Discuss about the Impacts of Employee Motivation in International Business.
Employee’s motivation remains an important element organizational management structure for a dynamic market (Dundon & Rollinson 2011). Specifically, Rose (2008) asserts that financial motivation propels organizational productivity and increases its competitiveness. In fact, financial motivation and rewards boosts the employees’ workplace morale, which chronicles around pay rise, commissions, fringe-benefits, and even pension schemes. Therefore, managers and the administrative controllers ought to aim at customizing financial rewards as a way of motivating employees. In fact, when it comes to employee motivation, the management handles the recruitment and selection process, job descriptions, salaries as well as other employee benefits such as performance appraisal. Even performance reviews sometimes they also do the interviews when it comes to organizational development they have to do with the long term strategies. Like training, development, leadership, objectives, visions, goals and the vision of the business on the set targets that they aspire to achieve.
Human resource management entails the formal systems tailored for the administration of people within an institution or the organization. People are viewed as a very important resource in the productivity of a company. Therefore, there is need to ensure their welfare, policies, and regulations, professional code of conduct are taken into account hence the development of human resource management. Most companies have maintained their going concern due to the availability of a stable human resource department. This is because it is very essential in bringing sanity and unity within an organization. This will create a rapport that allows teamwork among the employees of the company hence boost productivity.
Problem definition- the gap between employees and their employers is widening in most companies. This calls for a proper way that can be structured to ensure that the two sides of the divided work as a team for a healthy progress of the firm. This enables the progress of the company since it will enhance the production in the company. This enables the company to boost its revenues hence maximizing the profits (Edwards 2011). Therefore there is the need for bridging the gap between the employees and the employers. Motivation to the employees has proven to be in linking the employers and the employees in achieving the objectives of the firm. These incentives have been not so major in most companies that are why the insolvency state in the market is booming amongst different firms. The motivational skills employed vary from firm to firm hence it leads to the difference in performance among various firms. Ultimately, it requires technocrats who are well versed in the human resource field to spearhead such a motive in the enterprise otherwise it might be considered risky. It is risky in the sense that the motivation skill employed does not guarantee increased productivity in the firm.
The study objective, in general, was to find out what impact does a motivated employee create in the international business platform. This helps in devising motivational techniques that can make employees work towards the attainment of goals of the firm. Despite the signals from the key performance indicators employees need to be passionate about the work they are doing. This zeal and zest lead to a better productive potential which might be above than what is expected from the performance contract.
However, the specific objectives of this study include the following:
According to Dundon and Rollinson (2011), various studies carried out about the motivational theories in the employment market reveal similar motives; to please and satisfy the employee. Most employers employ people who will enable them to earn profits by incorporating their expertise in the day to day operations of business. However, most papers developed focused on the local business set up. This provided me an opportunity to identify the gap done by my predecessors who never focused on the international business organization (Alfe,Shantz, Truss &Soane 2013). Therefore the need to look for alternative ways of ensuring that most employees in the international business organization stay motivated. This is because they are experiencing a new market environment which has got its unique challenges. Therefore, every organization is required to provide motivation factors to improve the quality and skills of the workers.
The two-factor theory: According to Fredrick Herzberg employees could only be motivated by two factors. The hygiene factors and the motivator factors fulfilled the employees’ satisfaction (Edwards 2011). He says that the hygiene factors included benefits, job relationships, policies of the company and remuneration whereas the motivator factors entailed: the job promotion, recognition after an incredible performance and the love for your work. The later enable the employee to enhance his or her zeal in what he or she does best as there is an element of appreciation by the company. Though appreciation is a minor element, it gives one a sense of belonging. Thus one will try their level best to ensure that they give the best to the company (Thomas 2012). It suggested that the hygiene factors were fundamental motivational skills to the employees. Once eliminated the firm’s performance drops across all the departments. This significant drop may lead to the closure of an organization as it might not be able to pay creditors and suppliers.
Nasibov (2015) asserts that giving an employee a fair remuneration gives him or her drive to work extra harder to ensure that the company generates profits. Profits provide an avenue for the company to progress and enlarge its investment portfolio which boosts the economics of growth of a nation. The absence of hygiene factors led to the employee dissatisfaction. This meant totally nothing of value could be given to the company by the employee. This is contrary to the motivating factors since their absence never guaranteed dissatisfaction (Salamon 2011). Moreover, the two factors worked independent of each other, and that’s why the variation emanated. This showed that none of the factors relied on the other. Furthermore, a human being has got different perceptions and took in life. What motivates one employee does not necessarily mean that it will motivate the other employee (Akar & Topcu 2011). This demands that the individual needs and motivating factor by employees should be taken into consideration.
The Hawthorne effect: This theory emphasized on job supervision as a result of better performance. It stated that there are those employees who work best under the strict supervision of their bosses (Landsberger 2007). Otherwise given the freedom, they would not perform by doing some shoddy work. Nevertheless, this theory emerged as a result of several experiments. The experiments majorly tested the impact of physical conditions to employees’ productivity. This was demonstrated at Western electric’s factory. The conditions changed included working hours, lighting and breaks provided during working. However, the results implicated that in every scenario there was some improvement in production from the employees (Tessa & Offermann 2010). It was observed that employees give their best when someone is monitoring them. This is because in comparison to the actual physical changes they responded much to the attention paid to them.
This was transformed into the work environment through the introduction of regular feedbacks by those in the managerial positions (Kotler &Keller 2006). It was also manifested in the local environment through the provision of care to the employees by the management. Giving employees encouragement to participate in employees’ needs research gives the progressive feedback to the management.
Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs: It was developed by in 1943 by Abraham Maslow in his paper a theory of human motivation. The theory emphasized on fulfilling basic needs for the employees before fulfilling their advanced needs. Therefore he developed a hierarchy of how the needs should be responded to. He categorized the needs into five groups:
Physiological needs
This entailed the core human needs for the survival of an individual. The needs included food, shelter, and clothing. Therefore for employees to increase productivity, the basic needs for his survival must be deemed fit. An employee who has got no shelter will not have the drive to increase production an organization (Bratton & Gold 2012). Similarly, an individual who is hungry will have no energy to spend so that he can meet the set targets for the company. For one to perform better in a job environment, his primary human environment must be satisfied.
Safety
According to Torrington, Hall, Taylor and Atkinson (2014), physical, medical, and financial security must be guaranteed to an employee in his work environment. When it comes to physical security, an employee needs that assurance that the job environment is not risky hence his or her productivity will increase as safety has been guaranteed. In the case of financial safety, the employees ought to be rewarded fairly so that they can continue with the same zest they had when they acquired the job. This fair remuneration at least guarantees them some savings hence a high probability of them making some viable investments in future (Paul 1960). This also raises their living standards. In the case of health safety employee feel comfortable in a disease free environment. Areas which are prone to diseases are not attractive for employees to work there. Employees will prefer disease free areas since they are not risky. Some outbreak of airborne diseases can claim lives of people due to its high degree of spreading (Webster, Lambert & Beziudenhout 2008). Some people might end up being employees of the organization and the gap left may lead to low productivity and high costs of hiring another personnel.
Love
Every individual needs a sense of belonging. Love should felt at the work environment in the form of being appreciated and given equal treatment. This makes one feel part and parcel of the organization (Armstrong 2012). In the long run, it will lead to increased performance of an individual. On the other hand, denial demoralizes employees and they will end up being dormant in the organization thus unproductive.
Esteem
Employees with a high self-esteem tend to perform better than those with a lower self-esteem (Maslow, 1943). This is because an esteemed individual fills respected and confident in the job environment. The confidence instills the sense of production hence one can easily attain the daily set targets.
Self-actualization
Employees develop the urge to attain their targets and become what they want to be. This passion emanates from within (Lewis, Thornhill &Saunders 2003). Therefore, such a passion is essential to keep them on the move. They normally attain their limits and get past their boundaries through actualization.
This chapter covers operational framework within which gotten for their meaning to be seen clearly. The research method will utilize population sampling magazines, website information, and data recorded on books and journals. Moreover, the research utilized the positivism philosophy by employing the incorporation of both scientific and human rationality perspective (Storey 2007). Apparently, secondary through both the quantitative and qualitative secondary; through an online surveys to quantify the data representations and interpretations..
The techniques used in the research largely applied secondary data. Due to dependency on the already researched data, there was an acceptable level of error of 5% that was set. The most common techniques adopted in the research work included: use of trade and technical journals, business reports documents from history and the records from the public. In this study, descriptive survey research will be used. In this survey, data will be collected by reading through the study of sampled individuals with the aim of studying their attitudes, opinions, and habits. The secondary data will be essential in establishing the impact of motivational skills on the performance of employees.
Based on the publication on the impact of employee motivation on performance highlighted various instruments to be crucial to the performance of employees. The data suggested various factors such as respect, teamwork, job satisfaction and the need for money. With these factors being put into consideration, the motivation of employee becomes a long-term benefit to the company (Nasibov, 2015). The data collected included some variables for instance; training of employees, reward systems, treatment of employees and communication amongst the employees. My paper too applied the same variable though I concentrated on the international business set up. The same data that was used by (Nasibov, 2015) was shifted to my project.
From my research, I found out that employee motivation is key to the success of any business including the international business organizations. I also realized that Maslow’s theory of the hierarchy of needs was efficient when applied to the international business firms. This was in comparison of other theories such the x and y theories which had some challenges in application. Other theories such as Herzberg and Hawthorne were also analyzed to quantify the research findings. However, the results didn’t give much guarantee because the data was secondary. But there is an error which is acceptable from the data. Despite the challenges encountered the confidence interval that can be placed on the findings is close to 0.97. This gives a guarantee that the data was collected had very few errors, and the research represents a perfect reality that the corporate scene on the world stage is experiencing.
Many people did were not comfortable responding to the HR management activities since they were not clear of HR management activities in their respective company used. The questionnaires results research found that many organizations did not use HR practices.
According to Purce (2014), the only factors that affected employee motivation were the hygiene factors and motivator factors. He argues that the factors do not depend on each other. This contradicts my research. My findings revealed that the motivator factors were depending on the hygiene factors. The health factors were the independent variables. According to my model, the motivator factors were influenced by the independent variables. Recognition was based on the policies of the company. Some companies have got the tendency of not recognizing employees no matter how best they perform. Such policies will eventually impact on the motivator factor (Edwards 2011). This will adversely affect the company’s productivity, and this might impact on the profitability of the firm. My study also revealed that this is the real scenario experienced in reality. Most international business organization employees face the challenge of coping up with hygiene factors since they affect their motivator factors.
Abraham Maslow’s hierarchy of needs was also analyzed in my study. My research revealed that the needs Maslow provided were critical for the performance of employees. From my study, it was noted that most employees who lacked the essential basic needs underperformed. They appeared to be experiencing some psychological torture, but they never unveiled to other employees (Armstrong 2012). Their relationship was weak with other employees, and therefore they never complied in the team work spirit of enhancing performance in the firm. Therefore the hierarchy of needs was the best motivational technique employers could apply to their employees to improve their performance. This was applicable across the divide since regardless of the business geographic human beings will always have the same basic wants. These wants are the ones which will provide convenience to them or distort their ability to produce.
However, in the international business framework, the female gender was adversely affected by the hierarchy of needs compared to their male counterparts. Their satisfaction was only evident on the safety of the work environment, and this gave them some drive to work. Though this was a dangerous trend that employees have started getting worried about.
Hawthorn’s theory of close supervision has also proven essential on the international business scale. Most employees were seen productive when they were monitored by their bosses. They concentrated mostly on their jobs rather than the physical changes. Although this is move is bold it’s a dangerous move since employees work to please their bosses. There is nothing passionate that keeps employees on the move. My paper revealed that in the absence of supervision employees could develop ill plans against the company or the management. Such plans impact on the performance of the few good and loyal employees since they will lower their moral hence becoming less productive.
Conclusion
The aim of the paper in general was to find out the impact of motivational skills on the performance of employees. It’s evident that there are several factors that affect employee performance various ways. This ranges from policies set in the firm to the way the policies are communicated and implemented. The drive for better performance from employees depends on the motivational skills adapted by the company. In this paper, I solely focused on the international business organization. I covered both genders during my study and realized the hierarchy of needs played major on motivating employees to enhance their performance. The specific objectives were also covered as my literature review analyzed some few theories developed by my predecessors.
The theories, however, suggested that employee treatment was a key incentive in making them perform better. The skills employed to employees could advocate for teamwork which normally results in achieving together more when resources are pooled together. This was the greatest impact of employee motivation on the international business organization. This implies that the chances of the international business organization earning more profits when its employees are motivated its high. This is because their performance will also be better due to the incentives initiated to them.
Recommendations: Through the research the following recommendations were observed:
Limitations and Success of the study: The researchers experienced a challenge in securing the providing the questionnaires to various since it took the people precious time which made this a severe challenge. Many people also did not give an accurate feedback concerning the questionnaires’ thus make it difficult for the data collection. Also it was very expensive to design the simple questionnaires that would be used in various parts of the world since it needed printed paper which have a higher cost (Purce, 2014). Many people also gave a negative feedback about the research thus making it difficult for data to be gathered. Advertising the questionnaires online was also expensive since money was required to pay for the advertisement. Some of the people in various parts demanded for money in order to answer the questionnaires thus creating a negative attitude. Though the research had many challenges the research also had success. Many people from various parts of the questionnaires answered the online questionnaires that were able to gather data from different parts of the country. The research also got support from various companies which provided their data collection.
References
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