There are five levels in the hierarchy: Physiological needs Safety and security needs Love or belonging needs Esteem needs Self actualization needs Moscow suggested that employees cannot move to the next level of the hierarchy until the lower-level needs have been satisfied Once basic needs have been met, employee motivation becomes more complex and is highly dependent on individual needs and desires. What motivates one employee may not necessarily motivate another. To be successful in motivating employees to feel empowered and to achieve effectiveness in their jobs, managers need to be attuned to these individual preferences.
Taking the time to understand individual employee needs can be an important first step in creating a motivated and empowered workforce. (http://smelliness’s. Chronic. Com, 6th Feb. 2015) In 1959 Frederick Herbert developed the Two-Factor theory of motivation. His research showed that certain factors were the true motivators or satisfiers. They are : Achievement Recognition Work itself Responsibility Promotion Growth Hygiene factors, in contrast, created dissatisfaction if they were absent or inadequate.
Hygiene factors : Pay and Benefits Company policy and administration Relationship with colleagues Supervision Status Job Security Working conditions Personal life Dissatisfaction could be prevented by improvements in hygiene factors but these improvements would not alone provide motivation. Herbert showed that to truly motivate an employee a business needs to create conditions that make him or her feel fulfilled in the workplace. Delegation is one of the most important management skills as it empowers the team member to make decisions.
However, the person who delegated the ark remains accountable for the outcome of the delegated work. Delegation can save money and time, help in building skills, and motivate people. Poor delegation, on the other hand, might cause frustration and confusion to all the involved parties. Attainment & Schmidt defined 7 levels of delegated freedom which moves from manager-oriented to subordinate-oriented. As the team develops, the area of freedom for the subordinate increases and the need for the manager’s intervention decreases. Within my team I have tried to improve motivation through several initiatives:
One member of my team seemed to be becoming disillusioned with her role and so I spent some time with her trying to establish the root cause of this. Having asked several questions I established that she felt bored with her daily routine and wanted a fresh challenge. I took notes of our meeting and produced a plan with her which involved a gradual phasing in of more duties and a greater involvement in decision making. We now regularly review progress and I have seen a dramatic improvement in her involvement and motivation. Another example is that I now try to make time to talk with my team about things ended the immediate tasks at hand.
I now regularly have one-on-one meetings just to find out how all of my team is doing, what’s going well in their work and what isn’t, what’s satisfying and what’s frustrating, and (if they care to talk about it) what else is going on in their lives. Feel this has also been successful in forging closer ties in the department. An area that I feel I need to work more on is in giving praise. Having researched motivation now realize how important this is to most people. Justas simple ‘thank you’ or ‘well done’ can make the all the difference and is something I don’t o enough of at present – this will change. Eave recently experimented with giving my team specific projects that I would have taken on myself in the past. For example, we are currently conducting a review of overhead costs in the organization. Instead of adding to my workload decided to involve my team in the areas to concentrate on and to perform the review of costs. We met to discuss the plan, establish the objectives and timeline and agree to meet regularly for updates. This has resulted in a genuine desire to achieve the outcome of lowering overheads without compromising on quality or service.
