'Motivation Techniques'.

Year 11 Business Studies Coursework

‘Motivation Techniques’

Introduction

For this assignment I am going to look at different motivational techniques that businesses use in order to motivate their work force, I will then decide on which I feel to be the most effective and why it is so effective.

Hypothesis

All businesses want a motivated workforce, and expend a lot of time and money in order to attempt to achieve this, what these people need to look at is the common goals that there employees hold, for example:

Self-esteem: needs for self -respect and self-confidence, for autonomy, for achievement, for competence, for knowledge.

Status: needs for recognition, for appreciation, for the deserved respect of others.

These needs tend to be at the top of most employees priority list, once these are fulfilled the employee will be happy and therefore motivated, e.g. if a worker is appreciated and competent in their job, they tend to be happier and therefore more highly motivated, but if they do not fully understand their job, and do not feel appreciated for what they do, they tend to feel unhappy and under perform.

It is only recently that employers have learnt to be more like coaches then law enforcement officers in the workplace, they have discovered that it is far more effective to praise an employee rather than punish them, and give them constructive criticism rather than shout at them

Another factor that strongly affects employees’ motivation is security, if an employee feels secure in their job, i.e. have a permanent position there than they will be a lot happier and therefore hold a much higher state of motivation.

Motivation Techniques

Utilising peoples competitive nature is an ...

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Motivation Techniques

Utilising peoples competitive nature is an excellent way to encourage employees to work to the best of their standards, for example by giving commission to sales people, this means that they receive a percentage of the price of each product that they sell, then, to add competition you can use an ‘incentive’, for example a bonus that goes to the employee who sells the most of one product in a month, this bonus must be something that the employees will really work for and want to obtain, such as extra paid holiday days, or money etc.

In order for a worker to feel happy, they must be in the right environment, if they do not feel happy in the area they are working in then they may be tempted not to come at all. If a worker does not get on with his/her colleagues and are possibly picked on by them than this will cause them to be highly unmotivated, the same goes if the place they are working in is clean or sanitary, for example if a chef is working in a very dirty kitchen in which they have to spend a long time working in than they will not produce their best work, or if someone is working in a dirty cluttered office than it is bound to affect their work motivation. But if they work in a clean friendly environment, then they will be a lot happier. But there is one problem with there being an environment that is too friendly, and that is the employees may talk too much and become distracted from their work, this means finding a balance.

Although money may seem to be the most effective motivator, I personally do not believe this is true, it may be important for an employee to receive a salary that they are happy and fulfilled with, but it actually does not tend to be at the top of most peoples priority list, here are some problems with the use of money for motivation

Availability - the company may not have cash available for the purpose
Flexibility – pay-checks cannot easily be varied from week to week according to the employees performance
Reversibility - once given, cash cannot be taken away
Performance- level of pay is a better predictor of management level or seniority than performance
Visibility - cash transactions are one-to-one only
Timeliness - bonuses do not immediately follow the performance of desired behaviours
Durability - the impact on motivation is short-term at best

I found the following quote on a google website:

"Just because too little money can irritate and demotivate does not mean that more and more money will bring about increased satisfaction, much less increased motivation”

Analysis

Personally, I feel that material goods are not the most effective form of motivation that can be used, infact, sometimes they can even be the worst as they encourage greed, for me the greatest motivator for a workforce is fulfilment due to the actual enjoyment of the job, most people say that they would much rather be payed a reasonable salary in a job they enjoy instead of a high salary in one that they don’t. The perfect worker in my view is somebody who enjoys what they do, and therefore does it well.

Evaluation

I have come to the conclusion that happiness is the key to the perfect workforce because as they say ‘a happy worker is a good worker.’ I also feel that we have only scratched the surface of motivation in the workplace, it is only now that people have realised due to being open-minded just how huge a part psychology has to play in the effectiveness of a workforce, and there are still bosses that believe that discipline is the way to go rather than encouragement, so if these people could open their minds I think that the world of work would be better for employees everywhere.