Introduction “Motivation often is described in terms of direction (the choice of one activity over another), intensity (how hard an employee tries) and persistence (how long an employee continues with a behavior, even in the face of obstacles or adverse circumstances). Motivated employees work harder, produce higher quality and greater quantities of work, are more likely to engage in organizational citizenship behaviors, and are less likely to leave the organization in search of more fulfilling opportunities” (Sadri and Bowen, 2011 p.44). “Motivation is the desire within a person causing that person to act” (Mathis and Jackson, 2011, p.157). Motivation comes from within each one of us in the form of: thoughts, beliefs, ambitions, and goals; motivation has fascinated researchers since the early 1900’s. There are many theorists and theories that have been documented and studied over the course of time in an effort to define, explain, understand, quantify, and impact workplace motivation. For the purposes of this paper, content and process motivation theories will be compared and contrasted, I will choose the most meaningful theory as it relates to designing rewards, describe intrinsic and extrinsic motivators, personally describe what motivates me and finally, reward practices found to be demotivating. Compare and Contrast – Content and Process Theories Motivation theories can be described in two categories, content theories or process theories. Content theories focus on “what” motivates people and it is concerned with individual needs and goals. In contrast, process theories are concentrating on “how” motivation occurs (Zan, 2011). Content theories include Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs, Herzberg’s Two-Factor Theory, Mu... ... middle of paper ... ... Sadri, G., & Bowen, R.C. (2011). Meeting Employee Requirements: Maslow's hierarchy of needs is still a reliable guide to motivating staff. Industrial Engineer: IE, 43(10), 44-48. Mathis, R. L., & Jackson, J. (2011). Human Resource Management (13th ed.). Mason, Ohio: Cengage. Zan, O. (2011, October). An Introduction To Motivation Theory [Blog post]. Retrieved from http://ozgurzan.com/management/management-theories/theories-about-motivation/ Reitan, A. (2013, January 8). Maslow’s Theory of Self-Actualization, More or Less Actualized [Blog post]. Retrieved from http://brainblogger.com/2013/01/08/maslows-theory-of-self-actualization-more-or-less-actualized/ Ke, W., Tan, C., Sia, C., & Wei, K. (2012). Inducing Intrinsic Motivation to Explore the Enterprise System: The Supremacy of Organizational Levers. Journal Of Management Information Systems, 29(3), 257-290.
Motivation is defined as individual internal process that energizes, directs and sustains behavior. Motivation depends on how much the person wants something and how likely they think they will get it. Managers struggle to improve motivation in the workplace, but with the right tools they can become successful. Maslow’s hierarchy of needs is a pyramid of personal satisfaction that need to be met so a person can reach their full potential and be happy. Each level of the pyramid is stratified from the bottom up. A person cannot move up the pyramid until the bottom needs are met. Maslow’s hierarchy is usually a personal tool used to assess how an individual is doing, but businesses adapted this tool to use in the workplace and improve morale.
It is inconceivable that people are motivated solely or even mainly by external incentives” (p. 27). Intrinsic motivation is when a person acts upon their own interest and enjoyment. Extrinsic motivation comes from avoiding punishment or obtaining external rewards. Motivation gained from intrinsic beliefs can only come to fruition once everyone is well accounted for. If humans are tasked with mindless routine as jobs, there is a chance that they can be replaced with machinery. When it comes to the workplace, running on extrinsic motivation might boost motivation the first time; however, it starts to dissipate once rewards and incentives runs
Taormina, R. J., & Gao, J. H. (2013). Maslow and the motivation hierarchy: Measuring satisfaction of the needs. The American Journal of Psychology, 126(2), 155-157.
Leaving Statement: Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs shows us how humans are motivated in five levels, and that humans can achieve greatness at the peak.
Maslow assumes that a person would satisfy himself with the more basic needs, which are physiological, before directing behavior toward filling higher level of self-recognition needs. He arranged humans’ needs in a five-level hierarc...
(Schwalbe, 2014, p.365-366). Once a need is satisfied it is no longer a motivator. There are 5 needs in Maslow’s hierarchy. From the bottom-up the needs are, physiological, safety, social, esteem, and self-actualization. The first four needs are considered deficiency needs and the last is considered a growth need. Once the first four needs are met a person will focus on growth (Schwalbe, 2014, p.365-366). It is important for a project manager to understand a person’s needs and what they can do to help that person meet their
Maslow needs theory has received wide recognition particularly among practicing managers. Perhaps it could provide some valuable insight in motivation. Maslow’s hierarchy of needs “hypothesized that within every human being there exists a hierarchy of five needs. Maslow separated the five needs into higher and lower orders. Physiological and safety needs were described as lower-order needs and social, esteem, and self-actualization as higher-order needs. As each of these needs becomes substantially satisfied, the next need becomes dominant. So if you want to motivate someone, you need to understand what level of the hierarchy that person is currently on and focus on satisfying the needs at or above that level.” (Robbins & Judge, 2007, p.187)
Mullins (2002) also classifies motivation into Intrinsic and Extrinsic types. Intrinsic motivation involves psychological rewards to enhance job satisfaction, such as the opportunity to use one's ability, a sense of achievement, receiving appreciation and positive recognition or being treated in a considerate manner (Mullins, 2002:P490). Such methods ensure employees are constantly motivated while being engaged in activities that are enjoyable and rewarding.
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Motivation, as defined in class, is the energy and commitment a person is prepared to dedicate to a task. In most of organisations, motivation is one of the most troublesome problems. Motivation is about the intensity, direction and persistence of reaching a goal. During the class, we have learned a substantial theories of motivation and many theories of motivations are used in real business. Each theory seems to have different basic values. But, they all have been analysed for one reason, recognising what motivates and increases the performance of employees. Ident...
In daily life, we need motivation to improve our performance in our job or in studies. Motivation is an internal force, dependent on the needs that drive a person to achieve. In the other words, motivation is a consequence of expectations of the future while satisfaction is a consequence of past events (Carr, 2005). We need to give reward to our self when we did correctly or we has achieve our target. Reward is something that we are given because we have behaved well, worked hard, or provided a service to the community. Theories of motivation can be used to explain the behavior and attitude of employees (Rowley, 1996; Weaver, 1998). The theories include content theories, based on assumptions that people have individual needs, which motivate their action. Meanwhile according to Robbins (2001), motivation is a needs-satisfying process, which means that when a person's needs are satisfied by certain factors, the person will exert superior effort toward attaining organizational goals. Schulze and Steyn (2003) affirmed that in order to understand people’s behavior at work, managers or supervisors must be aware of the concept of needs or motives which will help “move” their employees to act.Theories such as Maslow (1954), McClelland (1961), Herzberg (1966) and Alderfer (1969) are renowned for their works in this field. The intrinsic reward or also be known as motivators factors is the part of Herzberg motivation theory. Motivators are involve factors built into the job or the studies itself such as achievement, recognition, responsibility and advancement. Hygiene factors are extrinsic to the job such as interpersonal relationship, salary, supervision and company policy (Herzberg, 1966. There have two factors that are called hygiene fac...
Theories of motivation consists two parts. Content and process motivation theories. Content motivation theories focuses mainly on people needs and explains why people have different needs at different times. Content theories of motivation treated as a need or desire, to act for the sake of promoting a certain goal. One most prominent theorist Abraham Maslow (1943) proposed the hierarchy of needs. It states that all the needs of the people can be divided into five categories, aligned incentive effect in descending order: (psychological, safety, social, esteem and self-actualization needs). Psychological are the basic needs to survive, e.g. food, clothes, shelter, warmth, sleep, etc. Safety are the needs like security, stability, freedom from fear, etc. Social needs are the feelings of belongingness, acceptance, being part