MOTIVATION & WORKPLACE

Motivation in the Workplace

Motivation in the Workplace

Introduction

Motivation may be defined as a person's desire to achieve something for which he is willing to make an effort. It is one of the most crucial aspects of performance. High performers have the desire and the energy combined in the form of high level of motivation through which they are able to achieve the goals they set for themselves. In other words, employee motivation may be defined as “a reflection of the level of energy, commitment, and creativity that a company's workers bring to their jobs.” The behavior of the person will be affected by the level of motivation. Many organizations face employee performance issues because they fail to communicate to the employees what is expected of them. It is the responsibility of the management to keep employees connected by providing them regular feedback. This is one of the ways of motivating employees and telling them how their performance is viewed by the management.

What makes the subject so interesting is the fact that each person in the organization has a different reason for coming to work. This translates into a wide variety of factors that can lead to motivation of employees. For some, recognition and appreciation is all it takes to motivate them. For some others, a material reward is something more worthy than an exchange of few positive words. Employee motivation is a key to better organizational performance in that organizations that have its quality human resource as the competitive advantage are very difficult to outperform. Having stated this, there are certain motivational factors that have been identified by management gurus as very effective. A lack of motivation can lead to many behavioral and performance issues in employees which is detrimental to the success of the organization.

Purpose of the study

The main reason behind choosing this topic is curiosity to know how an organization motivates its employees. In today's recessionary period, organizations are reducing cost by reducing number of employees. Employees who survive downsizing have burden of work load on them. There must be some factors that motivate them in achieving the goals of the company as they perform the job of two people.

There are some organizations that do not use motivational factors to motivate their staff. They undermine the importance of involving employees and practicing good retention strategies. Absence of motivational factors cause high turnover of employees and it also de-motivates and reduces productivity of the employees. Understanding the concept of motivation and its implication in an organization is very important. This research paper can be used as the guide to understand the concept of motivation and to explore its different facets. Understanding motivation and its different facets is imperative because it is this concept of motivation that helps managers to drive their employees towards optimal performance. To create the quest of optimal performance among employees a manger must know each and every detail about motivation, when to provide motivational factors to employees and how to ...