Managing People In Organizations And Employee Motivation

Employee Attitude

Describe about the Managing People in Organizations and Employee Motivation?.

Organization behaviour is the application of knowledge on ways that employees will relate with the organization. For any firm to succeed, organisation behaviour is should be put in to practice so as to ensure people in an organisation behave or respond to situations in a manner that is required of them. (Armstrong & Taylor, 2014).  Organisation behaviour thus is not about the way organisations behave, but the study of an individual behaviour when in an organisation setting. For example, it will look at how an employee will behave alone and how he will behave when in a group. The study of organisation behaviour is very important as in enables firms to gain a much greater understanding of factors that influence an indivual behaviour and group dynamics. This is important as it will enable groups and individuals become more effective in the organisation. Organisation behaviour assists in formulating organization structure, improve technologies and help employees in the organization to blend with the work environment. According to Snezana (2007), organization behavior is defined as the study which looks at the role employees and the organization structure will play in the firm for the purpose of improving the effectiveness of the firm. This report looks at factors that affect employee motivation in organizations by discussing some of the main variables that if not managed properly will affect the way people work in the organization (Bernerth, et al., 2007).

Armstrong & Taylor (2014), looks at attitude as being the beliefs and feelings that are highly influenced by the way employees will look at the kind of work they assigned in to. Employee attitude is also very important as it will be able to determine their commitment to the firm (Root, 2016).  For example, when an employee starts complaining about working hours, his dissatisfaction might spread to other workers. Another example is when a department is run by a very cranky manager who is always scolding workers or refusing to appraise employees; this might make the working atmosphere difficult thus affect employee attitude and behaviour (Mack, 2016). .  The attitude of employees also produces their evaluative statements with regard to the way the view one another in their work places; it will determine their commitment to the organization.  The attitude of an employee also reflects the way each employee feels about a particular task and other operations in the organization like their boss, salary, working hours and job allocation.

Job Satisfaction

According to Candlin & Sarangi (2011), the attitude of an employee is usually regard under three components that include the behavioral component which will analyse the intention of each employee as the enter the office and why some of them will behave in a particular manner with regard to different aspects of the organization (Candlin & Sarangi, 2011). It will also look at the cognitive component which analyses the emotional aspect of the opinions and other decisions that are made in the organization (Cummings & Worley, 2014). Thirdly is the affective component which will discuss the feelings of each employee and emotions regarding worktime of an action taken in the organisaiton (Benn & Bolton, 2011).

In order to deeply understand the relationship between organization behaviour and the attitude of an employee Leon Festinger theory of Cognitive dissonance, (2007) can be applied as it discusses different incompative situations which a person will use to reflect on different attitudes at work. There are so many studies which support the theory as an employee attitude is a major determinant of the what the person would be productive in the organization.

Accoding to Candlin & Sarangi (2011), employee attitude is a major determinant of the way that employee would be productive in the organization. The attitude of an employee is reported to have a very strong link in the way that they adopt the culture in the organization (Candlin & Sarangi, 2011).  One of the examples of such situations is when an employee is asked by the manager to decide whether they are comfortable working in the organization in the next five year or not (Saari & Judge, 2014). Also according to Saari & Judge (2014), for an organisation to improve employee attitude, it is important for organisations to constantly hold trainings and seminars where employees and managers can be taught about various behaviour factors and be able to improve on their attitude as well. If the employee totally accepts the offer then it will mean that he has a positive attitude towards the organization however if the intention of the employee is to leave the organization immediately his or her contract ends then it might mean that he has developed negative attitude about the organization. Employee attitude thus will affect the way that an employee is motivated to do is tasks and how he will be productive (Bernerth, et al., 2007).

The other ways in which an organization can look at employee attitude with regard to motivation is by asking them how they feel about their workstations, job description and working hours on a salary. These questions are also necessary to ask since they help in shaping up the organization behaviour of the firm and enables organizations to understand their employees more closely (Hofstede, 2001).

Theory of Motivation and Job satisfaction

According to Choi (2011), job satisfaction looks at the attitude an employee carries whenever they are working. This has to do with whether they feel overworked, exploited or treated well in their jobs.  In most cases job satisfaction is about employees achieving what they desire in their Job description. According to literature, employees with good communication skills tend to gain more at their workplaces than those without (Nishii, et al., 2008). Other factors that will also be considered when discussing job satisfaction will look at the work environment that discusses supervision at work, standard operating procedures, working hours and policies in the organization (Snezana, 2007). The above factors will be will be used to determine whether employees are satisfied with the style of management, employee promotion, working policies and relationships with co-workers (Hart & Cooper, 2001) When it comes to managing people in organizations job satisfaction will explore employee feelings about the work and how they perceive the way that they are treated in their places of work. This aspect is thus an affective and shall mostly look at the emotions of employees and the things they like and what they do not like (Festinger, 2007). This is thus the overall attitude with regard to the work that an employee is assigned.

According to Guest (2008) it is important for managers to discuss negative and positive feelings that workers show when they are at work. For example, this can be observed through personal character. According to, Walumbwa, et al. (2010) managers are required to interact with employees and other workers. The company’s standard operation procedures should also be design in a manner that it enables employees accept and live by the working conditions. It is important that employers put in place aspects that can encourage an employee to hold a positive attitude towards work and the level of satisfaction which also looks at the way that he or she is going to conduct oneself in the organization.  According to (Grigaliunas & Herzberg, 2007) the advantages of ensuring employees are satisfied with their place of work will result in to high performances by employees and increase turnover for the organization (Armstrong & Taylor, 2014). The areas are very important in the behaviour of organizations. Increased performance of employees in an organization like hospitality for example, can only be realised if employee are well motivated (Choi, 2011). When this is realised then the company will also reduce the cost of employee turnover and recruitment and training costs.

The satisfaction of an employee at work is a challenging concept for any manager and is not easily measured, this could be slightly different from employee motivation. However the two go together. Employee job satisfaction will look much more at the personal attitude with regard to the way that employees feel about their current job description. These factors can be quantitative or qualitative, organizational or personal motivation which directs to job satisfaction in the organization (Hecht, et al., 2010).

According to the Motivator Hygiene theory by Frederick Herzberg, (2007) the satisfaction of an employee or dissatisfaction will look at factors which are both external and internal in nature. Such factor are very important since the enable organizations to understand attitudes that employeees form with regard to work. Internal factors for example, will be related to the department the employee works in. for example the kind of powers that the employee is allowed to exercise, job description and the kind of supervision excercised in the organization (Armstrong & Taylor, 2014).  In this regard, motivation will be the main factor that would be looked at by an employee when they are looking forward to peforming their tasks. Hygienic or external factor on the other hand will have more to do with the employees work environment in all aspects. For example, it is likely that an employee may not be satisfied with the work policies in the organisaiton, the salary allocation, interpersonal relations or the working hours and leave days. The theory of motivation states that factors which are important in employee motivation will look at job satisfaction as well (Hill, et al., 2014).

In another view by Darwish (2000), job satisfaction does not always have to do with the single view by various dimensions of work as well. However, there is quite a very unique relationship when exploring employee motivation in different aspects. For example, in one organization, there could be employees who are not satisfied with a certain area of their job but are happy about the salary. This means that for these workers, though the job may not be as welcoming as such, they are motivated to continue working due to the kind of salary allocated for the work. This proves that different levels of satisfaction may not really affected the way that employee is motivated to work with regard to individual, cultural and organizational factors (Loon, et al., 2015).

This means that it is very important for managers to ensure differences which exist between employees and the organization and what they feel with regard to how they are supervised at work, working hours, increment of salary and other policies in the organization.   Employee motivation will be important factor in shaping them up to what they need to be as employees and make then find satisfaction in the way they do their work. This is due to the fact that, organization behaviour will shape up employees to the effect that they are able to realise positive results and also improve their internal and external view of the organization. It is also important to note that employees in organization are only able to act on the basis of what they see as being the right thing to do in the organization. The basic reason for this is to be able to understand how different work situations will motivate an employee and increase production in the company.

This means that, as employees are able to bring their perception closer to the reality of the organization, the will be able to know what to know with the organization and what to do with themselves within the organization. It is also important that each employee shares with the management of the organization about what they expect from the organization so that managers are able to put in place mechanisms that look in to their concerns as well as the needs of their organization.

Employee motivation thus determines the performance at work, according to Snezana (2007), the relationship between employee motivation and the employee performance is more complicated and may not usually lead to the other. It is also not fair to assume that employee motivation will eventually result to performance (Harris, et al., 2012). For example, when an employee is rated as an average performer it does not mean that if motivated he may do more. Other factors come in such as knowledge and work experience (Hackman & Katz, 2010) (H.Zhao & Seibert, 2006). Employee motivation and performance has a very challenging relationship that need to be explored more deeply. According to the Hawthorne studies carried in 1930, a researcher looked at the effects of employee attitude for example, and the way that this affected performance (Loon, et al., 2015).  It was found that employee motivation and performance can be seen through believing that performance can change employee attitude thus increase motivation for the employee. This is due to the fact that increased performance at work eventually leads in to high social and economic regard for the employee, which is a major factor for motivation (Bernerth, et al., 2007). (Armstrong & Taylor, 2014).

Employee motivation will also affect the behaviour of people in the organization as it is the major determinant in the way people are productive in the organization. A well-motivated employee will always perform his or her task with a positive regard. This will be seen in the way that employee is able to meet deadline schedules, comes early at work and is in good relationship with his or her peers. When there is much motivation at work, even other employees will that the organization with the same attitude which improves the general organizational behaviour. Employees will also be able to perform much more when there is general attitude at the workplace that encourages positivity through sharing experiences in each aspect of the job (Hecht, et al., 2010).

Also according to the motivation theory, employee motivation will affect the general employee turnover. But it is important that the firm considers other factors which will also come in play like the current conditions in the market, work tenure, alternative job opportunities economic situations and salary scale of the organization.  These are some of the main factors that can lead to the employee seeking an alternative employment.

Grigaliunas & Herzberg (2007), supports this argument when he reiterates that the major reasons that employee leave organizations is due to lack of motivation which affects the employee. However, for other aspects of the organisaiton, this may not really be affective. The same issue is observed even with poor perfromers who may not be taken in other organizations hen they are not motivated to work in the current job (Darwish, 2000). It is a common observation for an unmotivated employee to constantly withdraw from their daily work duties. An employee who is not well motivated is most likely to quite the job at the end of the day or immediately he gets a new placement.

There is a very clear relationship between a low performing employee and motivation at work (Festinger, 2007). This is also seen in other forms of work withdrawals like abuse of drugs, lateness, grievances, excuses not to come to work, work theft and early call for retirement. It is also important to remember that employee motivation can also lead to the defiance within workplaces where employees come together in unions and fight out the current administration who may not have listened to their grievances.  Such issues may include long working hours, the work policies, lack of employee promotion and other aspects of motivating employees (Bernerth, et al., 2007).  In this regard, the organization is likely to find employees teaming up in protest of dissatisfaction of their job descriptions and protesting work relationship with supervisors or long hours.

Conclusion

In conclusion organization behaviour is influenced by factors such as employee motivation which ensures that there is maximum performance. It is important for managers in organization to look at determinants of employee motivation and make sure that this is exercised at all times. Some of the issues that are worth remembering would be first of all to put in place job description that do not exploit employees. It will also be important that employees are given opportunities for promotion, salary increment, are allowed to form unions and often are given leave days and day off.  It is also important that managers make the work environment friendly for employees by not being too strict for them or too lenient for them to not feel as if they are valued in the organization.

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