Motivating Employees Essay

Reward, whether it is financial (in terms of a monetary bonus) or simply praise and the recognition of success, will positively impact levels of motivation within a team. For example, a sales team working towards a target, that if achieved will mean a financial bonus will be more motivated than a team without this incentive, especially if a high percentage of that team have money as a primary motivating factor. The effect of praise and recognition on staff will be a team that feels valued and appreciated by its organisation. This will help promote harmony and make for a stronger, healthier and a more motivated team. A team that is not praised and recognised will soon start to feel that their hard work is not appreciated.

Motivation is derived from an internal force that provides an individual the opportunity to achieve their needs or goals. People are motivated by a variety of things and often have different motivating factors. Employers should be mindful of individual motivating factors when attempting to motivate staff to increase performance. While some people may be motivated by money, many are motivated by things like: recognition, promotion, and increased responsibility. Once an employer has identified motivating factors they are able to analyze a variety of motivational theories to design and implement a program that will motivate employees to go above and beyond what is expected of them.

It is an opportunity for an employee to respond to any issues discussed and to request any development requests they may have or any suggestions to improve the department or team. It also gives the employee a chance to feedback to the manager any concerns or issues they may have about the way they are being managed.

Recognizing employees for accomplishments such as finishing a major project, reaching sales targets or providing excellent customer service can be an important motivating factor. Set goals for workers to strive for and offer rewards for reaching them. This could be in the form of an employee of the month scheme, a bonus, or a promotion. Some companies conduct meetings where employees are recognised for good work in front of their colleagues. This can help motivate all the workers in the business to strive for success.

The leadership at the Corrections Department Rewards Correctional Officers who go beyond his or her job description. For example, a Lieutenant may reward a CO with written documentation stating what he or she did to receive such recognition. After reading the letter both parties sign the document and its place in his or her employee file. According to Manning and Curtis, “one-minute praising involves showing appreciation for effect and accomplishments” (2008, p. 407). Therefore, one-minute praising means to recognize employees as a mean for increasing his or her growth, so that he or she can continue on a path towards success. In fact, rewarding the employee not only motivates him or her, but inspires him or her to fulfill the company overall

Studies show that employees view praise as the most rewarding benefit they can receive from their employer. A study funded by Make Their Day – Employee Recognition

Additionally, the Spirit Program is successful because management encouraged employee’s participation and interaction, which leads to positive recognition and appreciation. Boltax (2011) points out the importance of peer positive recognition; he believes that positive recognition should not solely come from superiors, but that peer recognition can also provide the right effective feedback to employees. Ultimately, this incentive method achieves two goals:

Reward and recognition programs must connect the needs and expectations of the workforce with the company’s overall goals and strategies. A program that reinforces important company values and goals will encourage employees to act in line with such goals and emphasize the importance of achieving these goals. Alternatively, rewards which do not connect with organizational goals may convey a misleading message and encourage employees to act in a manner that does not facilitate the

Another step that companies could take that would make their employees excel at their jobs would be recognizing their achievements, and rewarding things like outstanding customer reviews with little things like gift cards or bigger things depending on the company’s budget, regardless these are impactful. Especially for those employees who are competitive and for those who need that extra little bit of motivation. Studies have proven that positive feedback and focusing on employees’ strengths is most likely to be engaged in their company. While employees whose managers ignore them have a 40% chance of being disengaged and those whose managers focus mainly on what they need to improve tend to be disengaged 22% of the time, one 1% of employees whose managers focus on their strengths tend to be disengaged, based on that same study done in Clifton’s book called Strenghtsfinder.

Recognize & Reward Employees . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Contentment and satisfaction of employees is extremely important as jobs are becoming more specified, selecting and training another set of workers is a long, expensive process. Motivation is the strongest, most efficient way to keep employees happy and at peak performance and things such as just saying “thank you” go a long way. In a study completed by Forbes, who polled over 2,000 professionals found that 53% of workers are more likely to stay with a company for a longer period of time solely based off of them receiving more appreciation from their boss/manager. That same study also found that 81% of workers are more motivated at work when their boss shows appreciation or thanks. Human resources has a huge part to play in this because of their role in the development, maintenance, and retention of employees. The HR management must make sure that bosses and managers with workers under their supervision feel appreciated and heard. This will lead to the employees working harder and/or better, making them more proud and happy, while benefiting the business by having a more efficient worker.

There are several different ways an employer can motivate their employee's: job design & goals, performance appraisal, pay, and career development.

Although there are other actions managers can do in terms of rewards for events such as “employee of the month” in which a particular employee is rewarded; this can help keep employee motivation and morale up. Therefore, Kyle as a new hire is experiencing high levels of motivation and productivity throughout his first months of being hired and does not understand what it is like to not be acknowledged for their hard work.

In today's high paced work environment it is reported that employees consider recognition of their work and efforts rare and infrequent. Think about it - What better way to have an employee continue their good work and success then to offer them praise-verbal, written or ideally a public announcement (¶ 3).

Being rewarded and recognised for their work or contribution is what keeps an employee motivated to work towards achieving the organisational as well as personal goals. When the employees is motivated by rewards, they will have job satisfaction consequently increasing the productivity of the organisation. It necessitates the need of managers to pay more attention in understanding their employees and come up with suitable types of reward systems for the organisation so that the employees are intrinsically and extrinsically motivated all the time. The hypotheses that I put forward here is to support this statement that effective reward management is critical to