Organizational Behavior: Employee Motivation

In the contemporary corporate world, in order to sustain in the volatile and stern market conditions, the organizations are required to prepare a team of enthusiastic, motivated, optimistic and loyal mavens. The key element for organizational stability and enhanced performances is motivated and passionate employees. Motivation drives employees to accomplish the goals, excel at their jobs and fulfil the responsibilities with positive, exultant and constructive outlook. Motivation is an imperative tool that reinforces employees’ attitude and behaviour towards their duties and responsibilities and triggers the tendency to achieve the desired targets and objectives with zeal and enthusiasm (Rusu, 2014).

Dysfunctional workplace environment, lack of synergy, depressing and gloomy conversations and impassive organizational culture are the demotivating and dispiriting factors which result in unaspiring employees’ performances, taciturn attitude of staff, absenteeism and high turnover (Greenberg, 2011).

As an organizational consultant, it is crucial to analyse and understand the motivation issues presented in the American television series-The Office (season 3, episode 4). Examining the work culture, behaviour, leadership style and motivating or demotivating drivers portrayed in the episode and applying the concepts, models and theories of organizational behaviour and motivation; could unveil the real and actual problems and challenges of the organization along with recommendations and suggestions.

‘Grief counselling’ is an edifying episode of season 3. Michael Scott is trying to keep his troop entertained and regaled. After a while he is overpowered with grief, sorrow and depression when he learns about the tragic demise of his former boss, Mr. Ed Truck. Though, the staff consoles him but then quickly gets back to work as nobody wants to confer about deaths, accidents and tragedies. Michael disgusts the employees by imagining bloodbath and decapitation that nobody wants to listen to. Moreover, he summons the staff to a primitive grief counselling session that nobody takes seriously. Michael is so devastated with the concept of death and loss that he even tries to revive a deceased and germ-ridden bird. Employees think of this act as eerie and weird; for them being disheartened and depressed because of a bird’s death is quite atypical. On the contrary, Michael schedules the bird’s funeral, despite of knowing that the employees have a lot of work to do. Only Pam tries to comfort Michael by preparing a coffin box and a speech.

Meanwhile, at a meeting in Stamford, Karen is distraught when Josh asks Jim to supervise her work; she is dismayed to see the vending machine being out of Herr’s potato chips, her favourite. Jim, being friendly and kind, helps her find the chips by tracing manufacturers, distributors and Vending Machine Company. Karen is quite happy to see the efforts of her project supervisor.

The whole scenario depicts a workaholic team that deals with an overly emotional boss. Overloaded with grief and pain; Michael expects the team to empathize with him. Michael longs for solace and support as he is not able to handle the loss of his former boss. Though, few minutes ago he was amusing the whole team by doing stuffs that bosses don’t usually do. This explains that he strives to be surrounded with people and tries to inject personal feelings at workplace (Hellriegel, 2011). However, this disrupts the daily workflow of the team making them feel distracted and side-tracked. At times, the team feels as if he is cares only about his emotions, his moods, his imaginations and his convenience. Nevertheless, he tries to add fun element at the workplace and inflates the value of the employees, when needed.

In this episode, he fosters a disconsolate ambience by constantly talking about the tragic incident and his loss. Being a regional manager, he is required to create a positive and energetic atmosphere even in stressed and catastrophic situations. Repeatedly using words like death, blood, accident, tragedy, mishap, etc. make the organizational climate glum and downhearted. As a boss, he needs to ease and comfort the employees to keep their focus intact. He cannot afford to bombard his emotions and sentiments as per his convenience; this can ruin the concentration level of the employees resulting in demotivation.

Moreover, his effort to organize a grief counselling session and letting employees burst their emotions out goes wrong because the team does not urge for any counselling session. Nobody is in the frame of mind to reminisce their losses, leaving their crucial tasks behind.

Michael’s struggle to revive the bird might sound touching but actually it isn’t. He is swamped by the emotion of not letting go a living being without trying to save it. His uncanny actions like taking the dead bird into the kitchen area and trying to resuscitate and thereafter, scheduling funeral for the bird make the employees upset about the hampered productivity and loss of precious time.

The theories and concepts of organizational behaviour and motivation, study the dynamics of an organizational setting. Concepts like leadership, team-building, decision-making, job satisfaction, organizational culture, training and development programs, strategies, etc. are facets of OB and motivation. This is an interdisciplinary field of psychology and sociology (Ivancevich & Matteson, 2005).

Expectancy: Enhanced and greater efforts would result in high performances. With appropriate resources, skills and support; the employees can put in a lot of hard work and efforts leading to boosted performances (Bloisi, 2003).

Instrumentality: High performances would fetch valued outcome. Leaders need to track and evaluate the performances to provide the deserving employees with an outcome.

Valence: The emotional orientations of the employees with respect to first order outcomes and second order outcomes. It implies strong preference for a particular reward (Bloisi, 2003).

Leaders, who observe the employee’s determination, performance and output and try to promote their skills and capabilities by rewarding them, create a team of motivated and energized employees (Armstrong, 2006).

Similarly, in the situation as presented in the show, the regional manager is required to provide appropriate motivation to the employees by understanding what they actually long for. Michael should understand that the entire team is putting in efforts to achieve its targets and get the desired outcome. Instead of forcing them to grieve and mourn for the loss; he should just motivate the team to concentrate on the responsibilities allocated. The employees require the support, direction and encouragement to perform stupendously and accomplish the tasks, but Michael is emotionally so weak that he gushes out his sentiments and feelings without understanding the mind-set of his team. Since, the team does not get the pertinent motivational drivers, it does not reciprocate what Michael is yearning for.

The effective manager theory explains that a manager needs to be consistent and emotionally stable. The foundation of a highly motivated team is an effective manager, who boosts the morale of the employees despite of facing troubles and issues at personal end. An effective manager never lacks in internal fortitude (McShane, 2011). He is the one who strikes a perfect balance between fun and sincerity. He inspires the team to fight back and get out of the bad phase. For him, the workplace should be clean and comfortable physically and psychologically.

Michael tries to make the workplace pepped-up by cracking jokes and acting funny, but when he gets to know about the sudden death of his former boss, he drowns into the depressing and dismal syndrome. Though, the staff tries to sympathize with him while maintaining an emotional distance; but he needs a team which engrosses along in dreary and bleak discussions and counselling sessions. This hampers the entire team’s energy and verve. Michael does not prove to be an effective manager as he does not try to tone down his feelings nor he tries to understand the employees’ outlook.

Intrinsic and extrinsic motivational theory explains the various drives and reasons for which the employees work hard.

The internal desires and wishes for inherent satisfactions like; to act morally, to refine the skills and capabilities, to learn and explore, to sooth the discontent and restlessness, to develop confidence, to help others, etc. are the facets of intrinsic motivation (Lau, 2014).

Factors that are external to an individual like money, incentives, perks, status, class, luxuries, etc. are extrinsic motivators (Lau, 2014).

Every employee urges for different motivational drivers. It is the prime responsibility of the manager or the leader to understand that urge and desire of the employees. If an employee delivers the best quality output when the leader praises his efforts, provides him with regular feedback and fosters an optimistic and sprightly organizational climate; then he might not get motivated with mere incentives (Champoux, 2011).

Similarly, in the fourth episode of the show, the manager is overwhelmed with his emotions and his school of thought and he does not realize what instigator or motivational driver the team needs. The team requires a leader who remains positive even in adverse circumstances and who has high emotional quotient.

Emotional sensitivity is healthy, but after a certain limit it becomes detrimental. It is important to manage the strong and extreme emotions especially at a workplace. As a manager, it is important to think about employees’ motivation. In the scenario as depicted in the episode of the show ‘The Office’, the employees find it hard to deal with the manager’s over sensitivity. As an organizational consultant it is imperative to provide few recommendations which could lead to high motivation level of employees.

In the given situation, in order to keep the employees charged and motivated, it is essential to firstly understand that there is a thin line difference between being sensitive and being weak. The manager needs to conduct self-assessment to know if he is being weak and setting a wrong example in front of the entire team. He should also explore his emotions through journaling; this can help him curtail the extreme emotions and responses. Eventually he would be able to spread cheer and optimism making the employees feel passionate and enthused for their tasks (Driskill & Brenton, 2005).

The manager needs to know what drives and pushes the team to work harder and perform better. If the employees are not showing any keenness or interest in interacting about deaths, calamities and heartaches; then it is a prerequisite for the manager to not force them to do so. This enhances the relationship and understanding between the team and the manager. This leads to high motivational level.

Thirdly, if in adverse situations, the manager needs a shoulder to cry on or needs someone to share the feelings with; he can do so, but in a normal and sensible manner that doesn’t look peculiar and anomalous. This can make the employees sense the honesty and genuineness in emotions. Hence, they would be able to share their feelings and concerns as well that would result in healthy interactions and strong rapport.

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