Work Environment in the 21st Century - Coursework Example

Work environment in the 21st Century Name Course Name and Code Date Word count: 2989 Contents Contents 2 The role of money in motivation 3 How to improve team performance 11 Stage one: What is your goal? 11 Stage two: What is the reality? 12 Stage three: what are your options? 12 Stage four: What will you do? 13 References 14 The role of money in motivation The amount of money that employees need to earn is a tricky issue and varies from different condition and environments. Importantly, the problem of determining salary is not as a result of limited resources since even if resources were unlimited it would be intricate to determine an amount that would satisfy an employee. Intuitively, one can think that higher pay perks can motivate an employee to give good results, nevertheless scientific research illustrates that the relationship between motivation, compensation and performance is very intricate. Furthermore, when an employee is given the authority to determine how much he is supposed to earn he will not enjoy doing his job (Müller, 2011). Evidently, money motivates some individuals when they are under specific conditions, therefore the main concern should not be whether money motivates employees, the most important question needs to be: what is the impact of money on most employees motivation at the workplace so that there can be higher performance? It is pretty obvious that the response to such as question is “NO”. There are specific circumstances, which should be observed before money can motivate an individual. Firstly, money needs to be something that is very fundamental to the person. Secondly, the person needs to consider money as a direct reward for good performance at the work place. Thirdly, the marginal amount of money given for good performance by the person should be considered to be very fundamental. Lastly, the administration needs to have discretion to give rewards for high performing employees with a lot of money. Noteworthy, not all employees consider money to be important. There are some employees who have person for their job, therefore with or without more money, they will still work better. In most cases, high achievers are always motivated intrinsically. Conversely, money is key to employees with low self-drive for their job, therefore they need something that will motivate them to work better. In some cases where there are union, pay increase is determined through collective bargain agreement and not performance. In some cases, pay increase is determined by an employee’s job title. When pay increase is determined by an employees job title more employees will be determined to work harder so that they can please their employers who will in turn promote them to a higher job title. Some employees go back to school so that they can get more academic qualification that will enable them get better pay. Nevertheless, going back to school is never a guarantee that an employee will get more pay but it will enable him get more opening as a result of higher academic qualification therefore he may end-up leaving the organisation for another better paying job. Each job has a certain pay grade and this implies that the manager or boss is not supposed to pay more than the job grade of the employee even if the employee is doing a pretty job (McConnell, 2011). Mostly, managers have limited funds to run organisations therefore they have to plan well how they will spend allocated money (Daft, 2008). Therefore, money can motivate employees to work better but in most cases managers do not have enough funds to help them run their affairs. “In the hotel industry, the work has a high turnover and is labour intensive; nonetheless the sector is characterized by low pay, low job security as well as few opportunities for advancement” (Chiang, 2006, p.1). Therefore comprehending the attitude of hotel workers has been an important issue for research in the hotel sector as well as other sectors in the economy. Different research studies have attempted to identify aspects that motivate employees. Evidently, pay increase or money rewards alone cannot guarantee improved performance. Job security, good wages, improved working conditions as well as opportunities for development and advancement aid in motivating employees. There are other aspects that motivate employees, for instance, appreciation, interesting work, trust, recognition, tactful discipline, feeling of being valued, as well as sympathetic help (Chiang, 2006). “Employees require time management ability, intelligence, job skills; job knowledge however devoid of motivation an employee is not likely to advance his career. Motivation is an intricate aspect and it involves money, personal, and relationship as well as career goals” (Chiang, 2006). Motivation aspect is considered to include monetary bonuses, pay, and opportunity for career advancement, promotion, recognition, job security and benefits. It is not easy to motivate an employee since each employee has different desires, needs, capabilities as well as accomplishments. According to Shell (2002), money is an intricate aspect in according to the motivational process. Even though the importance of money is always ignored by behavioural scientists, money is pertinent in employee motivation. Money is fundamental for various reasons. Firstly money gives a measure of recognition, achievement, advancement and status (Kumar, 2009). Secondly, money is something tangible and is measured by its receipt. Thirdly, money is the variable, which often can have a positive impact in reinforcing various motivational aspects, because it is manipulated by the administration and can considerable raise motivation among subordinates. On the other hand, careless handling of remuneration issues results in a negative impact on performance of employees (Hill, 2010). When an employer understands the role of money in motivation he is likely to ensure that he carries out activities in a manner that will help the employee benefits so that he can be motivated to work (Willis, 2013). When an employer understands the impact of money on an employee he will be able to determine what other aspects need to be integrated so that the employee can be productive. It will help administrators to take corrective measures in instances that a professional employee is undertaking his tasks ineffectively (Shell, 2002). Managers should also be aware of factors such as age when assessing motivation of employees, since when one becomes older his motivation for the job declines considerably (Reece, 2013). Therefore he ought to devise strategies of addressing such issues since money may not be the main issue here since most of the old aged people have long experiences and are the best paid in most organisations (Shell, 2002). b) How to develop effective self-directed team Usually, self-directed team is considered to be a “leaderless” group of workers that take the position of supervisor and accomplish various management responsibilities (Tozer, 2012). In most cases, attempts to have effective self-directed teams have collapsed owing to the fact that there is neither skill nor experience to guarantee its fruitful results (Production, 2008; Anderson, 2012) There are some guidelines that when followed they increase the chances of self-directed teams becoming successful (Nutt, 2009). Some of these guidelines are not easy and require some work however these guidelines reduce the mistake the management makes when they are trying to develop self-directed work team. a) It is pertinent to have a detailed vision explaining the teams will easily fit in the structure of the whole organisation. There should be a common leadership vision, which is supported by the entire management team, and there should be a proper comprehension of the notion of team (Cork, 2007). b) With the vision, the organisation is supposed to be ready to change its culture to one that supports effective functioning of the team. Teams can counter what has been done by an organisation; this therefore necessitates the need to have thorough preparation before starting this process so that the program can have fruitful activities with minimal criticism from team members as well as members of the organisation. Change in the team should not be done overnight it needs to be an incremental process since when it is not incremental team members may not be in position to understand the logic behind the change in philosophy and vision. Therefore team members will be able to understand what the team can do for them. The administration should be in position of understanding the organisation’s culture; this will make it easy for the management to change the culture (Pietri, 2014; Brounstein, 2009). c) The organisation is required to have the required resources so that it can commit itself to this kind of shift in people, money and time. In this case an upfront investment is required and it will have a long-term time frame (Pietri, 2014). It will need personnel to be trained and develop effective teams. Initially, consultants of in-house personnel can help in developing the team, however in the long-term supervisors and facilitators need to be present so that the team can work effectively. The administration should conduct a thorough assessment of the resources and needs to be committed to the attainment of vision of the team (Pietri, 2014). d) When developing a team training is an instrumental aspect (Baird, 2013). Members of the team need to have training on skills that allow them to work well in a team, for instance, effective communication, assertiveness, decision making skills, conflict management along with other skills which will aid people work together effectively (Floyd, 2010). Supervisors and facilitators should also be trained on how they can work well with teams to ensure maximum results (Eitington, 2007). For a team to work well the supervisor should be have counselling and coaching skills so that he can pass this skills easily to team members (Robbins, 2009). e) Upon team members completing training it will require some time before members become familiar with each other and nurture the novel skills (Pietri, 2014). Upon completing training, the development needs to commences, this development is very important since this is what translates from what team members were trained on and it should be taken seriously since it will determine whether the team will be fruitful or not. In most cases many organisation’s believe that upon completing training an organisation can begin to function nonetheless this is not the scenario since there are some teams that will need more time to develop (Pietri, 2014). The administration should be patient and available people to help in the development project. Apparently, development is supposed to be a continuous process and when it is implemented well it is not supposed to end (Pietri, 2014). f) Performance expectation of teams needs to be developed so that they know what it is expected from them (Parikh, 2010). The team needs to have performance standards that are attainable since when the performance standards are above the ceiling then team members will not be motivated to attain the standards since it will be above their means (Burke, 2010). The administration needs to measure teams performance so that they can determine whether the team is attaining its expected standards or not. Measuring team performance also helps in determining whether the standards will be attained or not or whether the standards need to be revised. g) There should be a feedback mechanism to determine what the team is doing. The feedback method is instrumental in determining corrections that need to be executed in the organisation. Incessant improvement in the team can be attained when team members their position in relation to the established standards. When team members know they are likely to improve compared to when they are not aware. h) The team needs to have boundaries in which it will operate (Pietri, 2014). Team members need to understand their limits of empowerment. In most cases, organisations begin and want the team members to make all the required decisions however in some cases decisions made by the team are not appropriate (Pietri, 2014). When the administration corrects decisions it results in a setback in development of team as well as its long-term effectiveness. It important that teams begin with boundaries that are narrow; this involves simple decisions until they can understand the process of decision-making. When teams expand they expand their boundaries and therefore they can take part in intricate decision-making process. Nonetheless, teams need to make decisions that have an impact on their team (Pietri, 2014). i) Team members should not have the mentality that self-directed work teams do not require the intervention of the administration. Even though the team can take responsibilities of the administration it does not mean that they will not require guidance or coaching since when they ignore guidance or coaching it will imply that the team is likely to collapse (Pietri, 2014). c) Resolving team conflict Conflicts in teams occur when there are disagreements between team members. Traditionally, conflict is considered to be negative, nonetheless when conflict is handled properly it can help in improving performance of the team. For instance, when team members disagree on something, the warring members can analyse the scenario and determine the best course of action. When conflict in an organisation is handled properly it can result in effective results since it will result in improved performance. Teams develop strategies for handling conflict and this is based on their aim of satisfying their concerns versus another party. The key aspect refers to levels in which the person is assertive against cooperative in his approach to the conflict. a) The competing approach depicts assertiveness to get an individual’s objective and needs to be instituted when quick, decisive action is pertinent on vital aspects or unpopular actions. b) The avoiding approach does not reflect cooperativeness or assertiveness. This approach is most appropriate when the issue in question is trivial, when there are minimal chances of winning, when there is need to delay gathering information. c) The compromising approach depicts moderate levels of both cooperativeness as well as assertiveness. This approach is apt when objectives on the two sides are important, when the rivals have equal power and they would like to split their differences or in scenarios that individuals need to get to an expedient or temporary solution when they are experiencing time pressure. d) The accommodating approaches depicts a high level of cooperativeness that works appropriately when individuals know that they are not right, when the issue is important to more than one person. e) The collaborating approach depicts both high levels of cooperativeness and assertiveness. This approach is vital since it helps warring parties to win, however it requires considerable negotiation and bargain. This approach is instrumental when the two parties concerns cannot be ignored. For effective team management members need to vary conflict management style so that it can fit into particular scenario (Marcic, 2012). How to improve team performance The Grow model can be very helpful in improving team performance. The GROW model indicates growth through setting of goals (Passmore, 2010). GROW model comprises of four-stage coaching process that easily forms goal-setting session with client and it adds a wider understanding to the coaching conversation (Rostron, 2009). GROW model stages: Stage one: What is your goal? Rostron (2009) states that this stage involves outlining of client’s main goals, their comprehensive goals as well as the goal for the specific coaching conversation. GROW is all about working with the removal of internal and external impediments to goal achievement. Moreover, it helps client discover the kind of goals, for example, dream goal, end goal, performance goal Rostron (2009). Questions include: What do you anticipate from the session? Where do you expect to be before the end of our union? What would be most helpful item for you to acquire after this session? How do you plan to achieve your values? Why do you anticipate fulfilling this goal? Stage two: What is the reality? Rostron (2009), this stage the coach invite clients to say his story that is What is presently going on the client’s side relating to the goal (Garvey, 2010). The coach welcomes self-assessment. At this instance the coach may make the client redefine the goal in case it is not precise enough. The reality questions ensure a straightforward way of self-assessment. Reality questions emphasize on the value of the action as well as the difference between thinking and action Rostron (2009). Possible questions may include: What steps have you made so far? What were the consequences of the action? What are the in-house obstacles? What are the in-house blocks? What can you do well this time? Stage three: what are your options? Rostron (2009) explains that this stage centres on what the client may possibly do. This will involve possible strategies and action plans, development of other perceptions and brainstorming options. What the client was in position to do, from real to fantastic thinking? This stage involves generating various options (Law, 2013). Many people have implicit assumptions such as: I have never done it, we have never done it, and I will never be permitted to do it. This stage is aimed at ensuring the client stops finding reasons why he should not do something. It encourages brainstorming of options exclusive of making judgment as well as elimination of assumption, which limit the client form their desired goal (Gorell, 2013). Some questions, which are asked in this stage, include: What if you have more staff? What do you expect? What if that obstruction did not exist? What are the disadvantages and advantages? What are you ready to entrust yourself to? What else? Stage four: What will you do? Rostron (2009) states that this stage refers what the clients will do. What did the learner learn? What will they do differently? What is likely to change? This involves summing up as well as writing down the steps, which are to be taken to realize the goals set in the first stage. This stage directs the client into decision-making mode with exactness as well as detailed timelines. In short this stage is about what the client will do (Antcliff, 2010). Questions asked here are: What will you do? When will you do? Will the action deliver your goal? Which obstacles are you likely to encounter along the way? Who is expected to know? References Anderson, D. (2012). Organization Development: The Process of Leading Organizational Change. London: SAGE. Antcliff, S. (2010). Life Coaching - Made Simple. London: Lulu.com. Baird, R. (2013). The Four Components of a Fast-Paced Organization: Going Beyond Lean Sigma Tools. Boca Raton: CRC Press. Brounstein, M. (2009). Managing Teams For Dummies. Hoboken: John Wley & Sons. Burke, M. G. (2010). Self-management and Leadership Development. Cheltenham: Edward Elgar Publishing. Chiang, C.-F. (2006). 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