Evaluate how to motivate individuals

and teams to achieve a goal

Lo 2
 What is Motivation
 “The processes that account for an individual’s intensity, direction,
and persistence of effort toward attaining a goal.
 While general motivation is concerned with effort toward any goal,
Organizational Motivation goes further.
 In the Organizational context: Intensity describes how hard a person
tries. This is the element most of us focus on when we talk about
motivation. However, high intensity is unlikely to lead to favorable
job-performance outcomes unless the effort is channeled in a
direction that benefits the organization. Therefore, we consider the
quality of effort as well as its intensity. Effort directed toward, and
consistent with, the organization’s goals is the kind of effort we
should be seeking. Finally, motivation has a persistence dimension.
This measures how long a person can maintain effort. Motivated
individuals stay with a task long enough to achieve their goals.
 EARLY THEORIES OF MOTIVATION
 Hierarchy of Needs Theory
 The best-known theory of motivation is Abraham Maslow’s hierarchy of
needs, which hypothesizes that within every human being there is a hierarchy
of five needs. Recently, a sixth need has been proposed for a highest level—
intrinsic values—which is said to have originated from Maslow, but it has yet
to gain widespread acceptance.
 The original five needs are:
 1. Physiological. Includes hunger, thirst, shelter, sex, and other bodily needs.
 2. Safety-security. Security and protection from physical and emotional harm.
 3. Social-belongingness. Affection, belongingness, acceptance, and friendship.
 4. Esteem. Internal factors such as self-respect, autonomy, and achievement,
and external factors such as status, recognition, and attention.
 5. Self-actualization. Drive to become what we are capable of becoming;
includes growth, achieving our potential, and self-fulfillment.
 Two-Factor Theory by Frederick
Herzberg
 A theory that relates intrinsic factors to job satisfaction and
associates extrinsic factors with dissatisfaction.
 For example, challenging work will motivate many people to
exert increased effort. If intrinsic factors such as challenging
work are not present, the result is neutral rather than negative,
and the worker will feel bland rather than angry or unhappy.
Although the presence of hygiene (or extrinsic) factors is not
motivational, their absence can cause dissatisfaction.
 Also known as the motivation hygiene theory in which
conditions such as quality of supervision, pay, company
policies, physical work conditions, relationships with others,
and job security are hygiene factors.
 Motivating people through interesting work is based
on the principle of intrinsic motivation. It refers to a
person’s beliefs about the extent to which an activity
can satisfy his or her needs for competence and self-
determination. The intrinsically motivated person has
energy and passion for the task. People who highly
value work tend to be intrinsically motivated, while
people who place a low value on work have low
intrinsic motivation.
 McClelland’s Theory of Needs
 McClelland’s theory of needs was developed by David
McClelland and his associates. As opposed to Maslow’s
hierarchy, these needs are more like motivating factors
 than strict needs for survival.
 There are three:
• Need for achievement (nAch) is the drive to excel, to
achieve in relationship to a set of standards.
• Need for power (nPow) is the need to make others
behave in a way they would not have otherwise.
• Need for affiliation (nAff) is the desire for friendly and
close interpersonal relationships.
 The three needs are linked to important job outcomes.
First, when jobs have a high degree of personal
responsibility and feedback, along with an intermediate
degree of risk, high achievers are strongly motivated.
 Second, high nAch does not necessarily make someone a
good manager, especially in large organizations. People
with high nAch are interested in how well they do
personally, and not in influencing others to do well.
 Third, the most effective leaders are high in nPow and
nAff, according to recent research—the “rough edges” of
nPow may be tempered by the nAff desire to be included.
Equity Theory and Social Comparison
by Adams, 1965
 According to equity theory, employee satisfaction and motivation
depend on how fairly the employees believe they are treated in
comparison to peers.
 The theory contends that employees hold certain beliefs about the
outcomes they receive from their jobs, as well as the inputs they
invest to obtain these outcomes.
 The outcomes of employment include pay, benefits, status,
recognition, intrinsic job factors, and anything else stemming from
the job that workers perceive as useful.
 The inputs include all the factors that employees perceive as being
their investment in the job or anything of value that they bring to
the job. These inputs include job qualifications, skills, educational
level, effort, trust in the company, support of coworkers, and
cooperative behavior.
 The core of equity theory is that employees compare their inputs and
outcomes (making social comparisons) with others in the workplace.
 When employees believe that they receive equitable outcomes in relation to
their inputs, they are generally satisfied and motivated.
 When workers believe that they are being treated equitably, they are more
willing to work hard.
 Conversely, when employees believe that they give too much as compared
to what they receive from the organization, a state of tension,
dissatisfaction, and demotivation ensues.
 The people used for reference are those whom the employee perceives as
relevant for comparison. For example, an industrial sales representative
would make comparisons with other industrial sales reps in the same
industry about whom he has information.
 Another way of looking at equity theory is that workers search for justice in
terms of being treated fairly. There are two kinds of comparisons.
 EXPECTANCY THEORY
 According to expectancy theory, motivation results from
deliberate choices to engage in activities in order to achieve
worthwhile outcomes. People will be well motivated if they
believe that a strong effort will lead to good performance
and good performance will lead to preferred outcomes.
 The theory suggests that our choices depend on three
specific beliefs that are based in our past learning and
experience: expectancy, instrumentality, and valence.
 Expectancy represents the belief that exerting a high level of
effort will result in the successful performance of some task.
 Instrumentality represents the belief that successful
performance will result in some outcome(s).
 Valence reflects the anticipated value of the outcomes associated with
performance (abbreviated V).
 Valences can be positive (“I would prefer having outcome X to not
having it”), negative (“I would prefer not having outcome X to having
it”), or zero (“I’m bored . . . are we still talking about outcome X?”).
Salary increases, bonuses, and more informal rewards are typical
examples of “positively valenced” outcomes, whereas disciplinary
actions, demotions, and terminations are typical examples of
“negatively valenced” outcomes.25 In this way, employees are more
motivated when successful performance helps them attain attractive
outcomes, such as bonuses, while helping them avoid unattractive
outcomes, such as disciplinary actions.
 Goal setting theory (Locke & Latham, 1990)

 Goal setting theory views goals as the primary drivers of the intensity and
persistence of effort.
 Goals are defined as the objective or aim of an action and typically refer to
attaining a specific standard of proficiency, often within a specified time limit.
 More specifically, the theory argues that assigning employees specific and
difficult goals will result in higher levels of performance than assigning no
goals, easy goals, or “do-your-best” goals.
 Why are specific and difficult goals more effective than do-your-best ones?
After all, doesn’t “your best” imply the highest possible levels of effort? The
reason is that few people know what their “best” is (and even fewer
managers can tell whether employees are truly doing their “best”). Assigning
specific and difficult goals gives people a number to shoot for—a “measuring
stick” that can be used to tell them how hard they need to work and for how
long. So if your boss had said, “Have the assignment on my desk by 10:30 a.m
on Tuesday, with no more than two mistakes,” you would have known exactly
how hard to work and for how long.
 Emotional Intelligence
 Emotional intelligence refers to qualities such as
understanding one’s own feelings, empathy for others,
and the regulation of emotion to enhance living.
 Emotional intelligence has to do with the ability to
connect with people and understand their emotions.
 A worker with high emotional intelligence can engage
in behaviors such as sizing up, pleasing, and
influencing people.