Management of Human resources HOW TO MOTIVATE YOUR EMPLOYEES

 BRAIN STORM  HOW WOULD YOU MOTIVATE YOUR EMPLOYEES

The value of motivation  Motivation - a person’s internal drive to act  As a manager, you want employees to be committed and productive  Happy workers result in happy customers, happy customers result in a successful business

The value of motivation  Unhappy workers are likely to leave the company and these lead to a overall loss for the company.  Factors to be considered when you risk losing employees:  1. time and cost to rehire  2. training costs  3. loss of productivity  Estimates of loss range from 25% of the employee’s salary to 200%

The value of motivation  Indirect costs include:  1. disruption in team or department dynamics  2. burden on other employees filling in  3. lost human resource investment – training, knowledge, and skills developed during their time of employment  4. loss of intellectual capital – companies pay millions of dollars for professional development and other training programs for their employees  5. Decreased morale  6. Negative company reputation

The value of motivation  People are willing to commit when they feel their work makes a difference and/or is appreciated  Human psychology plays strongly into this  At the end of the day, we just want to feel happy and loved

The value of motivation  Motivators:  1. recognition by peers and superiors  2. Intrinsic rewards – the personal satisfaction felt when something is accomplished  3. belief that your work makes a strong contribution to the organization  4. Extrinsic rewards – something given to you from others  Ex: pay increase, promotion and praise

The value of motivation  Ex: In Canadian Tire has the “Customers for Life” award. Given to the employee who receives outstanding customer feedback or for outstanding conduct witnessed by fellow employees. Reward = presentation of a plaque, and a day off  Recognition like this can help uphold the company’s mission statement or maintain a Service Standard

Frederick Taylor and Scientific management  Titled: The father of scientific management  His goal was to increase worker productivity to benefit both the company, and the worker themselves  He believe to increase productivity, we should study the most efficient ways to do things.  His studies were comprehensive and detailed. It detailed how long each step should take, how often one should take a break; even how much water one should drink

Scientific Management  Taylor focused on three basic principles: Time, methods, and rules of work.  His research resulted in “time-motion studies”  His research outlined what tools were the most efficient for a specific job and what were the best techniques. In some cases, productivity increased by 40% after adopting his methods

Scientific Management  His studies gave rise to the principle of motion economy  Frank and Lillian Gilbreth detailed that each job can be broken into a series of elementary motions and can thereby be optimized for efficiency.  Taylor’s methods were often criticized as turning people into programmable machines

The Hawthorne Studies  The study was conducted by Elton Mayo to identify if different working environment conditions resulted in an increase of productivity.  Results of the study were mostly confusing as all experiments resulted in an increase in productivity, and returned back to pre-study levels when it ended.  They finally concluded that there is a tendency for people to behave different when they know they are being studied – this is called the Hawthorne Effect

The Hawthorne Studies  Mayo’s findings has led research in the direction of “human based management”  This meant that managers should begin to consider their employees, not just productivity and efficiency.  Giving some thought into the well-being of your employees could lead to immense gains

Maslow’s Hierarchy of needs  Maslow’s theory of needs is one of the most famous theories in motivation  His theory states that we have:  1. Physiological needs – basic needs for survival; Shelter and food  2. safety needs – the feeling of being secure at home and at work

Maslow’s Hierarchy of needs  3. social needs – the need to feel loved, accepted, and a part of a group  4. esteem needs – the need for recognition and acknowledgement from others. Self respect and a sense of status or importance  5. Self-actualization needs – the need to develop to your full potential

Maslow’s Hierarchy of needs  His theory states that when the first and most basic level of need has been met, an individual will strive to meet the next higher-level need  So how might we apply Maslow’s theory?  Firms must create a work environment that includes goals for social contribution, honesty, reliability, service, quality, dependability, and unity

Herzberg’s motivating factors  Herzberg compiled a survey to ask workers to arrange job related factors from most to least important.  Factors that led to productivity:  1. sense of achievement and contribution to the company  2. earned recognition  3. importance and responsibility

Herzberg’s motivating factors  Entire list of 14 items:  Sense of achievement, earned recognition, interest in the work itself. Opportunity for growth, opportunity for advancement, importance of responsibility, peer and group relationships, pay, supervisor’s fairness, company policies and rules, status, job security, supervisor’s friendliness and working conditions

Herzberg’s motivating factors  His research also found that good pay, job security and friendly supervisors only led to job satisfaction, but was not a motivator to work harder for the company  Thus factors that contributed to productivity were termed motivators and factors that cause satisfaction/dissatisfaction were termed hygiene factors ( or maintenance factors)