Work Variables that Enhance Work Performance - Research Paper Example

Lecturer Business Research Approaches Part Reflective Account of the Learning Journey The learning journey went wrong because ofinsufficient understanding of the theories of business research design. Understanding research designs was challenging, because I did not adequately consult the lecturer for further clarification. The learning journey in the business research method was also very challenging, because I engaged in minimal teamwork and knowledge research. The research design is adequately illustrated through the research onion which illustrates six key issues. These issues are research; techniques, time horizons, choices, strategies, approaches, and philosophies. For example, the research techniques explain the approaches of data collection and analysis. Data collection methods include interviews, observation, and questionnaires. The data analysis techniques involve measures of central tendencies like mean, and the measures of dispersion such as variation. I am negatively affected by the failure in the business research method course, and this has generated unhappy feeling. I reacted appropriately by enquiring from the lecturer the academic issues that resulted in the failure. Effective analysis of the course results and feedback from the lecturer illustrated that I have minimal understanding of the research meaning, and the research design theories. Another learning challenge that I illustrated involved poor grammar, because I utilized several contracted verb forms. The course failure was because I did not participate in additional learning processes like; academic team discussions with fellow students, consultations with the course lecturer, and asking questions during research classes. A have developed an action plan that will result in academic success in the business research course. One success approach entails adopting online reading in the area of research methods. Online reading will enhance my understanding, because I will access different perspectives of the business research methods. The second success approach entails engaging in more learning practice. The practice is effectively achieved through participating in academic team discussions, of the issues illustrated in the business research methods course. Part 2: Research on Work Variables that Enhance Work Performance Research Designs on the Work Variables that Influence Job Performance The paper discusses two research designs that will explain the work variables that influence job performance. The management of all organizations has one common major goal. This goal involves the improvement in the productivity of the employees at the workplace. Employee productivity is thus directly and indirectly influenced through four major variables; skills, rewards, motivation, and job satisfaction. Skills illustrate the level of competency and proficiency required to perform the job tasks (Merkle, 2011). Employees who have high skills level will most probably post high job performance. For example, a staff who has high skills in computer applications, will record above average results in the jobs of computer programming or software development. Rewards can be financial or non-financial. Financial rewards like cash bonuses enhance employee productivity. Most employers give bonuses to employees who reach certain performance limits. Thus, majority of employees will put adequate efforts to reach performance goals, leading to high job productivity (Johnason, 2011). Motivation is critical in influencing employees achieve expected goals. Management that encourages employees to set work goals and the strategies of achieving the goals, benefits from high employee performance because of adequate involvement in decision making processes. Job satisfaction is critical for employees. This is because employees satisfied employees enjoy their work and thus the continuously strive to achieve the stated goals and objectives. The paper also discusses two research design approaches that will adequately address the issue of job variables that enhance employee productivity. The two research designs are; exploratory research design and descriptive research design (Muaz, 2013). Exploratory Research Design Exploratory research adequately addresses an issue through the usage of literature review, expert interview, and the focus group interviews (Robson, 2013). Literature review concentrates on using secondary data in the analysis of the research problem (Gorard, 2013). There are very many literary materials that addresses business issues like enhancing employee performance through; job satisfaction, employee motivation, skills development, and reward systems. Skills development is enhanced through adoption of sound training programs. The training programs also ensure career development of the staffs and this continuously builds their competencies. The skills can be developed on-the-job through methods like role playing and coaching, and skills development can also be conducted away from the workplace through approaches like participating in professional seminars. Literature review on employee motivation illustrates that it enhances productivity. Motivation entails the psychological forces which influence the efforts and persistence of employees (Conaty & Ram, 2011). The commonly used motivation approach entails the involvement of employees in the organizational decision making processes. For high employee productivity to be realized, the staffs should be adequately involved in the quality control circles. A team of employees are formed with the main responsibility of addressing work related challenges such as; minimizing costs, enhancing production approaches, and adequately implementing quality improvement strategies. The open book management approaches also enhances employee involvement in company decision making. Through the system, the company provides employees with enough access to the financial records. The staffs then develop adequate strategies for improving revenue and profitability of the company. Diverse reward approaches are used in enhancing employee productivity. The intrinsic rewards include employee autonomy. The staffs must be given adequate space to make job decisions like goals formulation (Collings & Wood, 2013). The interview research approach is a key aspect of the exploratory research design (Freshwater, 2011). The interviews are conducted through two perspectives; expert interviews, and focus group interviews (Ader & Mellenbergh, 2011). The expert interview entails looking for information from professionals in the field of business and human resource management. Businesses and human resource experts are competent enough to provide the relationship between the employees’ output levels and the key job performance variables. The human resource managers of organizations are experts because of the educational, professional and experience competencies. Effective expert interviews are properly scheduled, after providing the expert respondents enough information and seeking the required authorization for the study. In most research studies, the anonymity and confidentiality of the respondent is maintained (Cohen & Arieli, 2011). The expert interview approach provides primary source of information, which is highly credible (Soeters, 2014). The human resource experts entirely agree that employee productivity is positively influenced through; sound reward systems, high employee satisfaction levels, effective staff motivation approaches, and also high skills development levels. Focus group interviews comprise a team of respondents. The data collected is very reputable because different experts provide a unique perspective to the research problem. Majority of the members of the focus group team are professional in a field related to the research study (Scott & Tad, 2014). Research on the factors enhancing employee productivity can be selected from related departments of human resources, operations, and finance. The focus group provides the data used in the research, and it can also be useful during the analysis of the collected data (Shuttleworth, 2011). Thus, literature review and the interview approach are important aspects of exploratory research (Bell, 2011) that adequately addresses the research problem of relationship between the four job performance variables and employee productivity. Descriptive Research Study The descriptive research analyzes the research elements or subjects. It provides accurate profile of events and situations through evaluating the research data (Creswell, 2012). Descriptive research study is thus appropriate for the research involving, the factors influencing employee productivity. One of the research elements that are described is the low output of the employees. The other research element entails the job performance variables (Trochim, 2013). The low productivity of employees is due to various factors. These factors can include; poor remuneration, hazardous work environment, strict supervision, and low work morale. The production manager can adopt sound strategies that will result into increase in the level of staff productivity. The four critical measures that can improve staff productivity are; improvement in the skills levels of the employees, improving the employee reward approaches, enhancing staff motivation, and ensuring job satisfaction of the employees. Descriptive research explains that highly skilled staffs illustrate high performance levels at the workplace (Ulrich, 2014). The production manager should thus adopt effective skill development approaches at the workplace. One of these approaches is the adoption of on-the-job training program. These programs include; role playing, mentorship and job rotation. Job rotation makes the staffs more versatile, and thus they get skills required in various departments. A versatile staff can perform functions in the production department and still work in the administrative sections of the company. The mentorship skills development approach enables senior company staffs, to communicate appropriate skills requirement to the junior employees. Role playing enables the staffs to acquire important work skills by working in a given position in an unofficial capacity (Paauwe & Boon, 2011). Descriptive research explains that the adoption of appropriate reward scheme can enhance employee productivity greatly. The rewards should aim at improving the staff satisfaction and motivation levels. Staffs are usually rewarded through financial rewards like employee share ownership programs. The share programs enable the staffs to improve performance, because they consider themselves as part owners of the organization (Merkle, 2011). Descriptive research explains that staff motivation is very critical for high employee productivity. The motivational theories also show that employee motivation enhances work productivity; for example, Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. Approaches of staff motivation are diverse, and they range from staff recognition to involving employees in the decision making processes. Satisfied employees are usually better performers. The production manger should, hence, ensure that satisfaction levels are maintained at high levels. Satisfied staffs have low turnover and absenteeism rates, and hence their work performance will be high (Klerck, 2012). Comparison of Descriptive and Exploratory Research The discussion focuses on two major research designs. These research categories are; exploratory research, and descriptive research. Exploratory research aims at identifying the causes of occurrence or research problems. In this discussion, the research aims at analyzing causes of poor employee productivity, and then illustrating effective solutions. The two approaches of exploratory research are; literature review, and interviews. Literature review is very effective for the research, because it analyses scholarly data or information in the area of staff productivity improvement. Interviews are also effective in collecting research information from industry experts, like the production managers, human resource managers, and business managers. Exploratory research strives to reach progressively narrower solutions. For example, employee productivity can be enhanced through improving staff reward schemes, which results into increased staff motivation, job satisfaction and generally productivity. The paper also addresses the descriptive research approach. Descriptive research aims at describing the research phenomena, characteristics, population. The synthesized data provides accurate description of the research factors. The descriptive research illustrates that the production manger can improve staff productivity through three major factors. These factors are; increasing the skills and competencies of employees through training, introducing reward scheme that encourages employee to achieve and exceed performance targets, increase staff motivation through involving employees in decision making, and enhancing job satisfaction by giving staffs adequate autonomy at the workplace. Descriptive research analyses the data collected in the research through interviews, questionnaires, observation and literature review. The Most Appropriate Research Design Exploratory research design is the most appropriate. This is because it is appropriate for looking for new insight regarding the phenomena under research (Trochim, 2013). The exploratory research process adequately addresses how the productivity of the employees can be increased through enhancing staff rewards, improving skills, increasing job satisfaction, and ensuring adequate staff motivation. Exploratory research is also the most suitable research technique because it applies effective data collection technique of interviews and literature reviews (Bell, 2011). Exploratory research is deductive method, which is effective in illustrating appropriate theories that ensure adequate data for the research. The theories are illustrated in the literature review research process. Deductive research method also generates effective quantitative data that ensures sound analysis or interpretation of the research data. The interview method of data collection as applicable to the exploratory research design is effective, because it entails the both structured and unstructured interview approaches (Scott & Tad, 2014). The structured interviews are effective in collecting quantitative data like employee performance measurements. The unstructured interviews provided qualitative data like the role of reward schemes in enhancing employee productivity. Thus, the production manager will benefit greatly from using the exploratory research technique, in understanding how rewards will improve job satisfaction, staff motivation, and skill development of employees. References Ader, H. and Mellenbergh, G. (2011). Advising on research methods: a consultants companion. Huizen: Johannes van Kessel Publishing. Bell, J. (2011). Doing your research project. Buckingham: OUP. Cohen, N. and Arieli, T. (2011). “Field research: Methodological challenges and snowball sampling.” Journal of Peace Research 48 (4), pp. 423–436. Collings, D. and Wood, G. (2013). Human resource management: A critical approach. London: Routledge. Conaty, B. and Ram, C. (2011). The Talent Masters: Why Smart Leaders Put People Before Numbers. London: Crown Publishing Group. Creswell, J. (2012). Educational research: Planning, conducting, and evaluating quantitative and qualitative research. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall. Creswell, J. (2012). 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