited has a large database of employees who maintain and update their primary software EditGrid. This calls for hiring of innovative young individuals who are conversant with the current technology in use. However, the company also required the input of older employees who have been with the company since its foundation. This is due to tee organization’s need to maintain the functionality of the software and to ensure that customer satisfaction is met as the introduction of completely new software in the market might cause the organization’s main consumers decline the use of the product. It is due to this that I choose the company as a case study to identify the types of organizational theories they implement to motivate the older generation working in the organization as they are under the management of younger managers. The company’s human resource is made up of mostly young individuals who make up 60% of the organizational employees and the rest consists of elder team members. Research The research conducted involved mainly of questionnaires and voice recording of oral interviews. The questionnaires were addressed to receive information from the elder team members who work in the organization particularly enquiring about fairness and equity in the organization and the type of motivation they receive from the organization if any. The oral interview tailored to target the human resource manager specifically implements the human resource manager in the organization as most of the organizations organizational theories. The interviews conducted was recorded and later transcribed where the transcribed materials were used to provide a qualitative analysis where relevant data that demonstrated, confirmed, refuted or challenged existing theories was selected according to Eisenhardt’s (1989) argument. Logic of literal replication was selected as the preferred method of data analysis to provide reliable information as it calls for comparing and contrasting data collected with theoretical recommendations. Results The results obtained from the oral interview with the human resource manager showed that the company had implemented three of the four discussed organizational theories. TnC has implemented the Locke’s goal-setting theory. He explained that Edwin Locke’s theory forms the basis of the company as the company goal is to be the build the best spreadsheet software in the market today, and that is what has kept the company going for so long. He explained that the company holds quarterly general meeting to discuss the company’s goals and objectives and that the company reviews the achievement reached in each quarter. The organization also implements the self-determination theory whereby the company holds an analysis of its employees and determines the best environment that each individual works best under. This has promoted the performance of many employees since they are comfortable in their working conditions. The HR manager explains that the organization has mainly two types of employees: those who like to work alone and those that like to work as a team. The organization gives each of them the required environment, tasks and goals that match their personality to increase intrinsically motivated behaviour in both the elder members and the young members. The organization has also implements the justice and equity theory whereby they have a written conduct book to guide the employees on the accepted conduct and treatment in the organization. It implements the theory by enforcing consequences in cases of misconduct. The conduct book explains that in work relations no tribe, race or culture is above the other. The organization had a set of rules directed to the young team members concerning the elder team members emphasizing the importance of respect and taking advice. The organization had identified the need to retain old employees and the human resource manager gave as seven reasons why they retain employees why they impose the book of conduct concerning the old generation working in the organization. The HR manager explained that the older team members have been with the organization longer and hence know the companies trade secrets and were with the company from the start thus they tend to be more punctual, dedicated and honest since they are part of the organization they have a sense of pride in the companies achievements and hence will take the extra mile to ensure the company prospers. He added that the elder members are more detail oriented, focuses and attentive to instructions since they have been with the company for longer and understand the consequences of making mistakes in the development of the software compared to the younger team members who have not yet experience a loss of profit and hence their annual bonus due to a software bug. He added that the older workers have more organizational skills, efficiency, and maturity since they are more experienced hence act as role models for the younger workers to emulate and follow. The questioners directed to the older workers results were collected, and the results analysed. The analysis gave the following results. The majority of the workers were employed when the company was founded while other joined in the following year. 80% of the workers interviewed agreed that the issue of justice and equity in the organization was taken care of while the other 20% disagreed. The workers agreed that the organization implemented annual bonuses to all individual when the company’s profits surpass a certain threshold. They agreed that the company implements rules to reduce mistreatment and increase their comfortability in the working areas by implementing the book of conduct. Conclusion and Recommendations In conclusion, the Human Resource Management department in any organization is undoubtedly the most acute aspect of today’s business. A more complete understanding of the perspectives of organizational theories will yield to better performance as the human resource manager will understand the best ways to motivate his employees in any multi-generational organization. Team and Concepts Limited (TnC), has done a tremendous job in ensuring that organizational theories are implemented in the organization. In terms of justice and equity in ensuring that each group (young and old workers) is well taken care of to increase their effectiveness and performance. Although, the organization has implemented these theories there is more to be done to ensure that the workers are fully satisfied. TnC should implement more organizational theories to ensure that elder workers do not feel left out or feel alienated from the younger workers due to the increased growth in the technology sector. The implementation of Locke’s goal-seek theory was a step in the right direction from the beginning as the elder worker in the organization are used to the notion thus are even more productive than the new workers who might not be accustomed to meeting goals and delivering projects and products on time. Organizations should increase the number of retained workers in Hong Kong since they provide a more controllable and effective workplace environment by developing flexible arrangement in their workplaces that sustain the needs of the older workers for those who would not like to work traditional full-time routines. The organization should retain old workers due to their: Strong values, Old workers retain their strong values throughout their work life since they grow to accept the work as part of their daily schedule and part of life thus treat the company as an asset and will always vouch for options and ideas that will see the company flourish. Also due to their experience in the sector they are more likely to produce better performance than the younger generation and will always direct the young generation in the right direction i.e. achieving for the company. Generally older workers are more reliable in terms of productivity, punctuality, delivery of services according to McIntosh (2010) who carried out a research which showed that 97% of the workers among those interviewed agreed that older workers are more thorough, competent and reliable when carrying out tasks assigned to them compared to younger new employees. McIntosh (2010) is among the many who have studied the effectiveness of older workers compared to younger workers who have come up with concrete evidence from their research to support this notion. Although they might not acquire new skill as fast as younger workers, old workers should be retained to motivate the younger workers to emulate their work skill and passion for the job. References list Adams, J.S. (1963) Towards An Understanding of Inequality. Journal of Abnormal and Normal Social Psychology. (67), pp. 422-436. Adams, J.S. (1965) Inequality in Social Exchange in Advances in Experimental Psychology, L. Berkowitz (ed.), Academic Press, New York, NY. pp. 267-299. Davis, E. Brenda. Lockes Goal Setting Theory. Halifax, N.S.: Saint Marys University, 1988. Print. Deci, Edward L, and Richard M Ryan. Intrinsic Motivation And Self-Determination In Human Behavior. New York: Plenum, 1985. Print. Homans, George Caspar, Robert Lee Hamblin, and John H Kunkel. Behavioral Theory In Sociology. New Brunswick, N.J.: Transaction Books, 1977. Print. Kamimura, Gary. Older Workers And Elderly Workers. Olympia, WA: Washington State Employment Security, Labor Market and Economic Analysis Branch, 1995. Print. McIntosh, Paul. Action Research And Reflective Practice. London: Routledge, 2010. Print. Nagamachi, M. Implication And Practices Of Job Redesign For The Elderly Workers. Gerontechnology 3.4 (2005): n. pag. Web. Robbins, Stephen P, and Tim Judge. Essentials Of Organizational Behavior. Upper Saddle River, N.J.: Pearson/Prentice Hall, 2008. Print. Robbins, Stephen P, and Tim Judge. Organizational Behavior. Upper Saddle River, N.J.: Pearson Prentice Hall, 2009. Print. Appendix Questioners To the Human Resource Manager (Oral interview questions) 1. Does your company retain old workers? 2. If yes, why? 3. Do you hire young managers to manage the old workers? 4. If yes, why? 5. Are there any organizational theories implemented in the organization? 6. If yes, how are they tailored to aid the older workers in the organizations? To the Elderly Workers 1. How long have you worked here? 2. Has the organization in any increased justice and equity in the organization? 3. Are there awards given out to those who achieve something in the organization? 4. Has the organization implemented any polices in relation to managing old workers? 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