Importance of Employee Motivation and Techniques to Increase Employee Motivation

 

According to the Fuller et.al. (2008), motivation is something that energized individuals to take actions and make choices according to his or her goals. This includes personal, as well as professional goals and targets Motivated employees are needed rapidly changing workplaces. Because they have new energy to work for their organization.

Techniques To Increase Motivation

There are several techniques for increasing employee motivation.

1 Management by Objectives (Mob)

Management by Objectives (MOB) is a motivation technique in which managers and employees collaborate in setting goals. It is effective because management involvement reflects the mission of the organization. It motivates employees to get more involved in their jobs and in the organization as a whole. MBO clarifies the roles of the employees that are expected to reach organizational goals and allows them to participate and therefore motivation is increased.

2 Job Enrichment

Job enrichment is another method of motivating employees by providing them with variety in their tasks while giving them some responsibility and control of the job. In other words, the employees’ skills are broadened. Job enlargement (which is expanding a worker’s assignments to include additional but similar tasks) can lead to job enrichment. Job redesign is a type of job enrichment, where work is restructured in ways that develop the worker-job match.

3 Behavior Modification

Behavior modification is a systematic program of reinforcement to encourage desirable behavior. It involves both rewards and punishments. Rewards for quality, productivity and loyalty may change employees’ behavior in desired ways and also increase motivation. This can be accomplished by managers if they compare target behavior with existing level and provide rewards or punishments accordingly.

4 Flextime

Allowing employees to work more flexible hours is another way to build motivation and job satisfaction. Flextime is a system in which employees set their own work hours within employer-determined limit. The motivating factor in using flextime is the sense of independence employees’ gain from saying when to work. However, this method has the drawback that superiors find the job more complicated by having employees come and go at different times.

5 Part-Time Work And Job Sharing

Part-time work is the permanent employment in which individuals work less than a standard work week. However, this method does not provide the benefits of a full-time job. Job sharing (also known as work sharing) is the arrangement where two people share one full-time job or position. It combines the security of a full-time position with the flexibility of a part-time job. However, it will never be effective if the two people involved do not communicate well.

6 Telecommuting/Working from home

Telecommuting is working at home all of the time or for a part of the workweek. It can be accomplished through computers, modems, fax machines, cellular phones etc. Individuals can therefore set their own hours and have more time with their families. There are other benefits to this method –such as lower travel costs, reduced employee absenteeism or turnover, increased work/life balance and improved morale. However, telecommuting can lead to feelings of isolation on the employees’ sides or difficulty in monitoring productivity on the supervisors’ sides.

7 Employee Empowerment

Empowerment means making employees more involved in their jobs and in the operations of the organization by increasing their participation in decision making. Therefore, employees must work with managers in order to set the goals and communicate standards. However, there are barriers to this method which include lack of employee training, distrust of management on the part of workers and poor communication between management and employees.

8 Self-Managed Work Teams

Self-managed work teams are groups of employees with the authority and skills to manage themselves. This help increase motivation as employees have more task variety and more job control. When this method is implemented correctly, the employees in those work teams have higher morale, increased productivity and sometimes innovation. Intensive training should be done in order for such work teams to be successful.

9 Employee Ownership

Employee ownership is a situation in which employees own the company they work for by being stockholders. This means that when the company enjoys increased sales, the employees benefit directly. This method encourages employees to be more productive in their work areas in an attempt to increase the overall productivity of the organization and hence gain from its returned income directly.

References

Adeyinka Tella, C.O. Ayeni, S. O. Popoola, (2007). Work Motivation, Job Satisfaction, and Organisational Commitment of Library Personnel in Academic and Research Libraries in Oyo State, Nigeria. Library Philosophy and Practice

Fuller MA, Valacich JS, & George JF (2008). Information Systems Project Management: A Process and Team Approach. Upper Saddle River, New Jersey: Pearson Prentice Hall

Opatha, H. H. (2009). Human Resource Management. Published by the Author