Employee Motivation in Business Organizations: Theory and Practice at Tesco and Walmar

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BA 501

Organizational Behaviour

EMPLOYEE MOTIVATION IN BUSINESS ORGANIZATIONS

 - THEORY AND PRACTICE AT TESCO & WALMART -

 

   Lorena Gamez

Alex Heusener

 Janine Jaeschke

Schiller International University

Fall 2006

November 21, 2006


TABLE OF CONTENT


INTRODUCTION


Motivation originates from the word "move" and refers to the internal drive necessary to guide people's actions and behaviours towards the achievement of some goals. It is the force that makes people do things, which results from individual needs being satisfied (or met) giving people the inspiration to complete the task. Motivation is a multiple-step process that moves a person towards a goal. However, motivated behaviours are voluntary choices controlled by the individual employee. In a corporate environment, the supervisor (motivator) wants to influence the factors that motivate employees to higher levels of productivity.

Motivation and Performance Management usually go hand-in-hand. Performance Management consists of all activities that ensure that goals are consistently being met in an effective and efficient manner.

The focus of Performance Management can be placed on the performance of the organization as a whole, a single department, processes to build a product or service or the individual employee. Basically, Performance Management is the practice of actively using performance data to improve the organizational health in terms of quality, financial aspects, learning effects of the employees, decision-making and managing organizational change. The Performance Management System follows a circular flow, which consists of four elements:

  1. Establishing performance standards
  2. Measuring performance
  3. Reporting progress
  4. Improving processes

There is a definite relationship between motivation and performance management
(see Illustration 1). By evaluating and valuing its employees, a company can get all necessary information for the next steps of the performance management process (paying people, involving people, developing people).

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An effective performance management system is based on a general understanding of the performance standards on the side of the employees. Therefore, it is important that performance standards are clearly and fairly formulated, transparently communicated and effectively linked to the organizational success and strategy. Focus should be equally placed on how things are done, as well as on the final results. To ensure qualitative improvements, feedback has to be collected from multiple sources (360° degree feedback) and it needs to allow for open and honest communications. It is also important to realize that managers tend to differently (individually) treat ...

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