Unit 13

Motivation:
Issues and
Learning Objectives Aspects

After studying this unit, you should be able to:

> explain the concept of motivation;
> discuss the concepts related to employee
motivation; and
> describe the techniques that can be used for
motivating employees.
Communication
Skills and 13.1 INTRODUCTION
Motivation
We all know that motivation drives a person to achieve beyond normal. As such, it is a
state that originates within an individual though organisational structure, culture and
environment can also make individuals think: What motivates people? How can I
motivate others? By asking about the source of motivation, one is looking for an
understanding or explanation of what is known psychologically about the tendency of
people to expand their energies. By asking how to motivate others, a manager is
assuming (a) that s/he can affect the behaviour of others, and (b) that his/her effect can
override the other’s behaviour.

Motivation as a factor influencing human behaviour became an area of increasing

importance after the Second World War to fulfill the imperative need of increased
production. Motivation, concerned with all important human inputs, assumes crucial
importance when a system is confronted with challenges of development or a crisis
situation.

What is motivation? Who is responsible for motivation: individual or management?

The answers to these questions are not simple. While some see motivation as being
contained within an individual, others view it as arising from sources outside the
individual. As such, these views cannot be considered independent of each other
especially in the organisational context. Motivation in an organisation encompasses
forces both within and external to the individual member. Let us now learn how the
concept of motivation evolved.

13.2 MOTIVATION: EVOLUTION OF THE CONCEPT

Literally, motivation means incitement or inducement to act or move. In an industrial

setting, it means to make a subordinate act in a desired manner. Obviously “desired”
implies the interests of the organisation, as well as the employee. It implies not only
that the subordinate should act in a disciplined manner, but also that s/he should act in
an efficient and productive manner. To motivate, therefore, is to persuade, stimulate,
even compel (as and when fear becomes the motivator) an employee to act in a
manner which may help in attaining organisational objectives. This may be a limited
view. Motivation really comprises all the internal urges which are described as desires,
wishes, drives, etc., which make a person strive for doing a thing. Motivation is what
makes people do things.

Motivation may not be the same as incentive. In incentives we generally expect

greater output with the same inputs, while motivation involves some more inputs
considered necessary for changing the work, attitude and behaviour. As such, financial
incentives may not motivate all, particularly those employees whose physical needs are
already satisfied. To motivate means really to produce a goal-oriented behaviour,
which may not be made possible by mere provision of incentives with the object of
higher earnings and higher output.
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The importance of motivation is too obvious. Survival and growth of an undertaking depends Developing
Communication
considerably on the performance of its employees, which in turn, depends on their ability and will Skills
to work. The ability is determined by the quality of education, training and experience that one has
acquired. Even if there is any deficiency in the same, it can be made good by arranging
further training and developing facilities for them. The willingness to work involves
change in behaviour and attitude of a person towards work, or motivating him/ her to
work in a desired manner and give better performance. Motivated workforce is essential
for efficient working, optimum productivity, and attaining organisational objectives. The
motivation in personnel management follows planning and organising. Any managerial
decision becomes meaningful, if it can be converted into an effective action through
motivation of subordinates. In fact, every aspect of personnel function is pervasively
endowed with motivational attributes. Therefore, a successful personnel manager
incorporates the principles and concept of motivation into her/his own philosophy of
management. By applying them s/he can influence others in attaining a better or positive
motivation.

Yow now know that motivating people is difficult. But it is very challenging for changing
human behaviour. The study of motivation began to attract attention in the early part of the
19th century. However, with the development of theories of learning, it came to occupy a
central position. The application of psychology in education and industry led us to realise
that motivation as a process is highly significant in achieving excellence. However, in
spite of the relevance and popularity of motivation, its applicability was not well
understood till 1953 when McClelland extended its applicability in industry, education
and a wide range of areas and contexts. He identified achievement motive and developed
a general theory of motivation and method of measuring the same. According to him,
motivation consists of the learned anticipation of a goal as arousing positive or negative
emotional reaction. His ideas highlighted an ever increasing significance of the
entrepreneurial roles in society vis-à-vis organisation, especially so in economic
development.

Another concept of motivation is in the form of five human needs placed in hierarchical
order: Psychological, safety/security, social, self-esteem and self-actualization. This
concept is based on assumption of internal motivation – the needs, wants and desires,
which exist within an individual and influence him/her by determining his/her thoughts.
These, in turn, determine the ultimate behaviour in a particular situation.

The underlying assumption here is that individual motivation depends on urgency and
potency of the needs. As the lower order needs are satisfied, the higher order needs take
precedence over them.

Another way of looking at motivation is in terms of the internal dynamics of an individual

vis-a-vis the power of contextual factors like money, work conditions, etc.
An entirely different hypothesis of motivation is based on the nature of man,
i.e., being lazy, idle and indolent or creative, open-minded and energetic. An 33
Communication
idler is averse to any effort and would like to avoid any kind of responsibility.
S k ill s a n d
M o t i v a t io n Idlers prefer being directed and avoid being independent decision makers.
They only work under direct control and threat of punishment. For a creative person,
the work is as pleasant and natural as play. Responsibility is a welcome concept and
such people seek self-regulatory behaviour.
Motivation is also influenced by an organisation, and its style of management.
Management styles can be depicted to be in a continuum. This concept is based on the
effectiveness of management in ensuring participation of subordinates in decision
making and action orientation. This theory of motivation is action oriented and
projects the organisation as a task oriented, highly structured and authoritarian
establishment on one hand and completely democractic, people oriented and
emphasizing a participative management style on the other extreme. These are
interspersed with two intermediate stages system where definitive relations between
superior and subordinates have varying trust and confidence.
In the late nineteen sixties and thereafter, the concept of motivation expanded its
horizon and in that process lost some of its sharp focus on human needs but in no way
lost the significance for organisations and their members. The emphasis shifted from
the study of motivational notions to such fields as job enrichment, quality of work life,
meaning of work, organisational climate and to a very broad spectrum of
organisational culture. There has been a paradigm shift in understanding the relevance
and contribution of motivation vis-à-vis organisations. The enmeshing of individual
identity with his/her motivation is being given a wider but well defined boundaries of
social/organisational context. This may have caused some haziness in understanding
and application of the concept. A psychologist likes to put a premium on the
individual, whereas an organisational strategist would like to focus on the
collectiveness. And the debate continues. Since each organisation is unique in its
boundaries and contextual parameters, so is an individual. The concept of motivation
and its complexities helps us understand and create a unique relationship between the
two.
13.2.1 Some Common Assumptions about Motivation
i) It is commonly said that it is the subordinates or non-supervisory staff in an
organisation who need to be motivated. The fact, however, is that every one in an
organisation needs to be motivated; first the supervisory and managerial staff need
it so that they will be able to motivate their subordinates.

ii) Motivation and higher productivity go together. This may be true by and large, but
individual motivation at the workplace or group motivation as in the case of trade
unions may not have such a correlation with productivity.

iii) All motivational techniques are designed and applied by the personnel, and
managers and other line executives, who directly control and take work
from those under them. In fact, the latter are more concerned as it is their
primary function to see the persons under them work most efficiently. As
they are in closer touch with their workers, they can understand their 34
 Developing
problems better and also know their needs. If necessary, they can take the advice Communication
of the personnel or industrial psychologist or any other consultant. Skills

iv) Standard theories of motivation developed by psychologists will also apply to the
industrial situation with varying degrees of dependability.

13.3 TYPES OF MOTIVATION

In an industrial set-up, motivation may be intrinsic as well as extrinsic. Intrinsic

motivation is related to the job one is doing. When a skilled operative performs a job
well, s/he derives a sense of satisfaction. This is intrinsic motivation which satisfies the
creative instinct of an individual.
Extrinsic motivation is external to the job or task. For example, financial incentives for
doing a job well or giving higher production may motivate the workers. Other external
motivators are praise from the superior for good work, recognition of good performance
by the company in the form of public citation and award, admiration of fellow workers, and
improved working conditions and other facilities.
13.3.1 Determinants of Motivation
The traditional approach that a person could be made to work by monetary rewards
has been gradually giving place to a more complete pluralistic explanation which
recognizes that an individual works to fulfill a variety of needs. It is recognized that
the motivation is the result of the following three groups of factors:
i) Individuals: To know what can motivate employees, we must know their aims,
objectives and values. Human needs are both numerous and complex, and often it
is difficult to identify them. Motivation is not an easily observed phenomenon. We
have to first observe individual action and behaviour at work and interpret the
same in terms of the underlying motivation. Our interpretation may not
necessarily reveal the individual’s true motivation, as some of the human needs
may be difficult to describe and identify.
ii) Organisational Components: Organisational structure, technological system,
physical facilities, which constitute internal environment of an organisation, affect
motivation. Some machines are more interesting to work with than others or
certain kinds of work may be boring to many persons; job-connected experience
of a worker determines motivation.
iii) External or Exogenous Variables: A worker’s life outside the factory is also an
important factor affecting his motivation or willingness to work inside the factory.
Life at work and life outside the work are bound together. Troubles and joys of off-
job life cannot be put aside when reporting for work, nor can the factory matters
be dropped when returning home after work. A strong motivational role is also
played by culture, customs and norms, images and attributes conferred by the
society on particular jobs. An individual, for example, may find that his/her work
commands a substantial degree of respect and social acceptance quite apart from

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Communication holding a position in a particular organisation, and so s/he may be more willing or
Skills and motivated to perform such a work.
Motivation
13.3.2 Characteristics of Motivation
Some important characteristics of motivation which follow from the discussion of its
determinants are:
i) Individuals differ in their motivation: There is no single economic drive which
determines behaviour. As the desires and goals of individuals differ, so do their
motivations; one may do a job because it is remunerative, another may do it
because it gives a sense of achievement, or enables him/her to serve a cause which
is dear to him/her.
ii) Motivation is highly situational: A person may work very well in one
organisation and poorly in another in the same position or type of the job. The
performance may vary with working conditions and type of supervision.
iii) Motivation change: Motivation of each individual changes from time to time even
if he/she may continue to behave in the same way. For example, a temporary
worker may produce more in the beginning to become permanent. After being
made permanent, he/she may continue to produce more to gain promotion and so
on.
iv) Motivation is expressed differently: Needs and the way in which they are
translated into action may vary considerably from one individual to another.
Different persons may also react differently to successful or unsuccessful
fulfillment of their needs. One may feel frustrated if his/her need has not been met,
but the other may be motivated by his/her failure and redouble his/her effort to get
his/her need met (say, by writing and publishing additional scholarly articles or
books). Again one individual with strong security need may avoid accepting
responsibility for fear of failure and dismissal and the other with a similar need
may seek out responsibility for fear of being fired for low performance.
v) Motivation is complex: It is difficult to explain and predict the behaviour of
workers. Use of one motivational device may not produce the desired result if it
brings an opposing motive into play. In a factory when a blue-green device was
introduced to reduce eye strain, the output of male workers increased while that of
female workers decreased. It was found that the latter disliked this change as the
new type of light falling on them made them look simply ghastly in appearance.

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 Motivation:
13.4 MOTIVATION AND MORALE Issues and
Aspects

These two expressions are not synonymous or interchangeable. But the fact remains that a
motivated group of workers generally has a high degree of morale. Morale is a composite
attitude of various individuals employed by a company. It is generated by the group and
may be considered as a by-product of the group. It is not an average of individual attitudes.
Morale has been defined in a number of ways. It can be seen as “an attitude of satisfaction,
with a desire to continue in, and willingness to strive for, the goals of a particular group or
organisation”. It has also been defined as “the possession of feeling of being accepted by
and the belonging to a group of employees through adherence to a common goal and
confidence in the desirability of these goals”. Put simply, morale is a group concept,
while motivation is largely an individual concept. Morale is the summation of feeling of
employees as a group towards various aspects of their work job, the company, working
conditions, fellow workers, supervisors and so on. If the attitude of employees towards all
these aspects is more positive than negative, the morale of the group can be said to be
high, otherwise it is low.

Studies in India show that high morale among workers may not be an indication of high
productivity. Higher morale of union members may enable them to continue to strike and
fight out the issue.

Important components and determinants of morale are (a) a feeling of togetherness, (b)
need for a clear goal or objective to be achieved, (c) expectation of success towards the
attainment of the goal, (d) feeling of each member within the group that s/he has a
meaningful task to perform for achieving the goal and that s/he also matters whatever
may be the job assigned to her/him, and (e) supportive and stimulative leadership. All
these determinants of morale are equivalent to that of job satisfaction which is a precursor
of morale. However, the two differ as the term job satisfaction is used for individual and
morale for groups.

An enlightened management should be conscious of the need for assessing the morale of
its employees by opinion polls or attitude surveys from time to time. Low morale can be
caused by factors beyond the control of the organisation. However, workers’ morale can
be boosted up by (a) better methods of working in which workers or their representatives
may have a bigger say, (b) utilization of incentive schemes with the widest possible
coverage, and (c) consultative and participative style of management.

13.4.1 What Demotivates or Demoralises the Employees?

There are some management practices which affect the morale and motivation or
willingness of employees to give their best or work in the desired manner. Some of these
practices are:

a) Under assignment: If a skilled man is assigned an unskilled or routine job, it

may cause frustration or job dissatisfaction and thus demotivation. 37
 Communication b) Over assignment: If a good worker is overloaded to the point where
Skills and s/he
Motivation feels that s/he being exploited, this may make her/him lose interest in work. In big organisations, it is a
rather common practice to overload good workers as others cannot be trusted or
depended upon.

c) Buckmastership: Superiors or leaders avoiding hard work themselves and

passing on the same to their subordinates, and then finding fault with them may
erode employee motivation.

d) Coercive types of control or supervision which may give a worker a feeling that
s/he is not being trusted may also demotivate her/him or erode her/his interest in
the work. Some control no doubt is essential but if it is too coercive resulting in
frequent warnings or punishments, or withdrawal of facilities to chasten the
employee, morale and motivation of the employee are bound to go down.

e) Manipulative behaviour of the management which may take the form of divide
and rule policy or tactics, making promises which are not fulfilled, encouraging
groupism and appealing to the patriotic sense in times of national crisis, may also
have a demotivating effect. When employees perceive such behaviour, they lose
interest in work.

13.5 MOTIVATING EMPLOYEES IN ACTUAL

PRACTICE

We now know that motivation has something to do with our way of life and thinking.
Since there is a wide spectrum of human nature, there is no single magic wand to
motivate employees as their needs and priorities of satisfaction differ. What may
motivate one may not necessarily motivate the other. However, the employer should
find out the right way that could make workers more productive. Since an employee
has a lot of untapped energy, s/he would be ready to work and contribute the most if
trained properly and treated fairly. In managing an organisation, some of the important
factors which could improve motivation and morale of its employees are as follows:

i) Devising a well-defined humanistic personnel policy, wherein the workforce is

regarded as the valuable asset of the organisation, and sufficient care is taken to
maintain and develop it, not only to attain organisational objectives but also to
satisfy the normal aspirations of employees.

ii) A long-term employment policy projecting image of fairness in

recruitment and selection, placement of the right person to the right job, sound
and fair promotion and transfer policies, well-planned need-based training and
development programmes for grooming employees for higher job or building their
career in the organisation, and suitable workforce planning.

iii) Fair wages and salary administration ensuring equitable wage

structure free from internal and external inequalities.
 Motiva t i o n : I
iv) Rewarding good performance adequately at the earliest and also an d A s
s sue s
pe ct s
giving it deserving publicity.

v) A constructive and objective system of performance appraisal and merit rating

of employees aimed at servicing and improving them and not punishing them.

vi) Prompt handling of workers’ grievances by having a short time-bound procedure

well-known to employees. In handling grievances, the attitude of persons managing
grievances should be cooperative and positive and not negative, and the worker
should have the feeling that s/he will be properly heard and justice will be done.

vii) In handling disciplinary cases, the management should not only be fair but also
seem to be fair. Disciplinary procedure should conform to the principles of natural
justice. A corrective and not punitive approach in this respect may be more
motivating.

viii) Participative and consultative style of management and supervision and

increasing autonomy in work may create necessary conditions for motivating
workers to give their best.

ix) Job enrichment and enlargement, or making the job more

challenging are also essential for motivating the workers to give their best, as these
will not only reduce job boredom and frustration, but also increase job satisfaction,
and satisfy the esteem or ego and self-actualisation needs of employees, which are
perpetual motivators.

x) Self-motivation by top management, senior and middle managers and supervisors

is essential if the persons working under them are to be motivated. The dictum
“before you motivate others, you must first motivate yourself” should not be lost
sight of. Seniors are expected to provide their juniors effective leadership and set an
example of dedication and superior skill.

13.5.1 Specific Actions to Motivate Others

Managerial action, in general, can take four forms:

• Provide more of the valued rewards to the person.

• Change the values of the person towards the rewards, which are available.

• Improve the person’s perception of the behaviour-reward linkage.

• Improve the reality of the behaviour-reward linkage.

The first two of these deal with actions which affect the goals which people
value as outcome for their work; the latter two deal with their expectation of
whether the paths available to them will lead to those rewards. Let us see how
each of the three forms of influence may be used to achieve one or more of
these four forms of action. 39
Communication With respect to individual motivation, and in the context of the path-goal
Skills and
theory, managerial action which constitutes indirect influence is aimed at
Motivation
arranging the appropriate strategies, structures and policies to encourage and support
motivated people to achieve organisational goals. This includes, for example,
establishing incentive and reward system which will be valued by employees. Indirect
influence also includes selecting and employing people who have necessary skills and
who value the kinds of rewards available in the organisation. Finally, indirect
influence includes developing in oneself and others the managerial skills, particularly,
the management style of pattern of behaviour in dealing with subordinates, which will
have the effect of creating higher motivation.

You may recall that semi-direct influence is exercised when a manager acts to affect
an individual through his or her social relationships at work. The emergent group has
a strong effect on what its members value and what their expectations are with respect
to the outcomes from behaviour. The group reward may serve as a highly visible
symbol of the need for intra-company cooperation as well.

Direct influence on the individual involves communication and the personal, face-to-
face relationship. A manager who attempts to increase the level of motivation through
direct influence is typically trying to do the second and third actions mentioned above
with respect to that person’s value and expectations. Thus, the manager may work
overtime to convince an employee to value more highly the rewards already existing
and available in the organisation. This may be particularly difficult in times of major
social change.

The other form of action for direct influence is to improve the employee’s perception
of the linkage between behaviour and reward. This might involve, for example,
personal conversations about what can result from certain levels of performance, such
as promotion, bonus, or greater responsibility.

As important as what to do to motivate others is the question of how to do it. We

turn now to a closer look at a manager’s behaviour required to motivate others. To
do this, we discuss management style and leadership.
13.5.2 Management Style and Leadership
In working relationships with others, and particularly in direct influence in motivating
others, a manager exhibits one or more characteristic styles of behaviour. We may
define management style as the pattern of a manager’s behaviour in working
relationships with others over time. This definition is relatively loose being more a
concept than a precise variable. In order to be more precise, we need to set up one or
more categories of behaviour characteristics where employees for one reason or
another see their work only as a means of economic rewards. A second style is a
supportive, people-oriented, humanistic style, which may be appropriate for
employees who value social rewards. A third is a participative, mutual goal-setting
style in
40
which the manager works with subordinates who value autonomy and are Motivation:
Issues and
rewarded by self-fulfillment. Aspects
In a way, then, we say that a manager who holds one of the three basic sets of
assumptions about what motivates others should exhibit a style which is consistent
with those assumptions in order to provide the appropriate means to exercise direct
influence. In other words, managers need to understand what rewards subordinates
value, and behave in a pattern which will fit with that understanding as one part of
providing a consistent environment for the employee.

The manager who believes, as a part of his or her perspective, that people are complex,
is going above and beyond the three operational sets of assumptions about valued
rewards. The “complex person” assumptions imply that a manager will have no fixed
beliefs about what motivates people in general or what style to employ in all situations.
Rather, the manager will attempt to understand the particular subordinates, the
particular situation, and ideally, select a style to fit the situation. Thus, they recognize
that people are complex and that a diagnosis with a goal as a path-goal theory must be
performed before employing a style. The manager cannot have one particular style for
all situations. Rather, the manager must be able to choose an appropriate style for a
situation and then change that style, if necessary. One may call this approach a
“contingent” management style, but it is important to note that it refers to the process
of diagnosis and choice of managerial behaviour rather than to the pattern of
behaviour itself.

13.6 MOTIVES AND MANAGERIAL BEHAVIOUR

As a manager, we may have asked: What motivates managers to become successful in

a large organisation? Among other things, they need to make an impact to be strong
and to influence the behaviour of others for the organisational good. What separates
good managers from poor managers is the “need for power”. However, it should
neither be dictatorial, nor power for personal goals. It is not crude power, or power
used impulsively. It can be referred to as altruistic power, meaning the power to
influence people for the good of the organisation for which they work. It may also be
called socialized power, meaning power which is tempered by a large dose of self-
control and perspective.

When a large number of executives are grouped according to their success in a running
large, complex corporation, the profile of the effective manager looks like this:

The top managers of a company must possess a high concern for influencing people
and commensurate authority. However, this need must be disciplined and controlled so
that it is directed towards the benefit of an institution as a whole and not toward the
manager’s personal benefits. Moreover, the top manager’s need for power ought to be
greater than her/his need for being liked by people.

41
Communication A good manager is not primarily motivated by the need for affiliation. The
S k ill s a n d
M o t i v a t io n affiliation need refers to the desire to be liked and accepted by other people.
People with strong affiliation need not necessarily do well in management positions.
To maintain a high morale and productive environment, policies must be applied
universally and consistently. A manager concerned with developing friendly
relationships may make too many “exceptions to the rule” for certain subordinates,
thereby upsetting these subordinates who do not receive special treatment. A manager
motivated by the affiliation need may create poor teamwork and low morale. This, of
course, would be inadvertent; as such an individual would not purposefully do anything
to upset the relationships in the work group. It would occur most likely because of the
failure of the manager to focus on the task to be accomplished.

The need for achievement is not extreme among effective managers. The need for
achievement means a desire to do things better. Entrepreneurs, for example, are high
in the need to achieve. This is understandable since people high in this need try to do
things better themselves and want constant feedback on their performance to see how
well they are working. While good managers may be high in the need to achieve, it is
usually not greatly out of balance when compared to the power and affiliation motives.

A manager with an usually high need to achieve would in all probability be

characterized by the inability to delegate authority. But good managers get things done
with and through other people. They are, therefore, required invariably to delegate
authority. The manager must get others to do things through influence or through
persuasion. By definition, then, one aspect of a manager’s job is to help others perform
their jobs better, rather than trying to better perform the many short-term projects
alone.

A mature, self-controlled need for power will help create a good manager who helps
subordinates, feels strong and responsible, rewards them properly for good
performance and sees that things are organized in such a way that subordinates feel
they know what they should be doing. Above all, managers should foster among others
a strong sense of team spirit, of pride in working as part of a particular team. If a
manager creates and encourages this spirit, her/his subordinate(s) certainly should
perform better.

The actions of managers can be measured along two dimensions – a concern for
people and a concern for productive output. A strong power need combined with a weak
need for affiliation does not conflict with being people-oriented or democratic toward
subordinates. Power is a motive while being people-oriented is a behaviour or an
action.

Effective managers, in their effort to influence subordinates and get work done,
express their strong power needs in democratic, people-oriented ways. Research on
power in organisations indicates that the managers who were strong in power needs
were also rated strong on the people-oriented supervisory style by their own
subordinates.

42
 Motivation:
Issues
13.7 SUMMARY and
Aspects

• Motivation is defined as a “process governing choices, made by persons or lower

organisms, among alternatives forms of voluntary activity”. As such motivation is
concerned with (1) the direction of behaviour, or what a person chooses to do when
presented with a number of possible alterna tives, (2) the amplitude, or strength of
the effect once the choice is made and (3) the persistence of the behaviour, or how
long the person continues with it. Choices behaviour refers to decisions directed
toward occupational preference, choices, organisation choices, job attendance, self-
training, creativity, spontaneity and job termination.

• Almost all workers are motivated to have a high level of self-esteem in the work
situation. Often when a person is not in a work situation providing high self-
esteem, the person will be “fighting back” – actively or passively like a slave –
with all sorts of sly country measures. People do not want to be pushed around,
misunderstood, unappreciated, mistreated, controlled or laughed at. All these
things cause low self-esteem. The individual does not want to expect success to
be active, to be respected to exercise self-control and to be self-starting.

• Factors within the job (intrinsic factors) are usually effective motivators and can
help awaken the urge to accomplish and to be self-starting. Such factors include
feelings of achievement, recognition and responsibility among others. These
feelings sometimes “surprise” workers and in so doing inspire and encourage high
motivation

• Jobs not providing for intrinsic motivation are low in “cultivation” or

stimulation. Some form of job redesign is suggested for this type of job.

• High task performance results when (1) employees are able to use their valued
abilities and skills in becoming task competent, (2) employees perceive valued and
equitable rewards to be linked to task performance, and (3) employees acknowledge
a differential reward system based on performance within the organisation.

• The power motive is important to effective managers. This need is not for
dictatorial power or crude impulsive power but rather socialized power and the
power to influence people for the sake of the organisation. While some balance of
motives is usually present within most individuals a high need for power seem to
be critical to a person’s ability to function as a manager.

• Motivation is a complex problem in organisation because the needs, wants, and

desires of each worker differ as each individual is unique in his/ her biological and
psychological makeup and in his/her learning experiences. Motivation is either
internal or external, depending on where the action is initiated.

• External motivation builds on internal motivation and depends on the

motivational assumptions and techniques used by the manager.
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Communication
Skills and 13.8 TERMINAL QUESTIONS
Motivation
Study the cases given below and answer the questions following them.

Case 1

The procedure manual of Naidu Enterprises stated that backorders should be filed
numerically by the invoice number appearing on Naidu’s purchase order to its
suppliers. But one morning Hariharan spent several hours refilling the backorders
suppliers. When a customer called to check on an item that was backordered, it was
time-consuming for Ram to locate the order that was written up after it had been
determined that the item was not in stock. Consequently, the customer had no idea
what the invoice number of its backorder was. Hariharan was proud of what he had
done and wanted the opportunity to show off his system to the branch manager, John
Rowlings. After lunch that same day, Mr. Rowlings needed a backorder invoice to
answer a question a customer had about his order. It was no problem for Ram to find
the invoice since it was filed alphabetically under the name of the account. Mr.
Rowlings told Joe that although the invoice had been easily located, his filing system
for backorder invoices did not conform to company procedures and they would have
to be refilled by invoice number before the branch’s semiannual inspection next week.

Hariharan was depressed that he had to conform to company procedures even

when they were inefficient. He spent the entire afternoon refilling the invoices by
number, not caring that he didn’t get anything else done.

1. Will Hariharan be motivated to try other methods of improving the

efficiency of the job in the future? Explain.

Case 2

Arun was the first repair manager to be hired at Chawla Supply Centre. He was a field
repairman for another company before he took a position. In the past, the repair
department had operated without a manager. The repairman, Nand Kishore and
George Brown simply divided the work between themselves in whatever manner they
wanted. There was always a backlog of work, but It was finished on time.

When Arun came, he decided to divide the work load into repairs for company
and individual accounts and to assign certain types of repairs to each man.
He had to check all repairs before they were returned to the customer, and he
wanted all problems discussed with him before action was taken on them.
He started holding meetings with the repairmen to discuss problems the
section was having. At first, meetings were held during working hours, then 44
 Motiva t i o n : I
after work, and finally on Saturdays. During these meetings, the increasing an d A s
s sue s
pe ct s
number of problems were discussed, but no solutions were ever offered. In
the meantime, the work load was getting greater and some of the work was
not being finished on time. It seemed that Nand Kishore and George were
spending most of their time getting Arun’s approval on their work so they could
have it shipped back to the customer. Arun then decided that the repair
department should start working overtime.

1. Discuss this case in terms of job satisfaction and job enrichment.

2. Is anyone to blame for the increase in workload, or could it be just an increase in

business?

3. Do you believe that the repairmen should be motivated to increase their

productivity because they now have their own manager?

4. Discuss morale in terms of the relationship of satisfaction to productivity.

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