Question:
Write a research proposal on “employee motivation” in an organization.
Organizational behavior as a part of study helps investigate the influence that structure, group, individuals, have on behavior in an organization. This knowledge helps in making organization increase its effectiveness. Employee motivation is a critical factor in any organization. Employee motivation can be defined as the process, which determines the extent of inspiration or urge for an employee to achieve targets and aggravate the profitability of the business organization. A Human Resource manger applies the knowledge obtained from research on organizational behavior to trigger and sustain the employee motivation (McShane, et al., 2015).
The main area of this research is “employee motivation” in an organization. The researcher intends to answer the basic question that arises in every organization that is “What Motivates Employees to Perform?” To make this possible, information will be analyzed which will be gathered by performing thorough literature review.
The selected organization for this assignment is “Nestle” (Malaysia) Berhad. This firm carries out production and distribution of goods as well as food based nutrition health and wellness.
The objective of the researcher is to explain “JOB CHARACTERISTICS MODEL (JCM) of Hackman and Oldham (1980)”. JCM is a tool for motivating the employees, to bring out the best in them. In this context, the report will identify the “Core Job Dimension (CJD)” of jobs that are performed by employees in Nestle. Further, the components of JCM model will also be explained.
Nestle manufacture alternative source of nutrition for infants, which is affordable and advantageous for mothers who cannot breastfeed (Times, 2008). These products eliminate problem of malnutrition. This organization has completed 96 years in Malaysia. Since the year 1912, Nestle in Malaysia is maintaing its legacy and maintaing the principles and values of corporate business. It is located in “Petaling Jaya, Selangor” (Fischer, 2016). The vision of the company is to enhance the trust of Malaysians by “Nutrition, Health and Wellness”. It aims to serve its community by fulfilling its social, environmental and economic commitment. It has employed 5000 workers and its turnover in 2010 was RM 3.28 billion (Yach et al., 2014).
The JCM is designed on the idea that the key to motivating employee is the task itself. A challenging task triggers motivation but a monotonous and boring work destroys the motivation (Kougija, 2014). Challenge can be added to the job by three ways: Autonomy, variety and decision authority. Job characteristics and enrichment are the ways to add challenge and variety.
Hackman and Oldham believes that there are 5 job characteristics known to impact the critical psychological circumstances which are:
The five core job descriptions in regards to manufacturing process at Nestle:
Responsibility – Responsibility can be termed as a derivative of autonomy, where autonomy is the core job characteristic and the resulting psychological state is the responsibility for the resulting outcomes (Kougija, 2014).
Perception of Results – It corresponds to the knowledge or realization of the efficiency of the employee. Its corresponding job characteristic is the feedback of the quality of the job done which is received from the client, employer or the customers (Lăzăroiu, 2015).
Hackman and colleagues provided a link between internal work motivation and perceived job characteristics by using the CPS. Work motivation is assumed to result from task that prompts 3 CPS, namely experienced responsibility, experienced meaningfulness, and knowledge of results (Ali et al., 2014).
Experienced meaningfulness represents how much an individual believes that job is essential to an individual’s own value system. Experienced responsibility represents the extent of personal accountability an employee has for work outcomes. In addition, knowledge of results represents the degree to which a worker knows his or her job performance (Lunenburg, 2011).
According to (Manzoor, 2012) the three CPS prompted by work consist of 5 CJD. Skill variety, task identity, and task significance are assumed to prompt experienced meaningfulness. Autonomy may prompt experienced responsibility. In addition, feedback is responsible to cause knowledge of results. These five CJD are hypothesized to lead stronger experiences of 3 CPS resulting in more positive work responses (Bodla & Naeem 2014).
According to Hackman and Oldham’s JCM, workers with higher CJD are prone to get internal motivation, job satisfaction and greater quality of performance (Ali et al. 2014). These critical psychological states results in their respective outcomes such as –
The given flowchart below summarizes the Job Characteristic Model by Hackman and Oldham, 1980 –
Figure – Job Characteristic Model, Hackman and Oldham, 1980
(Source: Lunenburg, 2011)
In Nestle, the CJD are done by management at three stages that are- low level, middle level and high level. Employees at higher level, require, task significance, skill variety, and task identity (McShane, et al., 2015). A director of the division is responsible for decision-making and other skills necessary to make subordinates to achieve Nestlé’s goals such as quantity of the product to be manufactured for export market. On the other hand, the supervisor’s role is to monitor and evaluate the workers under his guidance and improve the work performance (Behson 2012).
The response of the employees towards enriching jobs is evaluated by three attributes termed as moderators (Yach et al., 2010)
Circumstantial satisfaction – Also known as context satisfaction and is generally defined by the level of satisfaction of the employees in their allocated jobs, working environment, facilities provided by the company and the remunerations provided. The summation of all these experiences is the contextual satisfaction of the employees (Lăzăroiu, 2015).
Growth- Need Strength – It refers to the extent of the need of an individual for personal accomplishment, opportunity for learning in order to achieve growth. It is a determining criteria for the quality of work, employee motivation and job satisfaction. Higher the growth need strength of an employee greater the productive work (Bodla & Naeem, 2014).
Knowledge and Skill – The certain degree of knowledge and skill is required to achieve the required targets (Greenbaum & Eissa, 2012). Insufficient levels of skills could cost the productivity of the company.
When a job is said to fulfill all the core characteristics, it enables the three psychological states, which facilitates positive outcomes. This propensity of the increased job characteristics to result in positive consequences can be contrived by the motivational potential score (MPS). MPS can be represented as follows:
In accordance with the equation mentioned above, a decreased level of autonomy or less feedback would affect in the overall motivating potential score of the organization. However the absence or a reduction in one of the job characteristics may not affect the overall motivating potential score since it could be overpowered by one or the other characteristics or if the organization is considerably autonomous (Behson 2012).
In this assignment we will focus on employees at manufacturing level, as their job is highly prone to turn monotonous therefore they require more motivation. Working at the management level of such a company in Selangor, it is a necessary challenge that is faced on a daily basis. Stagnation in productivity not only affects the company financially, but also raises a question as to what motivates the employees to perform. (Behson, 2012).
Food manufacturing organizations in Malaysia sustains a competitive environment due to minimal ingression to funds and capital. Since the productivity of such companies rely on the employee workforce, it is necessary that the employees are properly monitored for satiation and motivation in order to attain the required targets. The employees in such small and medium food manufacturing enterprises (SME) are an important resource, since the production of the company depends on the investment of labor. Therefore, the employee motivation is a major factor affecting the competitive environment of the companies since employees are not likely to continue their services if not properly motivated (Cerasoli & Ford, 2014).
The amount of labor provided by a certain number of employees for a certain number of hours, towards a particular goal or target, accounts for the profitability of the organization. Employees can either make or mar a business. Researches show that employment in a particular business is not always about salary, it is also about growth that is where people want to see themselves 10 years down the line. It is also about achievement and experiences people have in their workplace. Nobody would like to work in a negative environment, despite a chunky salary.
Employee motivation is greatly affected by the type of leadership, if the leader is intolerant and dominating in nature, thus he does not inspire much motivation among his team members (Barrick & Li, 2013). Lack of rewards and incentives at manufacturing level, negative work environment decreases the self-esteem of the individuals working in the company. It is necessary to maintain a healthy working environment within any business organization in order to increase the productivity of the business (Pinder, 2014). Facilitating interaction of production teams and their leads with the client helps in various clarifications regarding their job requirements and needs of the client. Lack of discussion, inspiration and interaction with other individuals kills the challenge and excitement in job. Lack of creativity and opportunity to learn new ideas, skills and enhance the innovativeness leads to demotivation as job becomes monotonous.
Being an HR Manager I would implement the following four approaches to introduce job motivation among employees at factory in manufacturing department. Here the job role of the employees is to manufacture the Nestle food products.
Improving skill variety – I will increase the CJD of each employee by sending him or her to workshops, seminars, to increase their skills and competencies with changes in Nestle. As an HRM, I believe that training is essential for employee development. Earlier, Nestle have conducted E-learning programs in the year 2008 that enhanced the skills of the employees (Vomberg et al., 2014). I would prefer to conduct “mission task force” to expand manufacturing department. I have a plan to provide graduation program by collaborating with “Open University in Malaysia”
Improving feedback – It is necessary for a job to facilitate a feedback mechanism in order to get an idea of how well the business is progressing or what improvements could be made. As an HRM responsibility, a customer feedback portal will be created or feedback forms will be supplied at distributor store. Sales person could also be asked to maintain records of their sales and the customers they are interacting with. Building rapport with the customers and providing offers exclusively for the customers (Chaudhary & Sharma 2012). Nestle conducts surveys for the employees to validate the behavioral outcome from the HR department and in future will come out with innovative feedback options (Manzoor, 2012).
Improvement in Task significance –includes increasing the production of Nestle products by entrusting the employees with an entire job rather than allocating the different part of the job to different people. It increases the significance of the job, and requires skill variety. Considering the present job, an employee who outlines a production plan, works on the methodology, researches the market for the demand of the food product, and on the basis of that implements the production plan to achieve the required targets. Nestle merges with the IIT’s polytechnics department to train workers about technical skills, ad provides idea related to basic equipment. These additional programs are provided as a part of HR development and are planning to introduce more modified methods.
Improving Autonomy – as an HRM of Nestle, I will induce autonomy in a job profile by not ignoring the workers. It includes endowing the employees with the responsibilities of managers. It authorizes the employees to set a timeframe of work, determine the working procedures, assess the results and the quality of work delivered, begin or end work, provide relevant solutions in case of problems or issues, and make unbiased decisions. For example, workers in manufacturing department are provided education related to health and nutrition so that they can apply the knowledge while making products. It makes the employees satisfied and feel valued (Ali et al., 2014).
As my role as a manager, it is my responsibility to entrust employees involved in the production line with responsibilities such as allowing them to assist in the designing of the production plan, or allowing them to voice their opinion regarding the work methodology (Kougija, 2014).
Conclusion
The job characteristic model focuses on the creation of a job, which enhances work motivation, and job satisfaction. The need of an employee to grow and develop within a job is what drives the motivation of the employee towards his job. The reported wanted to find Job characteristic model in “Nestle”. The researcher has tried to present an organizational implication and explained that how JCM works here.
In this report, the researcher has tried to find out how JCM functions in the organization at the factory level in manufacturing department. It measured the five core job characteristics, the psychological stages, possible outcomes of the job and the two moderators that are the Growth Need Strength and Contextual Satisfaction. Depending on the job type, the efficiency, ability, task significance, skill variety, feedback of job and freedom is determined in this organization.
Conclusively, employee working in higher level of corporation, have more variety of skills, autonomy and feedback whereas, those in the mid level show lower level of implication of these five factors. Application of this model in the FMCG sector will not only help increase the motivation of the employees but also, initiate an autonomic environment in the organization, which in turn would help in increasing the productivity.
References
Ali, S. A. M., Said, N. A., Kader, S. F. A., Ab Latif, D. S., & Munap, R. (2014). Hackman and Oldham’s Job Characteristics Model to Job Satisfaction. Procedia-Social and Behavioral Sciences, 129, 46-52.
Bakker, A. B., & Demerouti, E. (2014). Job demands–resources theory.Wellbeing..
Barrick, M. R., Mount, M. K., & Li, N. (2013). The theory of purposeful work behavior: The role of personality, higher-order goals, and job characteristics.Academy of Management Review, 38(1), 132-153.
Behson, S. J. (2012). Using relative weights to reanalyze research on the job characteristics model. Journal of Organizational Psychology, 12(2), 71.
Bodla, M. A., & Naeem, B. (2014). Creativity as Mediator for Intrinsic Motivation and Sales Performance. Creativity Research Journal, 26(4), 468-473.
Cerasoli, C. P., Nicklin, J. M., & Ford, M. T. (2014). Intrinsic motivation and extrinsic incentives jointly predict performance: A 40-year meta-analysis.Psychological Bulletin, 140(4), 980.
Chaudhary, N., & Sharma, B. (2012). Impact of employee motivation on performance (productivity) in private organization. International Journal of Business Trends and Technology, 2(4), 29-35.
Dobre, O. I. (2013). Employee motivation and organizational performance.Tabel of Contents.
Eder, A. B., Elliot, A. J., & Harmon-Jones, E. (2013). Approach and avoidance motivation.
Fischer, J., (2016). Manufacturing halal in Malaysia. Contemporary Islam,10(1), pp.35-52.
Kougija, E. (2014). Increasing Employee Satisfaction and Motivation: Case Company: Top Connect OÜ.
Lăzăroiu, G. (2015). Employee Motivation and Job Performance. Linguistic and Philosophical Investigations, (14), 97-102.
Manzoor, Q. A. (2012). Impact of employees motivation on organizational effectiveness. Business management and strategy, 3(1), 1.
McShane, S. L., & Von Glinow, M. A. (2015). Organizational Behavior 7/e.
Miner, J. B. (2015). Organizational behavior 1: Essential theories of motivation and leadership. Routledge.
Piccolo, R. F., Greenbaum, R. L., & Eissa, G. (2012). Ethical leadership and core job characteristics: Designing jobs for employee well-being. In Work and Quality of Life (pp. 291-305). Springer Netherlands.
Pinder, C. C. (2014). Work motivation in organizational behavior. Psychology Press.
Sundberg, A. (2015). Motivated to retain? A study of motivational factors among trainees in a FMCG company.
Taylor, G. (2015). Hackman And Oldham’s Job Characteristics Model.Teaching Business & Economics, 19(2), 7.
Times, N.S., (2008). Nestlé Malaysia proudly serves the international halal market.
Vomberg, A., Homburg, C., & Bornemann, T. (2015). Talented people and strong brands: The contribution of human capital and brand equity to firm value. Strategic Management Journal, 36(13), 2122-2131.
Essay Writing Service Features
Our Experience
No matter how complex your assignment is, we can find the right professional for your specific task. Contact Essay is an essay writing company that hires only the smartest minds to help you with your projects. Our expertise allows us to provide students with high-quality academic writing, editing & proofreading services.
Free Features
Free revision policy
$10Free bibliography & reference
$8Free title page
$8Free formatting
$8How Our Essay Writing Service Works
First, you will need to complete an order form. It's not difficult but, in case there is anything you find not to be clear, you may always call us so that we can guide you through it. On the order form, you will need to include some basic information concerning your order: subject, topic, number of pages, etc. We also encourage our clients to upload any relevant information or sources that will help.
Complete the order form
Once we have all the information and instructions that we need, we select the most suitable writer for your assignment. While everything seems to be clear, the writer, who has complete knowledge of the subject, may need clarification from you. It is at that point that you would receive a call or email from us.
Writer’s assignment
As soon as the writer has finished, it will be delivered both to the website and to your email address so that you will not miss it. If your deadline is close at hand, we will place a call to you to make sure that you receive the paper on time.
Completing the order and download