2.1 Motivating Employees Flashcards
What is motivation?
Motivation is the reason why employees work hard and effectively for a business.
What are the benefits of motivation in a business? Why?
Motivation improves productivity so motivated workers will work harder and produce more output, and the firm will make more profit as a result.
Motivated workers will arrive on time, are less likely to be absent from work (also known as absenteeism).
They are also less likely to leave the business.
Motivated workers are an asset who will go the extra mile for their business.
Motivated workers make the workplace a fun, positive environment where people want to be.
How do we calculate labour productivity?
Labour productivity is output per worker measured by output divided by the number of workers.
So if 10 workers pick 4000 oranges the labour productivity is 4000 divided by 10, 400 oranges per person.
How do we calculate the rate at which workers leave the business?
We can calculate the rate at which workers leave the business by dividing the total number of employees by the number of employees who left in the last year.
Define Labour Turnover rate.
Labour Turnover Rate is the amount of employees leaving a business in a year and is calculated as a share of the total workforce
Name some examples of highly motivated employees.
Some examples of highly motivated employees include:
a sales assistant who makes every customer feel special;
an engineer who works additional hours to make sure the product development is just right;
a teacher who always has time to answer student queries.
Why are demotivated employees a disadvantage to a business?
Demotivated workers are a liability for a business, and can mean an unsatisfactory customer experience, where products are faulty or the service is inadequate.
Demotivated workers are a negative influence on co workers and bring down the whole morale of the workforce, impacting the long term success of the business.
Explain Taylor’s idea of scientific management.
What was its impact?
Scientific Management is observing employees, figuring out “one best way” of completing a task, and then training all employees to do the job exactly the same way.
This had a huge impact on improving worker productivity in the early 20th century.
What is Taylor’s theory of motivation
Taylor’s theory on worker motivation was that the more you pay workers, the harder they will work and the greater the output will be produced.
He argued it was best to pay workers by piece rate.
If you paid them more by how much they produced, they would work harder and output would increase.
What was the disadvantage of Taylor’s approach?
His approach just focused on one human need, money (financial rewards).
It ignored other human needs like social needs (being able to form friendships at work and feel part of a team) and achievement, feeling your work has meaning and you have contributed to something bigger.
Explain Maslow’s theory of motivation.
Abraham Maslow believed money was important in that it fulfilled a need to provide food and shelter, but he also believed humans had other needs and wants which needed to be satisfied before employees became fully motivated.
He ranked them on his now famous pyramid also known as the hierarchy of needs.
First physiological and safety are the most basic needs, then social, then esteem needs – feelings of achievement, respect or status.
The peak of the pyramid is self-actualisation when employees have reached their absolute full potential.
How did Herzberg refine the Hierarchy of Needs?
Herzberg refined the pyramid with his two factor theory. He said that employees need certain basic needs, called Hygiene Factors, to be fulfilled by the business before they could even begin to think about motivation.
Only after the Hygiene factors (like working conditions and wages and salaries) had been taken care of, could employees be motivated using achievement, recognition and responsibility.
Name some Hygiene Factors.
Company policies
Supervision
Relationship with supervisor and peers
Work conditions
Salary
Status
Security
Explain wages.
Wages are usually paid weekly and are calculated by how many hours an employee works, times their hourly rate, or how much is produced by a worker in a factory, piece rate.
This sort of payment is often used with lower skill workers or part time employees.
What are the advantages and disadvantages of wages?
Adv:
Wages allow flexibility for employees and business.
Disadv:
It may lead to feelings of job insecurity in employees as they can’t be sure how much they will be paid every week.
Explain salaries
Salary is a fixed payment every month. Often used for higher skill professional jobs like teachers or managers.
In these jobs it may not be possible to use time rate or piece rate.
What are the advantages and disadvantages of a salary?
Adv:
Unlike wages, employees feel greater job security in employees as they can be sure how much they will be paid every month.
Disadv:
However, it can lead to complacency in employees, so businesses may need to consider additional methods of motivating staff.
What is a bonus?
A bonus is usually a one off reward. It could be for achieving a target like a driver delivering all his parcels accurately and on time. It could also be a team reward like a factory increasing production by 20%.
