Relationship Between Employee Satisfaction And Employee Retention

Motivation is derived from an internal force that provides an individual the opportunity to achieve their needs or goals. People are motivated by a variety of things and often have different motivating factors. Employers should be mindful of individual motivating factors when attempting to motivate staff to increase performance. While some people may be motivated by money, many are motivated by things like: recognition, promotion, and increased responsibility. Once an employer has identified motivating factors they are able to analyze a variety of motivational theories to design and implement a program that will motivate employees to go above and beyond what is expected of them.

Motivation is, according to the text, “A set of energetic forces that originate within and outside an employee that initiates work-related effort and determines its direction, intensity and persistence.” (Colquitt) When one hears the word “motivation”, one automatically thinks of an individual’s reasoning behind a certain task or performance. In terms of job motivation, it is what pushes or encourages a person to not only perform the work tasks, but to also be successful in the position and within the company. Motivation includes factors like “what do you do? How hard do you do it? How long do you do it?” The question of motivation has been a topic of discussion for decades. Many might think that money or, financial gains, play a huge role in motivation for an employee; however, motivation may differ drastically from person to person. Various underlying elements affect an employee’s motivation. There are several theories that are able to partially summarize aspects that account for high motivation.

What is motivation? As manager’s, motivation is one of the most vital and crucial assets to possess in managing a business. This drive is a critical tool to use in the work place and determine the success or failure of an organization. Motivation is a driving force that initiates and directs behavior. In other words, motivation is an internal energy that drives an individual to do something in order to achieve a certain goal. Therefore, creating a motivating environment in the workplace will lead to happy employees. Creating a work environment like this, managers can expect low staff turnovers, improved productivity, happy customers, and better financial performance. Therefore, the input of motivation use towards employees determines the output efficiency of the company. However, everyone involved in an organization is motivated differently. Everybody has their own individual needs in regards to motivation. Depending on how motivated a person is, determines the effort that individual puts into the work and therefore, how productive they are.

Motivation is what drives people to succeed and reach their goals. This plays an important role in enhancing an organisation’s development. An employee’s motivation can play a big part in organisational behaviour, as it is a fundamental part of how the employee performs in their role and how they assist the organisation in attaining their goals.

In order for leaders to inspire job satisfaction, employee commitment and timely output, motivation must be at the forefront of the organization’s agenda. Motivation is a force that initiates, direct, and sustain individual or group behavior in order to satisfy a need or attain a goal (ERIC, 2016).

“For true engagement to occur in a company you must first remove the issues that cause dissatisfaction – the baseline benefits offered by the company that satisfy the hygiene needs of the employee. Then you must focus on the individual and what they want out of their association with your enterprise.”

To begin this discuss a definition of motivation is presented. Motivation involves the biological, emotional, social and cognitive forces that activate behavior. In everyday usage, the term motivation is frequently used to describe why a person does something (Motivation Psychological Factors That Guide Behavior, 2016).

Motivation acts a force to energize and direct behavior in the workplace (Myers 329) so that employees perform tasks to a high degree. It is motivation that retains employees in a company because improper motivation acts as a deterrent to productivity and joy. Whether physiological, emotional, or incentive based, motivation affects our lives everyday and induces our natural drive to thrive and succeed. Many psychological theories explain the different ways employees may become motivated, such as Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, Herzberg’s two factor theory, and theory Y, based on how appealing a stimuli may be to an employee’s needs.

What really motivates people at work? Is it simply the size of their paycheck? Is it another promotion? Or is it something else? Many contrasting views of motivation exist. However, most experts agree that motivation energizes, maintains and guides behavior. (John, 1992, pg. 63)

What is motivation? Motivation is defined as “an individual’s willingness to respond to the organization’s requirements in short run.” (P.71 Dixon, 1998) For the purposes of this research paper, I find the most fitting definition of motivation is to define it as “the force that Energizes, Directs, and Sustains behavior.” (uri.com, 2014) Motivation is imperative to productivity. A highly motivated staff often leads to high productivity from the workforce.

Even though Maslow’s hierarchy model lacks scientific support, it is quite well-known and is the first theory of motivation to which many people are exposed. To address some of the issues of Maslow’s theory, Clayton Alderfer developed the ERG theory, a needs-based model that is more consistent with empirical findings.

‘Motivation’ is derived from the Latin term ‘movere’ that means ‘to move’. Thus, motivation is a process that starts with a physiological or psychological deficiency or need that activates a behaviour or a drive that is aimed at a goal or incentive (Luthans). Broadly speaking, motivation is willingness to exert high levels of efforts towards organizational goals, conditioned by the efforts’ ability to satisfy some individual needs (Robbins). Need means some internal state that make certain outcomes appear attractive. An unsatisfied need creates tension that stimulates drives within the individual. These drives generate a search behaviour to find particular goals, that if attained,

Maslow’s (1943) hierarchy of needs was one of the earliest theories developed on human motivation. With the basic principle that higher-level motives could not become active before the basic needs had been met (Lahey, 2001).

Industrial/Organizational (I/O) Psychology is devoted to the study of employee behavior in the workplace and understanding the issues facing organizations and employees in today’s complex and ever changing environment. Motivation refers to the set of forces that influence people to choose various behaviors among several alternatives available to them. An organization depends on the ability of management to provide a positive, fostering and motivating environment for its employees in order to increase profits, productivity and lower turnover rates of its employees. The purpose of this paper is to discuss and compare six academic journal articles and explore the behavior, job, and need based theories of motivation that can aid management in motivating and understanding their employees. Finding that delicate balance to can sometimes be elusive so effectively learning how to motivate by understanding, controlling and influencing factors to manipulate behavior and choices that are available to employees can produce the desired outcome.

Motivation is one of the most discussed topics in the present era’s organisations, especially since renowned psychologists like Maslow and Herzberg are dedicating their efforts to understanding it. Companies are investing a significant amount of resources in improving productivity in order to maximise profits. One of these important resources is of human nature. In order to get the very best out of employees, some motivational approaches need to be used. But what is motivation and how do I successfully motivate? I will try to relate one of my personal experiences with a friend to some of the most influential motivational theories. After introducing my story and making a definition of motivation I will address the ideas of Taylor,