Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs Essay

1)Explain the motivation problem with the hourly-paid employees in this organization in terms of the content models of motivation. What are the other things that the human resources manager is referring to in speaking of things besides money, conditions, and fringe benefits that are needed to motivate employees? The first theory that is briefly presented is Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. After which, this is linked to the needs of Tom, Rajina, and Harry. Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs Perhaps, the most famous theory of satisfaction and motivation was developed by Abraham Maslow (1954 in Loop, 1994). Maslow believed that employees would be satisfied with their jobs at any given point in time if certain needs were met. Maslow believed that there are five major types of needs and these needs are hierarchical – that is, lower level needs must be satisfied before an employee will be concerned with the next level of needs. Basic biological needs. Maslow thought that an individual first seeks to satisfy basic biological needs for food, air, water, and shelter. An individual who does not have a job, is homeless, and is on the verge of starvation will be satisfied with any job as long as it provides for these basic needs. When asked how well they enjoy their job, people at this level might reply, â€Å"I can’t complain, it pays the bills. † Safety needs. After the basic biological needs have been met, a job that merely provides food and shelter will no longer be satisfying. Employees then become concerned about meeting their safety needs. That is, they may work in an unsafe coal mine to earn money to ensure their family’s survival, but once their family has food and shelter, they will remain satisfied with their jobs only if their workplace is safe. Safety needs have been explained to include psychological as well as physical safety. Psychological safety – often referred to as job security – can certainly affect job satisfaction. For example, public sector employees often list job security as a main benefit to their jobs – a benefit so strong that they will stay in lower paying public sector jobs rather than take higher paying, yet less secure, jobs in the private sector. Social needs. Once these first two need levels have been met, employees will remain satisfied with their jobs only when their social needs have been met. Social needs involve working with others, developing friendships, and feeling needed. Organizations attempt to satisfy their employees’ social needs in a variety of ways. Company cafeterias provide workers the place and opportunity to socialize and meet other employees, company picnics allow families to meet one another, and company sports programs such as bowling teams and softball games provide opportunities for employees to play together in a neutral environment. Ego needs. When social needs have been satisfied, employees concentrate next on meeting their ego needs. These are needs for recognition and success, and an organization can help to satisfy them through praise, salary increases, and publicity. Ego needs can be satisfied in many ways. For example, many organizations use furniture to help satisfy ego needs. The higher the employee’s position, the better his office furniture. Self-actualization needs. Even when employees have friends, have earned awards, and are making a relatively high salary, they may not be completely satisfied with their jobs because their self-actualization needs may have not been satisfied yet. These needs are the fifth and final level of Maslow’s needs hierarchy. Self-actualization may be best defined by the US Army’s recruiting slogan, â€Å"be the best that you can be. † An employee striving for self-actualization wants to reach her potential in every task. Thus, employees who have worked within the same machine for 20 years may become dissatisfied with their jobs. They have accomplished all that they can with that particular machine and now search for a new challenge. If none is available, they may become dissatisfied (Knoop, 1994). In the case study, it has been pointed out that Tom does not seem to be simply motivated by money alone, suggesting that he has probably gone beyond the basic biological needs. There should be effort on the part of his supervisor to look for esteem or self-actualization needs, perhaps. One option is for his job to be enriched. This is also true in the case of Rajina who does have loyalty to the company, but is not too assertive. She may be asked to engage in activities that will increase her self-esteem. Finally, Tom is easily motivated by monetary rewards, and may be rewarded and motivated by these. Still another theory is the two factor theory of Herzberg. Two-factor Theory Still another needs theory, which reduces the number of needs to two, was developed by Herzberg. He believed that job-related factors can de divided into two categories, motivators and hygiene factors – thus the name two-factor theory. Hygiene factors are those job-related elements that results from but do not involve the job itself. For example, pay and benefits are consequences of work but do not involve the work itself. Similarly, making new friends may result from going to work, but it is also not directly involved with the tasks and duties of the job. Motivators are job elements that do concern actual tasks and duties. Examples of motivators would be the level of job responsibility, the amount of job control, and the interest that the work holds for the employee. Herzberg believed that hygiene factors are necessary but not sufficient for job satisfaction and motivation. That is, if a hygiene factors is not present at an adequate level (e. g. the pay is too low), the employee will be dissatisfied. But if all hygiene factors are represented adequately, the employee’s level of satisfaction will only be neutral. Only the presence of both motivators and hygiene factors can bring job satisfaction and motivation. Herzberg’s theory is one of those theories that makes sense but has not received strong support from research. In general, researchers have criticized the theory because of the methods used to develop the two factors as well as the fact that few research studies have replicated the findings obtained by Herzberg and his colleagues (Knoop, 1994). McClelland’s Needs Theory The final needs theory was developed by McClelland (1961 in Knoop, 1994) and suggests that differences between individuals stem from the relationship between a job and each employee’s level of job satisfaction or motivation. McClelland believed that employees differ in their needs for achievement, affiliation, and power. Employees who have a strong need for achievement desire jobs that are challenging and over which they have some control, whereas employees who have minimal achievement needs are more satisfied when jobs involve little challenge and have high probability of success. In contrast, employees who have a strong need for affiliation prefer working with and helping other people. These types of employees are found more often in people-oriented service jobs than in management or administration (Smither & Lindgren, 1978). Finally, employees who have a strong need for power have a desire to influence others rather than simply be successful. Research has shown that employees who have a strong need for power and achievement make the best managers (Stahl, 1983) and that employees who are motivated most by their affiliation needs will probably make the worst managers. It is apparent from both theories that Tom, Rajina and Harry may have need for hygiene factors to increase their productivity. This means that management must offer motivators to retain them or to motivate them to work more. 2)Building on the response to Question 1, explain the motivation of the hourly-paid employees in this company in terms of the process models of motivation. Based on the information provided by the confidential interviews, what would you guess are some of the expectancies, valences, and inequities of the hourly-paid employees of this company? How do these compare to those of Pat (the Director of Manufacturing and Operations)? Based on Vroom’s expectancy theory, Tom, Rajina and Harry have varying valences, expectancies and instrumentality. For example, in the case of Tom, values inspiration and motivation – which are intangibles. However, he is not motivated because he does not receive this from the company. He also does not believe that exerting more effort at work would allow him to receive such inspiration. In the case of Rajina, she has a high need for esteem, which she does not experience because she does not know to advertise her efforts to colleagues. Recognition is what may be given to her to compensate for her efforts and loyalty. There is no direct link from her perspective, of exerting more effort at work, and receiving such recognition as reward. Finally, Tom puts great premium on monetary rewards and benefits. However, based on the perceptions of hourly paid employees in general, there is no significant difference between those who work hard and those who contribute little. A compensation and bonus scheme reflective of relative contribution must be established to motivate employees like him. Based on these information, how can management leverage on the motivation of employees to enable them to attain higher productivity? Individual differences theory postulates that some variability in job satisfaction is due to an individual’s personal tendency across situations to enjoy what she does. Thus, certain types of people will generally be satisfied and motivated regardless of the type of job they hold (Weaver, 1978). The idea also makes intuitive sense. We all know that people who constantly complain and whine about every job they have, and we also know people who are motivated and enthusiastic about every job or task. First, we should be aware of the fact that there are several factors that affect our hourly paid employees’ satisfaction. Apart from money and fringe benefits that motivate employees like Harry, personality is another factor to consider. Whether the consistency in job satisfaction is due to genetic or environmental factors, there appears to be a series of personality variables that are related to job satisfaction. That is, certain types of personalities are associated with the tendency to be satisfied or dissatisfied with one’s job. Judge et al. (1998) have hypothesized that these personality variables are related and involve people’s outlook on life (affectivity), view of their self-worth (self-esteem), ability to master their environment (self-efficacy), and ability to control their environment (external vs. internal locus of control). People prone to be satisfied with their jobs have high self-esteem, high self-efficacy, high positive affectivity, and an internal locus of control. Research supporting this view has come from Judge et al. 1998), who found a significant correlation between a combination of these four variables and job satisfaction, and from Garske (1990), who found that employees with high self-esteem are more satisfied with their jobs than are employees low in self-esteem. Results consistent with the core evaluation theory were reported by Dubin and Champoux (1977), who found that some people are happier in their jobs than people without this focus. Moreover, the degree to which they are satisfied with their lives is also another determinant of their motivation on the job. Judge et al. 1998), Judge and Watanabe (1993), and Tait et al. (1989) have theorized not only that job satisfaction is consistent across time but that the extent to which a person is satisfied with all aspects of her life (e. g. marriage, friends, job, family, geographic location) is as well. Furthermore, people who are satisfied with their jobs tend to be satisfied with life. These researchers found support for their theory, as their data indicate that job satisfaction is significantly correlated with life satisfaction. Thus, people happy in life tend to be happy in their jobs and vice versa. Individual differences theories postulate that some employees are more predisposed to being motivated than others. Such things as genetics and affectivity are involved in the extent to which some people tend to always be satisfied with their jobs and others always dissatisfied. However, rather than genetics and affectivity, self-esteem, need for achievement, and intrinsic motivation tendency are the individual differences most related to work motivation. To be able to address hourly employees’ intangible needs, there must be much effort on management’s part to increase employees’ self-esteem. These may not be too applicable for Harry who seems to be more motivated by basic needs, i. e. money and fringe benefits. There are various ways of carrying this out, as follows: Employees who can attend workshops or sensitivity groups in which they are given insights into their strengths. It is thought that these insights raise self-esteem by showing the employee that he has several strengths and is a good person. Management also ought to provide hourly paid employees with experience on success. With this approach, an employee is given a task so easy that he will almost certainly succeed. It is thought that this success increases self-esteem, which should increase performance, then further increase self-esteem, then further increase performance, and so on. This method is based loosely on the principle of self-fulfilling prophecy, which states that an individual will perform as well or as poorly as he expects to perform. In other words, if he believes he is intelligent, he should do well on tests. If he believes he is dumb, he should do poorly. So if an employee believes he will always fail, the only way to break the vicious cycle is to ensure that he performs well on a task (Knoop, 1994). Particularly in the case of Tom, management has to think of ways to motivate him to achieve. Employees who have a strong need for achievement desire and are motivated by jobs that are challenging and over which they have some control, whereas employees who have minimal achievement needs are more satisfied when their work involves little challenge. Employees who have a high need for achievement ate not risk takers and tend to set goals that are challenging enough to be interesting but low enough to be attainable. Employees with a high need for achievement need recognition and want their achievements to be noticed. To increase motivation, goal setting should be used. This is particularly applicable in Tom’s and Rajina’s case who do not seem to perform well without adequate supervision. With goal setting, each employee is given a goal, which might be a particular quality level, a certain quantity of output, or a combination of the two. For goal setting to be most successful, the goals themselves should possess certain qualities. First, they should be concrete and specific. Setting more specific subgoals can also improve performance (Klawsky, 1990). Second, a properly set goal is high but reasonable (Locke & Latham, 1990). To increase the effectiveness of goal setting, feedback should be provided to the employee on his progress in reaching his goal (Locke & Latham, 1990). Feedback can include verbally telling an employee how he is doing, placing a chart on a wall, or displaying a certain color of light when the employee’s work pace will result in goal attainment and a different color of light when the pace is too slow to reach the goal. Feedback increases performance best when it is positive and informational rather than negative and controlling. Another set of theories hypothesizes that workers are motivated when they are rewarded for their behavior. As a result, organizations offer incentives for a wide variety of employee behaviors, including working overtime or on weekends, making suggestions, referring applicants, staying with the company (length of service awards), coming to work (attendance bonuses), not getting into accidents, and performing at a high level (Henderson, 1997).