Motivation Defined: Motivation is defined as an inner state or force that energizes, activates or moves and directs or channels behavior towards goals. Motivation includes drives, desires, needs, wishes and similar forces. Bartol et al. defines motivation as “Motivation is the force that energizes or gives direction to behavior.” (Bartol at al. 2008).
A study of motivation theories enables us to understand people and their actions and in a business organization environment it enables us to understand, for example, why certain people work hard or commit themselves to organizational goals and generally work well within a team.
Managers and Motivation: Figure 1 shows how the manager has to become involved with motivation of his subordinates or team members. The manager’s task is to recognize the needs of team members and to match those needs with opportunities that occur in the business environment. “Manager must hire those able to do what is needed.” (Bartol at al. 2008).
Figure 1: Management and motivations.
Manager must recognize team member’s needs. Many workers can be motivated to strive for higher performance by being offered additional financial inducements but other factors can influence their motivations. The manager has to search the work environment to find specific opportunities which will satisfy the needs of individual team member. The manager has to match the needs of individuals with opportunities in the environment and it can be achieved by reassigning work within a department, for example, so that the individual’s needs can be met.
Motivational Benefit of Using Team In An Organization: From a business perspective, teams are more productive, produce higher quality and are more cost-efficient than solo efforts. From a human relations perspective, the positive effects of teamwork on job satisfaction, motivation and employee morale have been well documented (Hoerr 1989). The reason for the continuing success of teamwork is the focus it places on the human in the job. Workers, from the manufacturing plant to the customer service office, can and want to perform more complex and sophisticated jobs. When given a chance, most have proved they are up to the challenge (Bingham 1991).
A high performance team can motivate team members effectively. A performing team develops clear roles and responsibilities tied to specific team goals. The roles match each individual’s interests and capabilities. As a result, the team is well organized, coordinated and motivated to work together to achieve optimum performance (Buchholz & Roth 1987).
Concord Branch of Commonwealth bank is a good example of high performance team. Each member of this team is highly motivated and active and committed to the product line and work cooperatively to achieve team goals. The Branch manager Subu Dasari knows that team goal is an essential tool for motivating people on the team because it gives them the information and the perspective they need to keep the team moving in the proper direction. He develops the goal, ensure that it is clear, communicate it to all people, create a commitment to it, and make certain that team members are constantly aware of it and working toward it. Subu Dasari provides direction on a day-to-day basis by guiding and facilitating team tasks and activities and as the steps are carried out, Dasari ensures that things stay on track and everyone participates. He also knows that it is not enough to have a goal; he needs checkpoints and activities to get his team to the goal. Checkpoint serves as an essential form of feedback that helps team member stay committed and motivated (Stuckenbruck 1981). Feedback has powerful motivational and developmental value for team. It lets team members know how they are doing so they know what to do more of, less of, or differently. Feedback can be about performance results, variances from plan, coordination with other units, customer satisfaction, or effective and ineffective behavior on the team (Stogdill & Coons 1957). By giving team member a well-conceived set of milestones and events, Subu Dasari provides them with a map to track their own progress and allow them to become excited about the team. He determines the amount of time, money, people, equipment and other resources each activity will require. Such estimates allow him to plan the team more completely. He is always vigilant for internal team problems and uses conflict and disagreement in a constructive way that stimulates creativity. Subu Dasari understands the fundamental nature of human behavior and appreciate team member’s motivations. To motivate team members, Subu reinforce the commitment and excitement of the team and he knows that motivation is tricky. He does not really motivate team members. Rather, he allows member’s motivation to be directed toward team goals. By effectively managing and negotiating conflicts, he achieves positive outcomes from the inevitable differences that arise in team management.
Customer Service Representatives (CSRs), Customer Service Specialists (CSSs), Assistant Manager Gabrielle Moore and Branch Manager Subu Dasari arrive fully prepared in the meeting and they have a clear picture of mission and goals. They talk openly and listen intently to one another. All members freely share resources and work out their disagreements. They remain open to new diversified ideas.
As a result, Concord Branch achieves top position for sales and customer service in South West Sydney region and CSRs, CSSs and Assistant Manager Gabrielle Moore receive ‘Top Performer of The Month’ or ‘Top Performer of The Year’ certificates regular basis. Branch receives various gift vouchers and other kind of incentives from regional office very often and Subu never forgets to thank his team members for their achievements.
Team members of Concord Branch are highly motivated. They feel like a valued member of the team and a sense of ownership. This feeling helps them to feel more ingrained in the bank and this sense of personal investment encourages a sense of ownership of their work for the bank. They work not only for the bank but also to not let their team down.
Working with a team exposes new CSR and CSS to the method and work ethic of potentially more experienced CSR and CSS, which can help them learn more about their jobs in a faster manner than simply trying to teach them. Getting on job experience with their efficient coworker can not only help a team member learn their job, but it also provides a sense of motivation and establishes expectations.
Team members of Concord Branch are synergized and the team work is multiplicative. They are more likely to bring vigor and enthusiasm to the task. As a result, quality of work increases and faster the work process.
Team member of the Concord Branch works in a highly motivated environment. That is why this branch of Commonwealth Bank has typically low absentee rates and high productivity levels in terms of sales and customer service. Regional office has identified that team member of this Branch is more loyal to the Bank than any other Branches.
Motivational Disadvantages of Using Team in An Organization: On the contrary, if manager fails to create motivational environment in the team, then team members can be de-motivated easily and in turn, team fails to achieve its goal and objectives. Time and again studies reveal that team fails because manager has not built a strong team of supporters and collaborators. This generally happens because of the team manager’s insensitivity to team members. This unwillingness or inability to understand the perspective of others has been diagnosed as the primary reason managers are not successful in their career (Manners 1983).
Mascot Branch of Commonwealth Bank is an example of less performing team where CSRs, CSSs and Assistant Manager Atri Bose are displaying a lot of forming behavior often lack clarity about why they and others are on the team and how they will work together to achieve team objectives. As a result, there is a lot of cautious and guarded communication testing of the waters. Sometimes storming behavior is apparent when the Branch Manager Lynn Habib or Atri Bose attempts to clarify roles by dictating who will do what , with whom and when. As you might suspect, there is little commitment to adhering to roles that CSRs or CSSs had little or no say in defining. Team members of Mascot Branch have commitment to working together collaboratively, but little specificity in terms of role expectations, authorities and coordination requirements.
Lynn Habib is not able to point her people in the right direction effectively, cant give them the big picture, cant get them to imagine how they would feel using the bank products or services and she is locked into an activity trap. She develops the goal and it is clear to everyone, but she can not create a commitment to it and unable to make certain that all CSRs and CSSs are constantly aware of it and constantly working toward it. To achieve the goal, Lynn Habib does not have constructive checkpoints or activities to get the team to the right direction and as a result CSRs and CSSs are not committed and motivated. They are not getting timely regular specific feedback from Lynn Habib or Atri Boss. Therefore they don’t know how they are doing so they know what to do. It creates lot of confusion among them. They are less informed about their performance results, variances from plan, customer satisfaction, sales targets, effective or ineffective behavior on the team. However, they receive negative feedback from Lynn Habibi or Atri Bose that comes across as harsh, personal and fault-finding rather than educational, behavioral and focusing on what should be done differently in the future. Lynn Habib is not that much vigilant for internal team problems and does not care to handle conflicts and disagreements in constructive way. It is destructive and a source of tension and undue stress and threatens the performance of the team. As a result, Mascot Branch has poor performance in terms of sales and customer service satisfaction and team members achieve rarely gift vouchers or any other incentives from regional office as performance reward.
CSRs, CSSs, Atri Bose and Lynn Habib arrive to the meeting unprepared and goals are not clear to them. They interrupt and do more talking than listening and some members do their “own thing”. There is lot of arguing and fighting. Some CSSs are stubborn and closed minded to new ideas.
Mascot Branch has high absentee rate and team member calls for sick leave very often. Due to de-motivation CSRs, CSSs and Assistant Manager don’t like to stay in the branch for long period and they have tendency to switch to another branch and if it is not possible then they switch to another bank. Besides that since roles and responsibilities are not clear there is always backbiting and buck passing, poor coordination, inadequate support and lack of accountability in the team. Some dominant CSRs or CSSs tend to over-control and impose their ideas on the group. The team flounders and loses out on the thinking of the less vocal people. As a result, decisions may not be processed in an organized manner; thus the quality diminishes. CSRs and CSSs are not involved in the whole process, so they often do not fully understand the decision; therefore their commitment is low and implementation problems emerge.
CSRs and CSSs get easily discouraged and lose interest because their attempts to solve an ill-defined problem are futile. They reject solution after solution until someone proposes one that, in relation to those quickly discarded, seems somewhat reasonable.
Mascot Branch team suffers from communication problems that produce undue stress and tension among CSRs, CSSs, Assistant Manager and Branch Manager which lowers productivity.
Some CSSs think that they have everything needed for success – intelligence, education, ambition, perseverance, initiative, analytical skills and technical competency. But they fail to perform to expectations. It is not because of an ability to handle the technical aspects of the job or a willingness to work long and hard. But they think that they are not able to explore themselves completely because of an unorganized and ineffective team. This thought makes them de-motivated not only about Mascot Branch team but also about whole organization.
As mentioned earlier that Lynn Habib doesn’t handle conflicts in a constructive way, this is the reason team members are always tensed and stressed. They suffer from anger, hard feelings and an avoidance tendency in the team. These emotions ultimately damages working relations between team members and distractions that keep team members from doing their jobs.
Conclusion: Teamwork is on the rise and it seems reasonable to project that the number and kinds of companies which use teams as a matter of standard operating procedures will continue to escalate. The success and growth of any organization depend on the proper and efficient use of teamwork. There are many motivational benefits of using team in an organization. A high performance team can distribute the workload, reinforce individual capabilities, make better decisions, create participation and involvement, provide a sense of motivation and establish expectations, generate diversity of ideas, create a sense of ownership and feeling of valued member, increase individual learning and synergy, enhance team member’s morale, quality of work and faster the work process, have low absentee rate, increase loyalty to the organization and high productivity levels. On the contrary, an unorganized and de-motivated team has some motivational disadvantages also, such as, a team can stifle individuality. Too much competition among team members and whole team can suffer when one is to blame. A tem can restrain team member’s potential and can create confusion among team members. Thus team member became tensed and stressed. Low commitment and less motivation increase high absentee rate and lower loyalty to the organization. Back biting and buck passing create poor coordination, inadequate support and lack of accountability in the team. Some member’s attitude problem and poor communication creates implementation problems that may harm the total output of the team. Thus team members get easily discouraged, lose interest, and suffer from anger, hard feelings and these damage working relations.
References:
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