Motivating People Flashcards
Which of the following statements is most false?
a. Attention and recognition from leaders is as effective as financial incentives
b. Netflix focuses on aligning pay to the top of the market each year
c. Pay and career opportunities in the emerging world is catching up with Western multinationals
d. Pay should never be linked to individual performance.
e. Brainard, Bennis & Farrel needed to redesign its motivation system to align its workforce to a new focus on selling, billing and productivity to keep up with increasing competition whilst also ensuring they don’t become a sweat shop.
d. Pay should never be linked to individual performance. This is most incorrect. Linking pay to individual performance depends on an organization’s strategy, work, people, formal and informal design. An organization may choose to make a link between individual performance and pay if an employee can control their performance, this performance can be directly measured, pay can be equitably administered, and the employee values the pay increment. It would not be wise to exclusively focus on individual rewards if team work is required.
Mary has a high growth need score and but a low score on the job characteristic of ‘Skill Variety’. To improve Mary’s ‘Skill Variety’ score what would you do?
a) Explain to Mary how her work fits in with the bigger picture
b) Improve communication between Mary and her supervisor
c) Rotate Mary in to different jobs.
d) Nothing
c) Rotate Mary in to different jobs. See slide on the Job Characteristics Model which indicates how to increase skill variety. The other things are good to do too but are not targeted at skill variety. Note that Mary must have a high growth need to be motivated by an enriched job.
- John has a high need for relatedness. His fellow syndicate member Peter has a different priority and wants an H1 at any cost and does everything to make the syndicate members deliver. John works hard to help his syndicate members to become cohesive but despite this effort the team members have had high levels of conflict and do not want to work with each other again at the end of the project. The syndicate project receives a H1 mark. It is likely that the link between ___________________has been maintained for Peter but broken for John.
a) Effort and performance.
b) Equity and outcomes
c) Valued rewards and satisfaction
d) None of the above because we don’t know whether Peter has a high need for relatedness
a) Effort and performance. See slide on Motivation Theory Framework Evaluation. Peter puts in effort and achieves the level of performance he wants i.e., an H1. John works hard but does not achieve his desired performance i.e., team cohesiveness
- Mary has a very low growth need strength and her job has low task significance. What should you do to motivate her more?
a. Delegate more tasks to her
b. Nothing.
c. Decentralize decision making
d. Enlarge her job
b. Nothing. Do nothing is the correct answer because Mary’s very low growth need strength means she will not be demotivated or dissatisfied by the low task significance of her job. It may even be that giving her more responsibility will reduce her satisfaction.
- Which response below is most correct? To motivate employees organizations must consistently:
a. Link pay to individual performance
b. Meet employee’s growth needs
c. Ensure that employee expectations are met and that they perceive equity in reward allocation.
d. Give team rewards
c. Ensure that employee expectations are met and that they perceive equity in reward allocation. Whilst designing jobs that meet employee growth needs is generally a good thing, particularly for today’s highly skilled workforce, some employees may not seek extra involvement in their work, especially if they have a low growth need e.g., maybe someone close to retirement who wishes to ‘smell the roses’. Pay linked to individual and team rewards may be good if this is aligned with the organization’s strategy, structure, and systems, however, it is not a one size fits all fix. Option c (ensure employee expectations are met) is correct because expectancy and equity theories always apply…however, how expectancy and equity needs are delivered will vary depending on the individual employee and context.
What are the considerations when linking pay to individual performance?
A) Pay doesn’t create lasting commitment but only temporarily changes behaviour.
B) Pay stifles creativity and long-term goals because bonuses are linked with short-term incentives.
C) Not receiving an expected reward is like punishment.
D) Pay may rupture relationships if people compete for rewards or are upset when rewards are perceived to be unfair.
All of the above.
What are the 5 characteristics of an effective Motivation and Reward System:
- Link to an organisation’s strategy and goals.
- Fit with organisational culture.
- Equitable. (Equity theory)
- Meet diverse individual needs (expectancy theory).
- Acceptance from employees
All of the above.
What is expectancy theory?
Expectancy theory (Vroom, 1964) states that an employee will exert more effort when they believe that their increased effort will result in a positive reward. If they believe they will receive a pay raise or promotion, they will be motivated to improve their overall job performance. However, if valued rewards are not aligned to their performance, then they will be demotivated to perform at a higher level.
What is equity theory?
Equity theory (Adams 1965) states that an employee will take action to restore equity if they discover that they are receiving less reward than what they feel is appropriate for their performance. The action could be lowering personal effort into the job.
What are 5 methods to design motivating jobs?
- Increasing skill variety (rotating, delegation, enriching or enlarging jobs)
- Task identity (responsibility for whole projects, or to work in teams)
- Task significance (tell employees how their work fits into the organisation’s purpose)
- Autonomy (empower employees, delegate responsibility and accountability)
- Feedback (Give lots of feedback. Use Situation-Behaviour-Impact (SBI) model.
What is more important in motivating people: financial or non-financial rewards?
Non-financial rewards can be more effective in motivating people than financial rewards. A meta-analysis of service organisations (Luthans et al. 1999) showed social attention and recognition combined with performance feedback was twice as effective as monetary rewards alone.
