Workplace Motivation Paper

Workplace Motivation Paper

When looking at today’s workplace, teams have become one of the most popular organizational methods in developing projects. There is an enduring aspect of teams that makes it powerful and great. But we should not forget to incorporate motivational strategies, in order to intensify the process. Motivation is the gist of any strategic plan and teams are no different.

Frederick W. Taylor, a management pioneer, stated that existing reward systems were not designed to reward a person for high production (Ames & Ames, 1989). He observed a very interesting phenomena. It seemed that once a worker realized someone producing less was receiving the same kind of rewards, he would also decrease his own level of production. So, in order to solve this problem, Taylor worked on developing a system that would financially compensate each worker accordingly. This work evolved into existing theories of motivation. Nowadays, money remains a major player in the game of motivation but in further developing these theories, other variables have been added.

Money is on peoples minds all the time; I feel that it is a great motivator. Especially for the short term. People want to be rewarded for the work that they do. And giving them a pat on the back is nice but it doesn’t put food on the table.

According to Rue and Byars (1983), "motive is a stimulus that leads to an action that satisfies a need". In other words, motive produces action, and these actions will ultimately enable one to achieve his/her goals. Many times the actual work seems to be a great source of reward. But in order for a job to be effective as a source of reward it needs to posses the following characteristics: (1)Skill variety, (2) task identity (identifiable pieces of work with an also identifiable outcome), (3) task significance, autonomy (a certain freedom in schedule in order to make work more enjoyable, and (4) job feedback (one should be able to evaluate his/her performance based upon the immediate outcome of the job (Malone, 1981).

In any line of work you have to maintain the motivation once you have it. The Motivational Maintenance Theory was developed by Herzberg (Keller, 1983). The process of development of this theory consisted of interviews with more than 200 engineers and accountants. The interviewees were asked to recall incidents at work that they associated with experiencing high or low self-esteem. Results of these interviews indicated that positive feelings were often associated with achievement, recognition, etc., and negative feelings with the work environment such as company policies, relationships with co-workers and supervisors, job security, working conditions, etc. This theory proposes that adding achievement, recognition and variables of that kind to the work environment, increases motivation. Along with maintenance of motivation you also have to have reinforcement. Skinner believed that reinforcing behavior would lead to its repetition (Keller, 1983). And so, behavior not reinforced was less likely to be repeated. In order for companies to apply this theory with success, the effective reinforces need to identified. Many times managers in security need to go back to training. This helps management get an outside look at what is going around in there own place. It also helps managers with their maintenance of motivation and their reinforcement.

Motivation is a complex subject and many theories have been developed with respect to its use in the work environment. No one theory solves every problem one might encounter in motivating others, but there are certain concepts that have been proven quite efficient