Benefits of Employee Motivation

Organizational Behavior & Culture

Complete summary of chapter 4

The chapter illustrates that the perception process is based on stages such as stimulation, organization, registration, and interpretation. The individual's acceptance and awareness levels for ascertained stimuli play critical roles in the perception process. The authors add that receptiveness towards certain stimuli remains highly selective in limiting a person's existing personality, motivation, attitude, and beliefs. People select various stimuli that satisfy certain needs (perceptual vigilance) while disregarding stimuli causing perceptual defense (psychological anxiety).

The chapter insists that guidelines facilitate companies in improving their workplaces through the surveying content. The employees can ask questions regarding observable behavior above thoughts and motives. The concept also includes items that are verified independently. The measures also attract behavioral consideration in the recognition of the company's performance. Attitude transformation requires time, determination, and effort to achieve. It is critical to relax expectations of changing an individual's attitudes quickly. The management need an understanding that such attitude change will take time will substantiate setting out unrealistic expectations and rapid changes. The attitudes can be formed in a lifetime based on the socialization process of an individual. Individual's approach to the socialization process involves his values and beliefs formation from childhood years. The aspects are influenced by family, culture, and religion and in socioeconomic factors. The scope of the socialization process influences person's attitude while working and relating with others.

Halo effects occur while individuals draw general impression on other persons based on single characteristics. Some of the features include intelligence, appearance, or sociability. Perceivers evaluate other people based on many traits due to their belief that such persons are high within a given trait. For instance, if employees perform difficult accounting tasks well through management's belief of high intelligence among the employees, the manager may erroneously make a perception of the employee to having competencies in subsequent management or technology. Halo effect applies to perceptions of others within the organizations. For instance, hospitals that are popular for opening cardiac programs are perceived as excellent in the community even as other obstetrics or orthopedics departments may not ride in the same category.

Perception determines how people understand, interpret, and organize the issues of the environment in which they live. The aspects are essential because businesses must make decisions: human senses play crucial roles in defining the courses of action. There are beliefs that the ingredients of perception alter or distort vision of the overall reality and mask the truth. For people who encounter situations of preconceived notions of the occurrences, there is need to see the expectations in line with overall goals. People tend to collect certain situations through inherent bias of perceived reality. Points worth noting include the view of business situations as important components of expected experiences, training, and expectations that otherwise be difficult to address.

Perception presents complex phenomenon that is influenced by personal values and experience, beliefs, attitude, training and education. The chapter illustrates that the level of perception of an individual has a hereditary basis. The scope of perception operates based on different aspects of life. Perception plays a critical role in organizing business. In the case, an individual understands and accepts that the development of a vision and prediction of where markets will emerge permits the identification of major trends affecting basic fabric within the society. The focus also determines how to take advantage of opportunities with essential elements of running businesses. The organizations flow with the accepted perception for basic ingredients within the processes. The hunch that people get forms part of perception. Perception is grounded in the manner in which people see things as well as how such aspects are arranged and interpreted to develop a conclusion or undertake a decision. Perception advances principal ingredient within the business management, and it has powerful tools in business through proper recognition and application.

Leaders can use the content that is known through sandwiching techniques to change behavior based on criticism. Some of the approaches include praising employees and sharing something nice in their achievements. It is important to mention the bad things that occurred. The conversation must end with positive things and other prospects of work. Leaders discover that such individual do not alter their expectations for purposes of dealing with criticism. In fact, such criticism is ultimately ignored due to the expectations of better discussions. Leaders are in a position of protecting themselves from wrongful perception in case there is work of the sensitive nature of the employees and consideration of different viewpoints. This is achieved by encouraging people around to make offering of independent observations, suggestions, and ideas despite the challenges stating goals and outcomes. There is needed to identify obstacles that team members do not see. Leaders can step from the action while taking other views of ensuring that they see the entire picture and not simply the parts found to be most interesting. Finally, it is important to have increased awareness of the people's expectations against what they see. People can shun away from big changes that do not match their expected reality.

Complete summary of chapter 5

The chapter discusses the motivational theories. The author opens by noting that need theories are based on the fulfillment of internal states that make various outcomes integrate as attractive. The theories narrow down to basic instruments of straightforward motivation theories. The Pyramid Hierarchy of Needs under Maslow's theory illustrates that individuals have pyramid-like hierarchies of needs that are satisfied from bottom towards the top.

The Alderfer's ERG Model condenses the five human needs from Maslow's theory to three distinct categories. The groupings include existence (physiological and material), Growth (self-actualization and internal esteem) and Relatedness (external esteem and social). McClelland's Achievement Motivation Theory involves an acquired needs theory where individual's particular needs are cumulated over time based on a person's life experiences. The theory describes three distinct forms of motivational needs such as affiliation motivation (n-affine), authority or power motivation (n-pow) and achievement motivation (n-ach). Managers have opportunities for designing reward systems for purposes of diminishing absenteeism through linking bonuses to attendance levels.

Adams' Equity Theory illustrates those individuals seeking to uphold balances between inputs and outcomes received should relate to outputs of other people. Fair forms of treatment involve creation of motivation that adds to the crucial additional motivation theory perspective for comparative 'reference' with others. People are considered to be in such situations. Herzberg's Job Design Model is widely used and replicated in the world of business. The theory splits the hygiene factors into motivation factors. The hygiene factors have a relationship to pain-avoidance as well as leading aspects of dissatisfaction without extensive satisfaction. Motivation factors have a relationship to ability to attain and experience all forms of psychological growth.

Models of this kind introduce 'job enrichment' towards achieving true motivation unlike elements of 'job loading'. The strategy has positive implications for the compensation among little job content as well as poor working conditions that are not otherwise improved. Further, various jobs within facility management firms have simple and routine approaches to managing insufficient motivational properties. The management of cultural diversity in workplaces does not directly establish tasks of administrative managers without persons of the company contributing towards the success of diversity management in a workplace. Managers are in a position of dealing with different individuals with proper orientation of cultural diversity. Effective managers contribute towards successful organizational efforts in the management of diversity through striving to achieve an empathy, understanding, communication, and tolerance. Other managerial concepts take basic concepts for equal employment opportunities within unnecessary extremes.

Vroom's Expectancy Theory separates efforts from outcomes and performance. The focus works towards perceptions as well as assumptions that such behavior results in conscious choices of alternatives geared towards maximized pleasure and avoidance of pain. The theory introduces the Expectancy concepts through increased efforts leading to an element of increased results. Instrumentality involves performance along the received valued outcomes. Valence is value attached to expected outcomes. Job characteristics model by Hackman and Oldham focuses on tasks. The theorists identify five distinct job characteristics such as skill variety, task identity, task significance, autonomy, and feedback influencing critical psychological states (such as responsibility, meaningfulness, and knowledge of outcomes).

The approach influences work and motivation outcomes (job satisfaction and absenteeism. The theory suggests people can redesign key components for jobs based on maximum motivation. People have different characteristics in different ways needing equitable and fair treatment. Therefore, managers should understand the differences between people and the need to maintain the sanctity. All efforts towards treating people in similar ways in the firm despite the fundamental human differences lead to extensive problems.

Read and complete the following case studies

Case study 4: MAGREC

Any manager must outline the quality standards upheld by an organization. The employees require continuous awareness of the consequences of delivering substandard good to clients. Further, management should develop a code of ethics that will guide the employees' interactions with customers. A clear chain of decision taking will inform the character and variation of organizational structures in the absence of supervision. Public relations efforts will also play an important role in advancing the approach and implementation of a fundamental reputation in terms of quality and compliance in the market. The deficiency needs that stifle other forms of movement without satisfactions; growth needs progressive face hindrances of primary coverage. In the end, managers should guarantee that the reward structures are equivalent to market rates. Effective reward systems enable fair competitiveness while the alternate firms seek certain forms of competencies and talents that are striking among prospective candidates.

I think that Dinah's actions were incorrect. Dinah was not justified to develop and dispatch goods that did not meet the intended quality. All forms of justification for the actions are subsided by the fact that approaches to extensive consideration of the ethical nature of the business were put in jeopardy. Dinah's approach shows a clear illustration of poor decision-making. Businesses require committed and productive employees, suppliers, and agents to create services and goods. The most important aspects include loyal and satisfied consumers and customers leading to profits. The firm should cultivate on people with a belief in its prospects. Dinah should acknowledge the long view while respecting physical environment, as well as prospects for future generations. Employees seek to have treatment and reward for fair and equitable elements despite gender, disability, ethnicity, age, geographic location, sexual orientation, among other defined categories. Service managers attempt a decrease of absenteeism through a link of rewards to the attendance levels. For instance, managers set policies for giving monetary bonuses and extra paid leave days for ideal and near-perfect record of attendance. Effectiveness of the company's performance is augmented based on the employee performance while facilitating effective reward systems. The chapter develops a linkage between reward and performance where extrinsic and intrinsic rewards are influential factors that influence subsequent performance.

Fred's dissonance is aroused as the team voluntarily does some unpleasant activity to attain some desired goals. Dinah's dissonance can be minimized through exaggeration of the goal's desirability. The individuals within the ranks undergo severe and mild "initiation" for purposes of becoming group members. For severe-initiation conditions, individuals can be engaged in embarrassing activities. Pat joined the activity that turned out a dull and inappropriate event. The group of individuals from severe-initiation conditions is evaluated as a group in determining the interests of the mild-initiation condition. With higher performances and increased effort, employees expect rewards from significant sources as compared to counterparts providing output as below the norm. Effort and performance of employees at certain levels face influence from individual objectives and goals that vary based on each aspect of the individual. Outcomes and rewards that are perceived to have significant and important outcomes of higher efforts and performances influence response from individual employees. Performance assessments in the learning and change processes rotate within company efforts for research and development.

Case Study # 5: IT ISN't FAIR

Mary was naive and inexperienced before meeting Sue. She was unaware of her rights and avenues of seeking fair treatment from her employer. The status led to her employer taking advantage of her through requiring her to work late hours without overtime allowance. The employer also micro-managed Mary's steps thus the discomfort. After meeting Sue, Mary's attitude has changed for the better, and she is now aware of her rights and essence of claiming fair treatment. The case identifies familiarity with best practices in human resource management. Equal treatment especially for pay and reward systems is an entitlement for all employees. The fact that people feel more competent to undertake within challenging capacities and have a previous demonstration of the competencies, employees feel the need of seeking additional responsibilities and reward through fair and equitable ways. Managers as well as other leaders have a frequent tendency of feeling the need of teaching, coaching and developing others. The individuals seek such influence for purposes of aligning to organization's goals, strategies and the objectives aimed at achieving mission of an organization.

With the changed attitude, Mary is likely to push for better treatment based on the information given. Employees across the world focused on the designs and implemented business ethics programs in addressing they are legal, social responsibility, environmental, and ethical issues faced in the workplace. Commitment theories are based on the creation of conditions upon which employees feel compelled to continue working for various organizations. On the other hand, engagement theories focus on bringing about situations that the employee has free choice of advancing intrinsic desires of work within best organization interests. The purposes are compared to traditional production systems while flexing on high-performance systems that involve teams, incentive pay systems, and training. For instance, various products that are developed in the year and time take longer in bringing alternative products to markets while performance measures advance on innovation techniques. Performance measures within the learning process comprise the employee training sessions as well as employees cross-trained for such skills. Measures relating to customer service performance consist of their complaints numbers and recurrence.

The Maslow's hierarchy of needs theory explains the case of Mary. People consider satisfying their basic needs first prior moving to advanced levels of their life requirements. The concept also involves variation of the organizational and personal interests to suit the needs of a mutually beneficial relationship in the workplace. It requires people who have achieved their basic needs to explore new prospects and advanced needs for purposes of investing. It is important needs to undertake long views for respecting physical environment, as well as prospects of diversified generations. The top management must develop an understanding that the cultural forces can cause individual to have a behavior that induces differences in accepted practices. Further, employees focus on practices of empathy within respective work areas while trying to establish meaning of perspective among other persons. Empathy enhances the ability of putting oneself in places of a person's cultural acceptance. In such case, cultural diversity magnifies problems as people face fear and unwillingness to have open discussions on issues relating to diversity. Ideal communication platforms require ideal infrastructure and continuous consolations.

Article 1

Porter, E. (2014). Motivating Corporations to Do Good. The New York Times.

According to Porter (2014), perception forms a critical reality. One of the important aspects of one's business skills package is perception as a core competency. Denying the implications of basic attributes of entrepreneurship impedes on decision-making and leadership. Perception forms the integral and basic concept for people to perceive and assesses opportunities as well as how alternative opportunities are pursued. The focus also develops a view of the business environment and the elements comprising of environmental internal like resources, staff, services, equipment, and products. The external factors like the market, the competition, and the customer/client are also considered. The approach identifies the understanding of different trends such as long-term trends affecting basic social structure in terms of empty nesters, aging population, and women returning to the workforce en masse. Other considerations include manufacturing jobs decline and increase in service jobs, global economics, health care growth, information technology and the inter-company collaboration trend.

Porter (2014) concludes that the roles of management include facilitating and guiding question and answer sessions. The tasks of effective facilitation include activation of group's resources while bringing out the best response from the group. For instance, the individuals should be involved in planning activities especially in icebreaker exercises. Working with energy within the groups promotes the usage of humor and laughter as well as healthy competition. The interactions cultivate on trust through helping people develop a feeling of comfort for sharing ideas and considering new options. The alternative tasks in facilitation include activating participants' internal wisdom. The parties ask questions while letting others discover answers by themselves. It is important to assist more participants in keeping dialogs going on while sorting out values and priorities. The focus also explores the beliefs and assumptions besides promoting the alteration of their work life based on the chosen activities.

Responses to the Ethics in OB scenario

Impression management involves the evaluation of what people do, how they do it, what they say as well as how they influence such perceptions to others. People try presenting themselves in ways that promote positive evaluations, highlight respective achievements, and limit the disclosure of failures. Impression management does not have an inherent ideal performance, but a fundamental element of social and works lifestyles. It is important to view the situations that it is applied. For instance, it is important to consider self-handicapping concepts. Self-handicapping involves people placing obstacles in the way. This way, if success is not achieved, they blame obstacles. If they are successful, they brag on their successful performance despite the barriers.

Customer surveys are used in getting together customer satisfaction measures for the company in comparison to the competitors. Performance measures for internal processes consider length of time taken in manufacturing certain products. Amount of waste and scrap are measures of efficiency within the manufacturing processes of a company. The scope of all customer returns involves performance measures for the sales ordering and manufacturing processes. Financial measures are inclusive of income from organizational operations while the rates of return on investment establish the residual incomes.

The concept empowers the law to absent discrimination against individuals based on characteristics of gender and race. The mandate creates a belief that treatment of people is based on company resources regardless of race and gender. However, the belief causes challenges in translation to workplace behaviors for employees who are recently hired.

Complete summary of chapter 6

Many organizations compete for survival within the fierce and volatile market environments. The article illustrates that motivation and performance for employees bears an essential instrument for success of the organization within its focus. Further, the measures of performance are critical to organization's management as they highlight evolution as well as achievement an organization. There are positive relationships between organizational effectiveness and employee motivation as reflected in study analysis. The paper targets an analysis of employee motivation drivers within high organizational performance levels. Individuals seeking security have underlying needs with fundamental relevance to their existence.

The article defines motivation as one of the internal drives towards satisfaction of unsatisfied needs and needs to achieve ascertained goals. The focus also involves procedure starting with physiological and psychological needs stimulating performance established by objectives. The comparison to the financial resources affects human resources with the capability of creating competitive advantage within the organizations. Employee performance is dependent on more factors of job satisfaction, motivation, training and development, and appraisals. The article focuses employee motivation and its influence on organizational performance. Motivated employees have their goals aligned along those of organizational performance while directing their efforts in similar directions.

Additionally, the organizations achieve more success if the employees look for ways of improving their quality of work. Pushing employees to attain full potential within the within stressful conditions of a workplace is tough and challenging. However, the chapter maintains that this is achievable through continuous motivation. Organizational effectiveness outlines the extents as which organizations fulfill their objectives using ascertained resources without attaching strain to the members. Goal models define organizational effectiveness with reference to the extent at which organizations attains their objectives. The systems resource models define the bargaining power from the organization against its overall ability in exploiting the environment as acquired through valuable resources.

The performance management extent is broad, and performance management is perceived as enterprise tools for the improvement of employee motivation and high performance. Effective performance management calls for solid understanding of production dynamics. This includes an understanding of the duty tasks and areas, which are integral parts of the job description of the company. The existence of adequate mastery for the job and respective tasks requires the firm to assess and improve its performance.

Human resources function helps organizations in developing potential of advancing the changes that keep on playing critical parts of the organizational landscape. Extensive HRM ensures that there is adequate provision for aspects of compensation packages where wages and salaries developed by workers and employees serve within the organization. The attempts include job evaluation, salary, and wages survey, wage rate determination, wage payment determination, bonuses, and incentive payment plans. Employees are rewarded based on the value of their job, personal contributions and performance. Even though availing rewards on levels of performance augments employee's motivation for performance, most reward schemes are given on the value of jobs the employees do. However, the rewards that are based exclusively on personal contributions of the employee and the variation of the membership in the organization have a rapid increment. Management requires awareness of differences between satisfaction and motivation. Motivation can be influenced by forward-looking options of relationships between rewards and performance. On the contrary, satisfaction remains the outcome of previous events that refer to feelings of people on rewards received.

Complete summary of chapter 7

Even as application of teams is perceived as a benefit, teams are not always the best approaches within organizations. This chapter illustrates experiences among teams with the goal of outlining the attractions against challenges involved in implementing teams. This will give realistic previews of the achievable goals based on teamwork. Reasonably, partnership effects have positive or negative contingent implications on factors like organizations' climate and culture, employee commitment, team leadership effectiveness, system of rewards and compensation, and employee autonomy level. This chapter outlines critical points that are identified by various authors in the facilitation of effective team development. The points involve clear goals, decision-making authority, training and development, accountability and responsibility, effective leadership, provision of resources, team success rewards, and organizational support.

The article highlights the relevance of training among team leaders. However, many team members have a higher likelihood of stable management skills. The authors add that employees require learning of new skills including computing, budgeting, marketing, and public relations, coupled with skills to allow them work effectively together. The concepts include sufficient confliction resolution, problem-solving, and communication. Training and development have an enabling environment where the team leaders and members can take on different responsibilities. In case team members are possession of inadequate work knowledge and skills, teams have a high probability of failure.

Emphasis on personalized rewards continues to undermine the effectiveness of all forms of team-based work while encouraging team members strive towards individual performance goals. The goals may not have congruence with the overall team goals. Reward systems that are team -based require a reward system for employees based on teamwork as well as contributions towards team success. An illustration of the system involves gaining share plans where the ideas of success and profit result in the entire team performance and rewards. Problems occurring with team-based rewards require social loafing problems. This concept occurs as efforts of various team members' decrease, and there is an increased probability of teams has an excessive deviation. Team-based rewards have a link to social loafers that are rewarded on a similar basis to alternative team members with a responsibility of advancing group performance. The argument for a reward system is based on respective efforts while considering the necessity of achieving team-based discipline those accompanying reward systems through team-based approaches.

First, teamwork achieves by making optimum application of human resources through an allowance of organizational access to personal knowledge and skills. Increment in complexities of organizational structures illustrates that management does not know all aspects of operations. In such situations, it becomes imperative that knowledge and skills within a workforce are utilized. Teams will enhance more organizational learning through employee management and the ability of experimenting and creating strategies that suit their work. The author adds that teams within organizations may develop gains within productivity and efficiency through the creation of synergy. Teamwork has a close relationship to the greater varieties of tasks as well as added responsibilities for the team members. The possibilities are outcomes of increased job satisfaction levels, diversified motivation, and employee commitment. The component causes decreased staff absenteeism and turnover. This element reduces organizational costs while improving organization's knowledge base or memory.

The article adds that rational individuals take the assumption that more conflicts are not developed as people remain objective. On the contrary, conflicts escalate through psychosocial and issue-related issues that are increasingly mixed. The implication is that there is the need to make collections and unravel various themes disputing and looking at precise contents. Potential for advanced conflict easily arises within levels of practitioners who do not recognize that issues can be assessed and perceived differently from the available perspectives and the varying disciplines and subjects. On the other hand, concepts are rarely clarified to people's satisfaction through misinterpretations and misunderstandings leading to failure of identifying real issues.

Read and complete the following case studies

Case study #6B: HOVEY AND BEARD COMPANY

The management approach of Hovey and Beard Business is made based on a top-down decision model imposed on the employees. Failure of the initiative led to intransigent production engineers showing resistance in the alteration of operational procedures and assembly line designs and standards. The changes were created on the existing assembly line through production methods resulting from advanced production contents of wood toys. The changes influenced compensation structures of the employees who were involved in the operations. The outcome was resentment among remaining employees from the company while the situations lacked regard for top-down decisions as imposed by manufacturing wooden toys in the firm. The response to such resentment by company's employees led to a disastrous plan that was produced by production engineers and re-imposed on results. The poor decisions in this case led to people associating the failure with initial implementation. The resentment response was based on company's alternative employees where original disastrous plans were designed to achieve production engineering and re-imposition of outcomes that were poor in the implementation stage.

The approach of the company needs more assessment in the cases likened to the overall attitude. In the case, government agencies declined to share with the people in top positions in helping government attain changes as warranted. The Hovey and Beard Company case shows that people should have instilled further consultations in increasing the production caps for wooden toys as desired. The workers in the manufacturing department determined the numbers of toys to be produced, and the group of workers made such plans to work through assuring success rates. When teams communicate their final or interim results, they should use techniques and channels that are consistent with phase models for decision and cognitive processes. The focus reflects on the accuracy of the team's record in advancing efforts in identifying solutions with respect to other organizational components. For example, project teams have come to conclude that other organizational components have been informed of problems and presentation of team's findings with a likelihood of meeting with rejection and incomprehension. Project teams can be advised to make presentations of systematic data while progressing. The information should explain the independent paths that are taken. The focus assists in the avoidance of phase misfit of an organization. Leadership requires a focus on persons and team members learning to undertake their work through individual commitment and responsibility. It is possible to recognize where new support and initiatives are needed. The maxim of leadership will change based on the situation that provides necessary steering impulses. The focus also has due recognition for courses of impulses given to the original team or group intentions.

The issues of management within Hovey and Beard Company should take a different approach for purposes of improving the probabilities that plans are implemented. The concept also has diversified outcomes in increasing the production levels for wooden toys as sought out by management. The implementation and support of teams in the organization involve considerable organizational changes requiring changes based on issues requiring consideration. The issues affect the team members and the supervisors and managers roles within an organizational culture, social relationships, work methods and processes, and structure. The scope and depth of such changes fosters implementation of teams through lengthy processes that present different challenges. Many organizations implementing teams lack no plans of reverting to previous structures. Despite the challenges, teamwork can avail different benefits to the organizations over specified periods.

Case Study # 7: THE FORGOTTEN GROUP MEMBER