Understanding Motivation: the use of Theories. Motivational Theories Groups of Theories, страница 4

The group of factors bringing about satisfaction were called 'motivators'. They relate to the work itself and include things like a challenging job, responsibility, the chances the worker has for achievement and recognition, advancement, and whether or not the job contributes to the worker's personal growth, etc. These factors give rise to positive satisfaction. In general, organization members tend to be more motivated and productive as more motivators are built into their job situation. Correspondingly, as motivators are built into job situations, human relations tend to become more positive.

Only if both the hygiene and motivator factors are properly maintained will motivation occur.

Herzberg's two-factor theory is shown in the following diagram. It is worth
noting that the hygiene factors refer to the context of the job - the conditions of
work - while the motivators refer to job content._________________________

Hygiene factors are essential if workers are to be motivated. As one writer has aptly put it, they deal with the question "Why work here?" The motivators deal with the question "Why work harder?"

If Herzberg's theory is true, it means that managers must pay great attention to job content. They must find ways of making jobs more challenging and interesting. As a result, managers in the USA and elsewhere have recently been showing great interest in job enrichment programmes. The idea of such programmes is to make jobs more challenging and to give the worker a sense of achievement. The process of incorporating motivators into a job situation is called job enrichment. Job enrichment is not concerned with factors like salary, working conditions, and training, but rather with greater scope for personal achievement. Sweden has been leading the way in this respect. At one car plant, for example, Volvo workers assemble the whole of a car rather than do a few simple operations. In a glass factory, production workers have complete control over the work process in the grinding and polishing department. Other workers have helped to build and design paper mills. Job enrichment is undoubtedly catching on fast in Sweden.

Although such companies as Texas Instruments Incorporated and the Volvo Company have reported notable success in motivating organization members through job enrichment programs, experience indicates that for a job enrichment program to be successful, it must be designed and administered very carefully.

Text 3.5 Read the text and answer the question: In what way are the Stacy's, Vroom 's and motivation theories alike? Compare and contrast them.

Process Theories

Process theories try to explain and describe the process of how behaviour is energized, directed, sustained, and finally stopped. Process theories attempt to define and link the major variables that make up motivation and are necessary for explaining choice (e.g., Should I work hard?), effort (e.g., How hard do I need to work?) and persistence (e.g., How long do I have to keep this pace?).Process theories tend to be more complex than content theories because of the multiple perspectives used. Main process theories are as follows: Equity Theory by Adams, Vroom's Expectancy Theory, Job Characteristics Theory (by Hackman and Oldham), Locke's Goal-setting Theory.

Equity Theory