Today's new generations of corporate leaders understand that loyalty is a concept that cannot be bargained, the same happens with a passion for work, imagination or talent of a person. These new leaders of our day understand that this is precisely what makes people decide to dedicate themselves to their work and that is something that organizations must strive to earn it. Some organizations try to offer something less tangible but more meaningful: an intellectual and emotional connection between people, their tasks and their workplace. Organizations adopt mechanisms to create new cultures in which people want to do their work naturally; not only for financial rewards,but also because of the satisfaction that comes from doing meaningful work of value to the organization where you work. And while managers' strategies improve bottom line results, they also create another collateral benefit: staff satisfaction with belonging to the organization and their internal desire to give more.
What are those mechanisms that make employees feel driven to do their best to deliver the best results for your organization?
KEY WORDS: Work motivation, Productivity, Strategy, Corporate leadership, human resources.
INTRODUCTION
Motivation is a fundamental element for business success since the achievement of the company's objectives depends largely on it.
However, there are still many corporate leaders who have not taken into account the relevance of this issue and continue to practice a management that does not consider the importance of the human factor and, as a result, they have a shortage of qualified human resources.
That situation is causing companies to adopt strategies to attract and retain the best performing human resources. The labor market has been transformed and nowadays, economic compensation is no longer the main element to consider when selecting a position, giving way to other considerations such as the work environment, flexibility, support programs, conciliation and personal and work development. These elements are considered by some as emotional salary.
MOTIVATION AS A DRIVER OF LABOR PERFORMANCE
The main objective of business organizations is to ensure that their employees are motivated and integrated towards personal and organizational achievement and that leads them to meet the goals of their different projects. However, how can we ensure that the people who work in an organization are motivated? Does being motivated mean they are committed to the company? In any case, the dilemma is to find the true reasons for the motivation and commitment of the employees (Crespi, VM and Boria, RS, (2011).
One of the most difficult and everyday challenges that executives face within an organization is getting people to do their best when they do their jobs. Even deciphering what motivates human beings has been a mystery for centuries. Some important thinkers who have studied human behavior, such as Aristotle, Freud or Maslow, have enlightened us about the causes that cause people to do what they do (Nohria, N., et al. 2008).
As Javitch, D. (2011) points out, it is important to know which strategies work and discard those that do not work, to make staff more productive and give better results. Managers need to make sure their employees are productive and want to do their best job. In all organizations there are people who do not perform their work with the quality that is required and this represents very costly problems for organizations. Coupled with that, many leaders lose their way when it comes to increasing worker performance. It is not an easy thing because there are a large number of myths about job performance. You need to learn to recognize them and apply effective strategies that help keep employees happy and productive. The top five myths about motivation are:Only money motivates, just keep them happy, conflict is better ignored, some people are just not motivated, and smart employees don't need motivation.
Javier Ayuso, CEO of Unique (Spain) points out that motivation is one of the factors that most directly affects the results and productivity of workers and, therefore, of companies. For this reason, it is extremely important to achieve the job satisfaction of workers through appropriate work environments, which in addition to that makes employees feel proud of the role they play within the organization. It is surprising to see that only half of managers believe that their people are motivated but it is more discouraging that 67% admit they do not know or do not know what measures to take to achieve it, adds Ayuso. (Romero, MA, 2010).
According to Crespi, VM and Boria, RS (2011), all the definitions of motivation agree that it is an internal state of mind that stimulates behavior; translated as the effort to carry out a job that leads to the satisfaction of needs (Rivas, p. 275). Motivation is an important factor in any field of human activity, be it family or work. However, it is in the work environment where it obtains more relevance, so it is necessary for business organizations to apply motivational mechanisms to people, so that their daily activity does not become a reluctant and oppressive activity. In addition, motivation brings several additional positive consequences, such as self-esteem, self-realization and the feeling of being useful and competent.
In this way, the satisfaction of workers is an end in itself, it has an intrinsic value that concerns both the organization and the worker himself. However, it is not convenient to adopt utilitarian interests where job satisfaction is considered only one more necessary factor to achieve better organizational results for the benefit of the company. In addition, for there to be organizational effectiveness, there must also be satisfaction in the members of the organization when they carry out a task. As employees are motivated, their level of commitment reaches its maximum expression, which is then transmitted to the product or service offered by the company.
On the other hand, Delgado, A. (2013) points out that according to the World Association of Human Resource Management Professionals (Worldatwork), recognition consists of “thanking or highlighting the actions, efforts, behaviors or performance of an employee”. And this responds to an intrinsic psychological need of people to be valued for their effort and contribution, it also strengthens the strategy of promoting some behaviors that favor business success. Employee recognition systems are in full transformation. Previously, variables such as seniority were valued, today recognition is clearly emerging as a strategy for alignment, motivation and employee commitment. Before loyalty was rewarded, now contribution is applauded.
According to some studies (Bersin, 2011), recognition practices that are based on criteria such as seniority are today considered wasted money in terms of return on investment. Today, very different behaviors are rewarded to align people with the business and increase efficiencies and results.
Jacobe (Gallup) points out in his report “Employee Recognition and the Bottom Line” that “Recognition is an inexpensive and effective way to generate motivation, especially in times of austerity where wage increases have disappeared”. In other words, recognition is an elementary factor to get the best version of employees, which is now so necessary in these times of socioeconomic congestion.
It is difficult to refute the conception - supported by practice - that a motivated workforce implies better performance. However, the key question is what actions executives should take to increase the overall motivation of their employees. An organization as a whole must primarily address the four fundamental emotional drives of employees (acquiring assets, forming ties, understanding and defending themselves), but so must executives individually. People know there may be restrictions because of organizational rules, but they are smart enough to know that their immediate superiors may have some leeway. In fact, Nohria, N., et al.(2008) "our research shows that individual executives influence overall motivation the same as any organizational policy."
Another strategy used to create or increase motivation, as the case may be, is the one applied by Berger, J (2011): people who in a competitive event are being outmatched by a small margin are more willing to win than those who are winning tight. His research consisted of telling a group of people that they were competing with another person placed in another room to determine who was typing faster and that the winner was going to be awarded cash. After an episode, he gave feedback to the group, telling some that the competitor was winning by a lot, others that they were losing narrowly and the rest that they were tied. Only the people who were told they were slightly behind in the competition put the gas in significantly for the second round,reaching the conclusion that the people who "were losing slightly" typed faster than the group of those who were "winning tightly." The results were undeniable: people who were told they were "losing slightly" increased their effort dramatically.
In other recent research works on creative work within companies, Amabile, M. T and Kramer, JS (2011), encountered a similar phenomenon, they discovered the principle of progress: Of all the things that can increase motivation, perception and emotions during a workday, the most important is progress in meaningful work. And what people experience most often in the sense of progress is being creatively productive in the long run. The role that the power of progress plays is central to human nature, but few managers understand how to harness progress to increase motivation.
In fact, work motivation has long been the subject of debate. In a survey asking about the keys to motivating workers, they found that some managers rank recognition for a good job as the most important, while for others it is tangible incentives. Some focus on the value of interpersonal support, while for others the answer is clear goals. Interestingly, very few of your surveyed managers ranked progress first.
Looking at the other side of the coin, after 90 years of human resource management, Skinner, W. (1981) asks Where are all the committed, loyal and dedicated employees? Managers naturally identify problems by their priority when faced with business problems. Once this is done, at least half of the work has been done, finding the right solutions is only a matter of time. However, this has not been the case with the problem of human resources: how to motivate employees?
Since the 1920s, Hawthorne's experiments uncovered the problem, and since then, managers, researchers, and consultants have tried to find the answer to the human resources problem. Why aren't the most productive, loyal, and dedicated employees of your companies the way your managers know they can be? Skinner proposes four reasons why the reality has fallen far below expectations in personnel management, that is, the expectations of managers have been too high, first, then, the concepts that personnel professionals offer managers are frequently contradictory, the corporate role of staff has always been problematic, and lastly,Managers make assumptions about their employees that undermine efforts to motivate them.
Amabile, M. T and Kramer, JS (2011), When studying the psychological experiences and performance of people who perform complex work within organizations, they also found that a central driver of productive and creative performance was the quality of the A person's internal working life, that is, the mixture of emotions, motivations and perceptions over the course of a working day. How workers are happy and motivated by an intrinsic interest in work, the positive way they see their organization, their management, their team, their work, and themselves. All of this combines either to climb to the highest levels of achievement or to go downhill. They finally concluded that of all the things that can improve the inner life of work, the most important is progress in meaningful work.
Javitch, D. (2011) indicates the strategies to make staff more productive, framed in ten brief incentives:
- Praise the employee for doing his job well, even if he does it moderately well Invite staff to develop a more satisfying career, including promotions on specific results Clear expectations about job performance Ensure varied activities in the job description Ensure that the employee knows the Impact of their work on the entire work process Verify that the employee finds sense in what they do Provide feedback, pointing out the positive and negative aspects Allow the worker some autonomy based on their achievements and goal planning Increase the depth and scope of what the employee does. Employee makes gradually, and Provide opportunities for success to employees.
Amabile, M. T and Kramer, JS (2011), question what could be more important for managers than increasing the productivity of their teams.
CONCLUSION
Loyalty is a concept that cannot be negotiated, nor is a person's passion for work, imagination or talent. Today's new leaders must grasp that this is precisely what makes people decide to dedicate themselves to their work and that is something that organizations must strive to earn it. Some organizations may offer something less tangible, but more meaningful: an intellectual and emotional connection between people, their tasks, and their workplace. Organizations must adopt mechanisms to create a new culture where people want to do their work naturally; not only because of the financial retribution, but also because of the satisfaction that comes from doing meaningful and valuable work for the organization where you work.And while managers' strategies improve bottom line results, it also brings another collateral benefit: staff satisfaction with belonging to the organization and their internal desire to give more.
Most managers still work under misconceptions about what motivates employees - knowledge workers in particular - to do their best work. They have concluded that people are more creative and productive when their internal work life is more positive, when they feel happy, are motivated by work and have a positive perception of their colleagues and the organization. In that sense, in those positive states, people are more committed to work. A person's internal work life on a given day fuels their performance for the day and may even affect performance the next day.
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Master in Information Technology Administration, ITESM; PhD in Senior Management. He worked at Pemex (1980-1996).
Writer, Consultant, Professor and Lecturer
February 2019
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BIBLIOGRAPHIC REFERENCES
- Amabile, T. M & Kramer, SJ (2011). The Power of Small Wins. Harvard Business Review, May 2011, 72, 73 Berger, J. (2011). If you want to win, tell your team it's losing (a little). Harvard Business Review, Oct 2011,36, 37 Crespi, V. M and Boria, RS (2011). The committed employee. Human capital. What do we understand by motivation ?, No. 255, 58, 59 Delgado, A. (2013). To win in times of crisis, recognize the value of your employees. Capital Humano, No. 275, 73, 74 Javitch, D. 5 myths about employee motivation. Entrepreneur Magazine, 92-94 Nohria, N. et al. (2008). Employee Motivation. A Powerful New Model. Harvard Business Review, Jul-Aug 2008, 78, 80, 81 Romero, MA (2010). 67% of managers do not know how to motivate their employees. Human Capital, No. 242, April 2010, 22 Skinner, W. (1981). Big hat, not cattle:Managing Human Resources. Harvard Business Review, Sep Oct 1981, 106-108
