Motivation theories and applications

¶ … Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs With Expectancy Theories of Motivation

Comparing and Contrasting Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs Theory With Expectancy Theory of Motivation

Anybody may be compelled to question the reason why people undertaker certain activities in the way they undertake them and not in a different way. This can be a challenging task as one might find, because possibly there might be no cheap answer. However, the subject has been of interest for several centuries. First were the philosophers who concentrated on the expectation of someone undertaking a task and how best one should live. Then came the modern times, when management thinking came to be and it interested in motivation of people, not only for them to be happy but also to be more productive (Droar 2006). Talking about motivation, it is a the strength arising from the mind/mental effort that dictates how an individual will behavior in an organization or work place, how much effort this individual has on his/her tasks and how this person continues firmly on his/her tasks whenever hurdles face him/her. To managers, their interest is to ensure implementation of strategies and thus they have the obligation to motivate their workers because loosing an employee can be very costly. In addition, managers need to motivate workers so that they can retain the valuable ones as well recruit the best to join the organization as this translates to success in implementing strategies. Through intrinsic reward (self-satisfaction on completing a task) and extrinsic reward (being recognized by others for good work done), employees are able to perform as managers expect, thus managers have to ensure they motivate their employees. As there are several motivation theories, only through comparing and contrasting one can establish which ones motivate workers more than others. Maslow's pyramid or hierarchy of needs theory of motivation has greater motivation to employees than Vroom's expectancy theory.

Comparing

First, Maslow's hierarchy theory as an earlier proposition, it creates the base on which Vroom's expectancy theory, a later edition, builds on. Secondly, both the Expectancy and the Maslow's hierarchy of needs motivational theories, they both enable a person to modify his/her input (efforts to undertake a task) depending on the importance they have on the expected result in the entire procedure of undertaking that task and what they understand about input and output. For example, Maslow theory of motivation as a commonly known theory, it addresses needs of an individual in a hierarchy manner. It considers a single need and this need depends on already other satisfied needs. From an arrangement of how these needs need to fulfillment in a hierarchy manner, one can establish those that require early fulfillment than others. In addition, both theories allows an individual to establish which results are most likely to motivate people and this will dictate the best measures to take as factors of their experiences and expectations ( Droar 2006).

Maslow's understanding on the effect of unsatisfied needs relates to expectancy theory in that like Maslow, Vroom indicates in the expectancy theory that the need to fulfill unmet demands is what motivates individuals where such a person will make a concerned decision to undertake a certain task in a manner that he/she understands as satisfying that need. Therefore, high motivation will manifest where there is concise and quantified goals that for example in a team the team members understand how a task as achievable and how it would benefit them considerably. In cases of low motivation, team members usually become frustrated as they cannot define the best ways to undertake different tasks and for what rewards these tasks can bring to them (Yeatts and Hyten 1998, p. 64).

In addition, whenever an individual understands that he/she is lacking an essential item/want necessary for well-being, then this understanding will establish a need for that individual to undertake activities or behave in a manner that will lead to satisfying that particular need. Moreover, if someone understands that certain need is being satisfied, then this person will lack motivation to manifest characters/behaviors that associate with fulfilling the need (Yeatts and Hyten, 1998, p. 63). Considering this perspective in a work place, what this indicates is that financial benefits will act as a significant motivation tool until an understanding that the money is a way of fulfilling different categories of demands (basic needs). Contrary to this, if these people understand that such demands are fulfilling, then these people/employees will lack motivation to fulfill such needs and will rather establish other ways of fulfilling higher ranked needs touching self-esteem. The more the expectations employees have on their job, the greater the motivation they will have to perform. These approaches are common both the Maslow's hierarchy of needs and Vroom's expectancy theories of motivation.

Contrasting

As suggested by Victor Vroom and unlike Maslow' theory, the expectancy theory of motivation does not focus on needs but concentrates in the results. When Maslow's hierarchy of needs theory concentrates on the association of internal needs of an individual and the expected effort needed to satisfy them such as time and money, Vroom puts apart effort (a result of motivation), performance, and results/outcome. What this means is that for anyone to get motivated, the drive behind effort should associate with execution of relevant tasks and the outcome. To connect the drive/effort with performance, expectancy helps one to believe that extra dedication on a task will improve performance, meaning hard work pays. For the hard work to be fruitful there has to be right resources (adequate time, appropriate skills, and support). Linking performance and outcome will be instrumentality that helps one perceive that whenever an individual performs excellently, then a worthy outcome is viable and finally valence connects outcome and effort as dictated by the main motivation. For example, if cash motivates someone, then taking leave would not be valuable to this person because he is not making money.

In Maslow's theory of motivation, individuals get motivation from something extra as compared to only cash/financial benefits and job fulfillment. Thus, the broad consideration of varying factors improves motivation of individuals/employees. Expectancy theory on its part only illustrates motivation as not applying to all cases as the understanding of whatever one wants to achieve/objects relates to efforts on a task and performance of that task, performance and compensation/gain, gain and objective fulfillment. As these will differ for different individuals as well as locations, to design rewarding systems, managers should thus always consider respective organizational structure so that the rewards offered relate to individual goals in such environments (Gunkel 2006, p. 15).

Expectancy Theory of motivation proves to be most sophisticated comparing to Maslow's theory in motivating employees because the effort to undertake a task will relate to the surrounding and capability to dictate the resulting achievement/performance of a person (Griffin and Moorhead 2009, p. 99). This theory to significant number of people and situations, might fail to apply. For example, it is more difficult to change management practices of an organization to meet individual needs, which might appear as outdated ways of doing things to many people and thus expectancy theory viewed as an individualized theory rather than management oriented (Hassard and Parker 1993, p. 93).

Contrary to the expectancy theory, Maslow's hierarchy of needs theory has the option that "working towards self-actualization, rather than actually achieving it may be the ultimate motivation for most people" (Griffin and Moorhead 2009, p. 88). As currently, some people find themselves leaving high paying jobs that fail to satisfy their job objectives to low paying jobs that satisfy. Maslow's gives a sense of understanding without conscious reasoning thus common to many practicing managers and gives a general structure to classify demands as needs will not necessary fit to Maslow's model. In the manner in which the needs rank, the bottom needs will be termed as physiological needs (food and water) and they determine when the following batch of growth needs (knowing and perceiving one's needs) will start fulfillment. It is only when the growth needs are fulfilled that one is at peace to attain his/her potential such as self-actualization after which one can overcome his/her self-esteem to assist others (Droar 2006). This is a more realist arrangement that enables one to progressive exploit his/her potential through satisfaction from preceding level of needs unlike expectancy theory that limits only on reward and job satisfaction.