Extrinsic Rewards Are the Best Motivation to Drive Performance

In any workplace, workers are no doubt the essential mainstay that holds any business or corporation together. Employees achieve important tasks to help the company’s long term vision and goals to be successful and efficient. A business can’t be successful without a proper management that is why it is important for employees to enjoy going to work and they also have maintain a positive attitude while being productive and completing tasks. Motivation is what gives a person the purpose to perform or behave in a certain way with the desire or willingness to gain something. There are two types of motivations, motivation that comes from a person and motivation that comes from materially goals. It is very necessary that employers keep their employees motivated and encourage them to perform above expectations.

Pay and Rewards – pay and rewards attract, motivate and retain staff. The employment contract which lists rewards, whether it be pay, bonus or benefits, can remove animosity amongst employees and employers. However, recent research reveals that employees are no longer motivated by a financial reward alone, but

Extrinsic motivation e.g. Money is the critical incentive to motivation in today's work environment However , motivation differs from individual to individual and with their respective beliefs and values, circumstances and culture. It is important for mangers to identify which motivation factor works with which employee and apply it respectively In any environment, both Intrinsic and Extrinsic motivations are needed for work satisfaction and work performance

In “Understanding Management”, there is a chapter on motivation that covers both extrinsic and intrinsic reward. The material does highlight the increasing trend of motivating people through appealing to those intrinsic needs and how it

Within the work environment employees with high levels of intrinsic motivation have the ability to reduce total labor costs. Managers spend less time working to stimulate intrinsically motivated employees therefore freeing more time for the manager to focus on more productive tasks. Intrinsically motivated employees are more likely to assume new projects on their own (Saleh & Hyde 49). Extrinsic motivation in the workplace sanctions for a greater extent of control over operational processes. These employees require a closer degree of supervision in order to keep performance high. Extrinsic motivation can come in the form of a financial incentive rather than encouragement (Ingram 1).

Intrinsic/Internal Rewards are obtained from within the individual. This could be an employee feelings good about a job they performed and taking pride in it.

The motivational strategies developed by most companies refer to financial motivation, but also to other types of compensation and benefits that can stimulate employees' work improvements (McNamara, 2010). Such compensation and benefits usually refer to bonuses, paid vacations, public acknowledgement of results, paid subscriptions to health and fitness clubs, training programs intended to improve employees' skills, and others. There are numerous types of compensation and benefits that can be addressed, but the motivational strategy must develop

“A reward is something that is tangible or intangible. It is offered by organisations to employees for their potential or actual work potential. Rewards can be categorised into two broad categories; extrinsic and intrinsic. With the right mix of rewards, performance and motivation can be optimised. This holistic approach to reward management is called ‘Total Reward Management’.” (Nankervis, Baird, Coffey, & Shields, 2014, Page 428) The first element of the ‘Total Reward Management’ system is Extrinsic Rewards. “Extrinsic Rewards also encompass three sub-elements; Financial, Developmental, and Social Rewards.” (Nankervis, Baird, Coffey, & Shields, 2014, Page 429)

An organization may have any number of goals, for example, sales growth, market leadership, profit maximization and customer satisfaction. It is clear that an organization will only be successful if employees are performing their tasks at a consistently high level and in line with the company’s objectives. To achieve this, organizations have tended to reward employees who demonstrate this high level of performance and behavior (Gatenby et al., 2008). These rewards may be intrinsic and/or extrinsic. Many theorists have critically discussed the core aspects of employee motivation, concluding that intrinsic and extrinsic rewards will only be motivating if these are of value to the individual. Intrinsic motivation lies in the internal satisfaction of an individual – concerning only the enjoyment of the task itself. Whereas extrinsic motivation focuses on external outcomes, in particular financial rewards (Psycnet.apa.org, 2017). In this essay rewards will be regarded as tangible or intangible assets in response to an individual’s achievement (Oxford Dictionaries⎪English, 2017), and motivation will focus on the behavioral aspects of why an individual’s productivity and performance increases.

What is work motivation? Managers must first know the definition of motivation before they can answer this question. Motivation in our textbook is defined as, “the process of arousing and sustaining goal-directed behavior” (ORGB Chapter 5). Given this definition, we can apply it to the workplace environment and safely assume that work motivation is a factor that pushes employees to reach goals. It is a force within an employee that makes them want to complete work-related tasks and perform well. There are many types of motivation, but the two most common are intrinsic and extrinsic. Intrinsic motivation is when an individual does something so they can feel accomplished inside like in the manner of, performing a task to feel satisfied. Extrinsic on the other hand comes from external things like getting a raise or being motivated to try hard so that your boss will give you a promotion. Now that we have some information about what work motivation is I will explain some of the theories of motivation and how managers can apply them to motivate employees. I will also talk about the most common factors that affect motivation, and lastly, the reasons why having motivated employees is beneficial.

The aim of this paper is to provide an analysis of what science teaches about motivation and give a contrast between intrinsic and extrinsic rewards as they relate to employee productivity. Additionally, this paper will include identifying and elaborating on

“Extrinsic motivation rewards are valuable to inspire workers to obtain new talents or skill related to their jobs. Intrinsic motivation reward signifies behavior supported by an internal goal to earn external success” (Neck & Murray, 2017).

First and foremost, in view of jobs which require an endowment of special ability and profession (mostly clerical nature), intrinsic motivation is significant to foster job satisfaction and in the acquisition of career achievement. There are some researches underpinning this postulate. According to Isfahani, Bahrami, and Torki (2013), the higher the profession, the higher the possibilities for employees to attend company meetings and comprehend the significance of the task assigned, hence intrinsic motivation ascents as they feel honoured due to their crucial obligation. Employees will surge a power of intrinsic motivation and this impetus gives them momentum to consummate their

Nevertheless, we think that without improvements in coordination at a macro level, this award-based motivation strategy might well become obsolete. Therefore, there are structural – not only contingent – changes to be made, capable of increase not only the employees’ average performance but also the company’s performance as a

One of the first authors that dealt with the sources of motivation was Frederick Taylor who focussed on the overall productivity of an organisation. He linked this productivity to the effort an employee puts into their work which in turn is dependent on monetary rewards (Taylor, 1911). This theory was established in the context of the industrial age and thus is outdated for today’s analysis but it still provides a basic assumption which is often referred to by other authors. The total neglecting of a worker’s intrinsic motivators is a starting point for discussion for authors that conducted research in that area after Taylor.