Motivation and the Meaning of Work

OMP LECTURE 8 OWN MADE NOTES 2011

MOTIVATION AND THE MEANING OF WORK

MANAGERS AND MOTIVATION

The ability to motivate people is considered to be a prime task of management. Managers, increasingly, have to act as coaches and guides in order to align the strategic goals of the organization with the demands and needs of individual employees.

WORK ORIENTATIONS

Refers to the values, expectations and feelings that workers bring to the work situation.

Goldthorpe & Lockwood, conducted a number of well-known studies that emphasized three general orientations to work;

1. An instrumental logic, which sees work primarily in terms of income and the workplace as discrete from other areas of social life.

2. A bureaucratic logic, which emphasizes service to an organization, security of employment, and relative continuity between work and self-identity; and

3. A solidarity orientation, which stresses satisfaction with work and a strong continuity between the workplace, self-identity, and community.

Goldthorpe & Lockwood (1968)

It describes the meaning individuals attach to their work. This meaning predisposes them to act in particular ways with regard to that work.

The concept of work orientation was based on an extended set of sociological studies carried out in the 1960s in Britain under the leadership of Goldthorpe and Lockwood (1968).

This group of researchers found that need-based theories of motivation were not sufficient to understand and explain the behavior of the work groups they studied.

People do not jump like little machines from ‘one need to the next’, forever striving to reach the highest needs. Rather, their behavior seemed to be shaped by their work orientation, i.e. what their jobs meant to them and which choices they made when entering their particular employment.

An employee’s work orientation is shaped in the first instance by their background. People tend learn, long before they enter the world of work. Whether it is a necessary evil, a means to make money; whether it is potentially a means to find fulfillment and/or do good; whether, indeed, it is part of human make up and defines our very humanity; whether it is our God-given duty to work. Based on such attributed meanings, we ‘enact’ particular behaviors at the work place. Whether we seek promotion or rather stay with the group we like and know (group affiliation), whether we strive for the forever bigger pay package, whether we revel in interesting work which broadens our understanding and enables us to ‘grow’ as a person; whether we seek to do social good through our work, is then no longer the consequence of internal needs, which ‘drive’ our actions, but the result of processes of learning and socialization.

Rodrick Wilbroad Page 1


In some regards, this is ‘bad news’ for a manager, because within the thinking of the work orientation school, workplace behavior is shaped long before the worker or employee enters the workforce. Thus, it is difficult to change.

However, work orientations are dynamic. They change over time and the ‘initial’ orientation brought to work is subject to renegotiation and change. Identifying such opportunities for change, leading and shaping the process of negotiation and establishing the agendas for change is indeed a prime task of management.

Detaching oneself at least temporarily from the influence of content theories of motivation might enable managers to ask these questions away from old fashioned debates about whether people generally ‘go to work mainly for the money’ or seek employment for other reasons.

THE RELEVANCE OF WORK ORIENTATIONS TO MANAGERS

Motivation as managerial action is to influence people’s behavior at work, so they perform as required in order to achieve organizational goals.

Frequently, this task is framed within the terminology of ‘needs’ and ‘drives’. These are treated as inborn factors, which determine human behavior at the workplace.

Central to those alternatives (Motivation theories) is the notion of work orientation (the meaning of work) together with a more process-oriented understanding of motivation.

The advantage this conceptual framing brings is that it moves our thinking away from deterministic and simplistic accounts, while simultaneously drawing attention to the process and changes which can occur in the position of work in the overall life projects of employees – and managers.

THEORIES OF MOTIVATION

Content theories

Content theories of motivation place the emphasis on what motivates.

1. MASLOW THEORY OF MOTIVATION

Maslow (1943)

It assumes that there are nine human needs (ranging from biological requirements at the bottom to self-actualization needs at the top).

Each of the lower needs has to be fully satisfied, before the next need becomes a motivating force. For example, we need to satisfy our biological requirements, before we care for affiliation needs or become interested in improving our knowledge and understanding.

We need to feel appreciated and loved - (affiliation needs – before we endeavor to satisfy our sense of ‘beauty’ and truth – need for aesthetics).



2. TWO-FACTOR THEORY OF MOTIVATION

It was developed by Herzberg (1974) It assumes that, there are a set of factors which, if absent, cause dissatisfaction. They are

related to job context, job environment and extrinsic to the job itself (Hygiene or maintenance factors). The other set of factors serve, if present, to stimulate the individual to superior effort and performance (motivators or growth factors).

The two-factor theory does not deny the importance of the hygiene factors, but stresses their importance to maintain a healthy work environment. If absent, even strong growth factors would not compensate for their lack.

CRITICISMS CONTENT THEORIES OF MOTIVATION

Content theories of motivation have been criticized as being more of a social philosophy, reflecting white American middle-class values; and as being too vague to explain - let alone predict - all human behavior.

For example,

How could one explain within the parameters of this theory the actions of people who risk their lives in the pursuit of their aims, thus ‘violating’ any needs for safety and security?

How could one explain that people forgo esteem needs for the sake of transcendence needs?

For that matter the content theories are redundant for understanding workplace behavior. They exert influence over management practice in areas such as job enrichment, rewards policies, self-managing teams and so on.

Process theories

Process theories attempt to capture the dynamic of making choices with respect to desired goals. Unlike content theories of motivation, they see the individual not as predetermined and blindly struggling its way upward the hierarchy of needs or being satisfied with or motivated by a different set of factors.

1. EXPECTANCY THEORY

(Vroom, 1964), Shows how work behavior is influenced by the particular wants and expectations with particular employees, in particular circumstances bring to the organization and how and to what extent the employer meets them.



For example,

If a (female) employee was promised and therefore expects particular childcare facilities to be available to her, but due to over-demand they turn out not to be, her expectations might be violated to such an extent that she leaves the organization, if she can, or alternatively she might withhold effort or withdraw her commitment.

This individual might not be looking for her next higher need to be satisfied, but for the opportunity to maintain her career while bringing up her children. It is also likely that the meaning she attaches to work has changed. But, of course, this state of affairs may again change: once the children are older, her expectations might be to be offered more challenging work and to take on more responsibility. In other words, this employee is not ‘motivated’ by inborn drives, but as her priorities and orientation to work change, so do her expectancies and behavior.

2. EQUITY THEORY OF MOTIVATION

(Adams, 1965)

It is related to the potential rewards that are promised to an individual. Adams gave the name ‘equity theory’ to the simple assertion that members of any

workforce wish to be treated fairly that is to say equitably in relation to others and to avoid inequality.

Thus individual employees are in a constant process of ‘comparing’ themselves, i.e. their pay package, their terms and conditions –to those of colleagues or even similar groups outside the organization. Should they feel themselves to be treated unfairly, effort and contribution will be affected negatively.

Thus, process theories of motivation offer an opportunity to understand and reflect on the dynamic contextual and individual factors, which constitute the ‘bundle of expectations’, which in turn influences workplace behavior.


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Motivation and the Meaning of Work