What are some common approaches to motivation and leadership

What are some common approaches to motivation and leadership in the workplace?

Solution

Being able to keep motivated can be a hard task for anyone. Anyone can experience depression and doubt at any time, and this can prohibit someone from being motivated. Motivation can be seen as an encouragement to help someone perform his or her task in a better way. However, when there is no motivation, there can be no simple answer to the problem. Discussed in this paper will be how strategies used for motivation can impact Spirit Manufacturing, efforts of the organization to performance improvement, the resistance of employees to productivity increases, the philosophy management uses for motivation, and two theories of motivation and their implications.

The motivation of employees is influenced by the purpose of the organization in which they work. The motivation will need to have the support of the management team. The management team will have to aid the employees in becoming more effective and productive. An employee can easily become frustrated when they have to work at a position where they feel inadequate, or have failed at in the past. When these negative motivations are allowed to continue, the effectiveness of the employees can decrease drastically. To help solve this problem, management will need to show the employees that they care about the employees. “Motivating and retaining employees requires strong leadership skills and effective management practices” (Hinshelwood, n.d.). Spirit Manufacturing uses several different techniques for motivation such as empowering employees, quality programs, employee benefits, and employee incentives. When these tools are used correctly, the company is able to gain and retain a staff that is cooperative, happy, motivated, and productive.

The productivity of the employees is an important aspect, when productivity increases “employees are able to generate greater results without more people, more resources, more money, more time, or more energy. The result is abundance for everyone” (The Institute for Management Excellence, 2009). Employees can build a resistance to productivity increases if they are being pressured by the management team, if the goals of the employees are different from the goals of management, and if management yells at the employees. The above problems can lead to conflict between the employees and management. For this reason, organizations should hire employees that are qualified to be able to achieve increased productivity. This will allow the organization to accomplish better results.

The working environment that is provided for the employees by the members of management will dictate the success of the organization. Employees that are motivated will be happier, more productive, and will keep working for the organization longer. Managers have to be able to understand the employees and know how to find what will motivate the employees. Two theories of motivation that would be useful in Spirit Manufacturing would be Theory X and Theory Y, established by Douglas McGregor. Theory X states that people are lazy and are not interested in working. Theory Y states that people are cooperative, willing to work, and have a commitment to their organization. If a management team works under theory X, then they will be assuming that the employees need to be told what to do, and how to do their work. If a management team works under theory Y, then they will be willing to let their employees have freedom in making some decisions to complete certain task. Some of the people that work at Spirit Manufacturing are good at thinking outside of the box, while other people only do what they need to do to get by. At Spirit Manufacturing, some freedom is given to the employees to make decisions, and management shows support for some of the ideas of the employees. The management team of any organization should offer freedom to make decisions and be supportive to the ideas of the employees. Employees should also be rewarded for their hard work and dedication to the organization where they are employed. The reward system for the employees should always be “aiming to satisfy the individual’s actual needs, not only lower level ones” (Norwood, 2008). The management team of any organization should be able to recognize the hard working employees in order to keep the employees motivated.