THEORIES OF MOTIVATION

All major, contemporary, theorists of motivation agree that it is important to reward high performance in order to encourage it to continue, to prevent it from diminishing, and to set an example for other employees in the unit or organization. Pay is important to high achievers because it serves as performance feedback, as a measure of goal attainment (Atkinson, 1964; McClelland, 1961), and as a reward for accomplishment (Herzberg, 1966; Herzberg, Mausner, & Synderman, 1959).
Motivational researchers have discovered certain preconditions to the effective use of pay as a reward . These are as follows:
1. Keeping pay policies confidential is unwise.
2. Employees must view their salaries as being important, so that pay increases are seen as rewards.
3. The reward must be large enough to make a noticeable difference to the person receiving it.
4. The raise or reward must be linked clearly to high performance.
5. The policy must be to reward only good performance and not to reward poor performance.
6. Rewards must be frequent enough to continually reinforce a desirable (higher) level of performance.
7. The linkage between pay and performance must be highly visible for employees to perceive a relationship between them and to satisfy the employees’ needs for recognition and esteem.
8. The pay plan should be evaluated in terms of its cost effectiveness rather than its cost. Rewarding a high performer may produce a high return to the organization.
Pay as a reward is powerful because it affects everything most employees want. In terms of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs (Maslow, 1970), it can provide for physical needs, safety (such as health insurance and retirement funds), social contacts and attendance at social events, and status symbols. Money can even help to provide growth and autonomy for self-actualization.

So what kind of persons we have in the organization?
The salary a person receives for the job he or she performs is determined by many factors, and there is no one correct salary for any job. The salaries for similar jobs in different organizations can vary because of the geographical setting, the person’s length of time on the job, educational and experiential qualifications, the presence of a labor union, or even governmental contract requirements. Salary typically has at least two major organizational purposes: to attract and hold employees with needed talent and to motivate employees to achieve a high level of job performance. Compensation often includes much more than just salary. Typically, it includes the types and levels of pay, supplemental benefits, and nonfinancial rewards such as praise, recognition, and signs of status. Fairness in compensation relates to the links between pay and expertise, level of responsibility, and working conditions.
Compensation decisions are among the most important activities of managers because salaries and other benefits are one of the major expense items in organizations and are the major external rewards that the organization can offer to influence organizational effectiveness . On surveys of rewards, employees have ranked salary first or second in importance consistently, for every occupational classification, for the past twenty years.
WHAT IS THE ROLE OF MANAGEMENT?

Although top management usually determines basic salary levels, often it is left up to the manager of a department or work unit to make recommendations about salary increases for employees. Generally, the opinions of the manager and the peers who are familiar with the job requirements and the performance of the job incumbent are the two most important sources of information about how well a person is doing a job. Any negative motivations of peers can be offset with the use of an effective evaluation instrument and by averaging their responses.
One reason why salary increases may fail to achieve their intended effects is that managers may be unable or unwilling to discriminate between good performers and poor performers. Many managers are reluctant to identify poor performers, perhaps because it may reflect their inability to lead those employees to perform better. Because of this, a manager may equalize the rewards among all employees in the work unit. However, the manager then risks discouraging the better performers, who may resign, leaving the manager with a group of satisfied but ineffective and overpaid employees.
Managers who complain that their workers are not motivated might consider the possibility that they have installed reward systems that are paying for behaviors other than those the manager is seeking. Managers need to ask themselves whether they are rewarding mediocre performance (e.g., show up regularly, do not stick your neck out) while pretending that they are rewarding high performance (e.g., work hard, attain new skills, take risks).
MERIT INCREASES
Under merit-pay plans, each person usually receives a base pay increase—often tied to the cost of living—and then is eligible for an additional increase based on performance. Workers rated low may be considered for termination, those rated mediocre may receive only the cost-of-living increase, and those rated high generally receive the cost-of-living adjustment and a fairly substantial merit increase. In this way, the basic needs of all employees are met and the superior performance is rewarded.
Merit raises are evidence of a compensation system that bases an individual’s salary or wage increase on a measure of the person’s performance during a specific period of time. Measures of performance should be realistic, accurate, and agreeable to those who have contact with the job: the employee, the supervisor, subordinates, and peers of the person being evaluated.
IMPLICATIONS
Research and experience have shown that merit raises and other rewards can motivate employees to perform better if:
1. The reward has enough actual value to serve as a motivator;
2. The linkage between pay and effort or achievement is clear;
3. There is accurate role perception between the employee and the manager; and
4. The reward carries “achievement” value that provides status, recognition, or satisfaction to the employee.
For more information about team or self motivation, visit our webpage:EVENTTEAM

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