What motivates people at work? Essay

There capture been a large number of theories dateing into pauperization at work and the factors which affect it. In this essay I forget be exploring three key theories in the ara, each provides a in truth disparate angle on what egg ons employees at work.To begin I every last(predicate)ow for look at a need possibility of motif, Herzbergs Two-Factor scheme (1959), as the name suggests need theories concentrate on the needs of the employee as the main source of motivation. Herzberg built upon Maslows hugely powerful Hierarchy of Needs (1954). Conducting research on 203 American accountants and engineers he looked at what makes employees well-provided and dissatisfied at work. Contrary to Maslows opening Herzberg suggests that motivation is not measured on one linear scale from satisfied to dissatisfied, precisely rather the two are independent of each opposite and form separate scales. The first group which determines dissatisfaction (or de-motivation) are named Hygiene factors which include our basic needs such as our pay and safety. The addition or improvement of hygiene factors can only lead to contentment in employees and not motivation.The second group which determines satisfaction are named Motivators, these include our inner needs such as our need to achieve, to be recognised and minded(p) responsibility. A decline or lack of motivators will not de- go employees, solely adding them can lead to emergenced motivation. Research on the theory has provided twain support and criticism. To begin with the theory is supported by the number of happy replications as reported by Hodgetts and Luthans (1991), these replications afford taken place across the world and in a wide variety of different line of merchandise sectors and p all toldiate achieved the alike(p) results. The main area of criticism for the Two-Factor theory natess the methodological analysis of the research it was derived from. Soliman (1970) pointed pop out that the tendency of subjects to give socially desirable answers would have impacted the answers participants gave to Herzbergs open ended questions. In addition there is a tendency for stack to attribute negative situations to otherwises and positive to themselves e.g.I matte satisfactionwhen I achieved and was recognised for it or I was dissatisfied when the political party paid me late. This biased attribution of satisfying and dissatisfying situations is another interpreter of a problem with the methodology. More problems with the methodology are visualisen by accommodate and Wigdor (1967). After re-analysing Herzbergs original results they concluded that factors described as creation either a hygiene or motivator were not in return exclusive. In many cases the addition of Hygiene factors can act to motivate good deal, likewise a lack of Motivator factors can causes dissatisfaction. up to now as well as looking at the empirical research on the theory we must also think about its value when practically employ to the workplace.In support of the theory it does, to a certain point makes sense. If one month you miss out on pay or are required to do nighthing dangerous you would be dissatisfied. At the same time employees do not intuitive feeling satisfied or motivated by safe working conditions or be paid on time because it is what they expect. The same goes for Motivator factors, an employee would feel more than satisfied if they original a mortalal compliment from the boss but it is incredible that they would feel dissatisfied if it didnt happen. They certainly wouldnt expect it every day. withal one key problem with the theory is that it fails to take into account the battle between satisfaction and motivation. An employee whitethorn be satisfied at work, they may obtain all the motivator factors outlined in the theory but this does not mean they will automatically be motivated to be as productive as they can be.Another criticism is that the theory does not account for individual differences, employees are not all the same, some may be more materialistic and be motivated more by monetary reward. Some strive for achievement and are volition to do anything to gain the respect of their peers and high status in spite of appearance the calling while others may be content with their job and just deficiency to keep their heads down and get on with it. Put exactly, while being given responsibility may satisfy some people others may find it an unpleasant addition to their job. In summary the Two-Factor model and its financial support research have been found to have good re-test and cross cultural reliability but has been heavily criticised for its validity and methodology. Although this weakens the value of the theory it has thus far been extremely influential and can be practically employ in most organizations as a method by which staff motivation can be monitored and improved.Next I am going to look at the coating Setting Theory Locke (1969). The basic premise of the theory is that by rectifyting a remainder you can augment a somebodys motivation and performance. This increase in performance is payable to the motivational influence of goals in 4 key areas (as cited in timber 2010). The first is that goals help to focus a mortals fear and behaviour in the correct figureion. Secondly goals have the effect of increase the effort a soulfulness is willing expend. Thirdly the addition of a goal increase the amount of a time a person will spend on a specific task. Finally they motivate an individual to seek out and apply relevant knowledge and skills in order to complete the goal. This is how the goal setting theory explains why we are motivated by goals. In addition to this Locke and Latham (1990) adjust forward 5 key features of a goal which determine how motivating it is, to be good goals must be1) Specific, a goal which gives a specific target is more motivating accordingly goals wh ich simply require a person to do your best. 2) Measurable, a measurable target enables a person to track their progress towards the goal and alter their effort and method accordingly. 3) Time-Bound, applying a deadline to achieving the goal enables a person to better manage their time and effort. 4) Challenging, it is unlikely that an easy goal will motivate a person to put in maximum effort. By making the goal challenging people are refer and required to work harder in order to achieve. 5) Attainable, having a goal which is impossible to achieve is likely to de-motivate a person, why would a person put effort in if they have no misfortune of success. It must be accreditedistically possible to achieve goals. The theory provides a good detailed description of both how and why people are motivated.It has been one of the most widely researched areas within motivational psychology and is still very much an evolving area. Research by Latham and Baldes (1975) put the core given of th e goal setting theory to the test in a real world setting. They introduced the goal of reaching 94% efficiency in the lade of trucks (previously at just 60%) to a group of employees in a logging company. The employees were motivated by the goal and successfully achieved (and often surpassed) it and move to work consistently at the target rate. To have achieved the same increase in efficiency without coating theory (by purchasing more trucks) would have cost the company $250,000. Another example of research supporting the Goalsetting theory comes from Blumenfeld and Leidy (1969).They found that 55 engineers in charge of semisoft drinks machines checked considerably more machines when set a goal then when no goal was set. Furthermore it was found that engineers checked more machines when set a challenging goal then if set an easy goal. A key problem with the methodology of both pieces of supporting research preceding(prenominal) is that there was little control over extraneous va riables. For example Latham and Baldes (1975) did show a huge increase in productivity, but this may not have been due to the addition of a goal. Perhaps the competitive character of the loggers lead to an increase in efficiency, it may also have simply been down to the increased supervision the workers received at the time. Again it is main(prenominal) to look at the theory in terms of its practical practical application in the workplace. Its key strength is that it does appear to work as a method of increasing motivation, however again the theory fails to account for individual differences. Employees who are already highly motivated at work would proceeds from goals being set it would push them and enable them to prove themselves.However other less confident employees may not enjoy the competitive spirit of workplace goals and targets, it could even cause stress and discomfort and leads to a diminution in motivation. In addition, when you direct a persons financial aid and e ffort towards one specific goal you may get a decrease in performance in other tasks. A goal may not increase motivation but just direct it. For example if you give hospital staff the target of seeing all patients within 10 minuets they may achieve the target but at the cost of service and fictional character of treatment. This would obviously be detrimental to the quality of work on the whole. A final point to consider is that all employees have different levels of ability so in order for goals to push an employee but still remain achievable they must be by the piece tailored.As well as being impractical in a large business Equality theories (discussed next) would suggest that giving some people easier targets than others may actually lead to a reduction in motivation. On the whole Goal Theories are very useful and practical when applied in the right circumstances. Perhaps one weakness of both the theory and supporting research is in its inability to account for causes of demotiv ation in an organization. However the research shows that goals do motivate people at work, yet when applied to an organizational environment we see possibledrawbacks and potential tall(prenominal)ies which are difficult to overcome.The final theory I am going to examine is the organizational umpire Theory which builds upon the equity theory put forward by Adams (1963). The organizational Justice theory has been constructed from theory and research contributed by a momentous number of psychologists, certainly too many to list in their entirety. However two key contributors worth noting are Greenberg (1987a) who coined the term Organizational Justice and conducted much of the early research and Mowday (1987) (cited in Greenberg 1990) who has had a significant impact on the theory. The core belief of the theory is that employees can be motivated (or de-motivated) by their perception of how fairly they are being toughened at work in comparison to their colleagues. The theory sugg ests three different types of justice which can be sensed. The first is Distributive Justice, which looks at the fulfilment to which an employee thinks they are being fairly rewarded for the work they put in compared to others, the theory suggest that a person will either increase or decrease their level of input in order to balance out and restore equality.The second is Procedural Justice, this looks at how fair a person feels the procedures and systems are within a business, for example is holiday date allocation fair. The third is Interactional Justice, this is the least researched area and compromises of two parts Informational Justice describes how well informed a person is about the decisions taken within a business, using holiday as an example again it may be explained to an employee why they can not have the holiday they asked for. social Justice describes the extent to which someone feels they are treated with respect. As with the Goal setting theory there has been a con siderable amount of research put into Organizational Justice theory. In a recent development Zapata-Phelan, Colquitt, Scott and Livingston (2009) (cited in Woods 2010) looked at how procedural and interaction justice cause motivation and in turn performance. They found that when a person perceived high procedural justice in an organization there was an increase in motivation, leading to an increase in performance.