Influence of Psychological Empowerment †Free Samples to Students

Question: Discuss about the Influence of Psychological Empowerment. Answer: Introduction Motivating company employees makes them have an interest in the future of the company, and therefore, will always exploit their full potentials at work. Motivated people are always full of the desire to accomplish given tasks. When employees are working in harmony, and mutual cooperation is observed, then it can be described as good employee engagement. Employees give their best to achieve the goals and ambitions of the organization. The extent at which the employees are motivated is directly reflected on their engagement. Therefore, for a company to increase the engagement of their employees, they need to find means of motivating them accordingly (Macey and Schneider, 2008). This paper examines various motivational theories that can be used in improving employee engagement. The various theories will be discussed as well as how they boost the employee engagement. The paper also discusses the relationship between the theories. There is close relationship between all the motivation the ories in that, in all of them, the employees must meet regardless of their different levels or stages or ranks in the workplace. It is attributed to Abraham Maslow, a Jewish, whose parents had migrated to Russia. According to Maslow, the basic needs of an individual must be met for one to be motivated to achieve their maximum potentials in their endeavors. In this hierarchy of needs, he translated it into a triangular design, where the bottom or base of the triangle represent the most basic need, to the top most, where an individual realizes their self-actualization (Miner, 2015). According to his believes, individuals are always motivated to satisfy their basic and general needs. The needs should be met, one after the other, which means that one cannot satisfy the upper needs before satisfying the lower or bottom needs in the hierarchy (Elliot, Dweck and Yeager, 2017). The needs on a particular level of the pyramid must be completely met, otherwise there will be a possible stagnation or fallback to the initial needs in the pyramid. Psychological needs refers to those needs that one can never do without their availability. Clothing, water and food can be described as basic requirements for every living person. These needs are mandatory, and should be met for one work or perform any activity. Individuals safety or security is the next level in this hierarchy. The environment should not pose any possible threat to individuals, or members of their families. Safe environment provides for consistency and stability necessary smooth flow of work (Latham, 2012). Financial security plays a critical role as well since it provides an assurance of a better future. Financial security is met by ensuring proper salaries, provision of insurance and job promotions. After security is the sense of love, which is the third in this hierarchy. Workers should always feel loved and feel included as part of the team. This refers to the sense of acceptance by other group members or employees. The second last in the hierarchy is esteem, w hich is essential since it comes from an individual. This need gives a person to feel confident of the work he or she is assigned. It also, encompasses the respect from the rest of the colleagues. The final stage is the self-actualization. For an individual to attain self-actualization, all the other needs must have been satisfied (Lunenburg, 2011, p.4). This is the level where the full potential of an individual is achieved. According to Maslow, individuals cannot reach their maximum level of self-actualization. Individuals always try their best to utilize their talents and gifts in various ways, therefore, it is always important to motivate workers by meeting their needs so as achieve subsequent levels and realize their self-actualization levels (Roca and Gagne, 2008). Chip Conley, who started the Joie Vivre chain of hotels applied the hierarchy of needs to its management. This led to an enormous growth of his business, where he saw the need of helping his employees to perform their individual roles. He valued the individual contribution of the employees, and therefore, team members realized that they are being respected and recognized. The employees were motivated, and thus, worked hard. For every business to succeed, they need to organize their employees and offer full support. Employees need to be supported either in their respective work places or outside work place. All their needs, such as flexible working hours, among other basic needs should be served. By meeting their needs, the engagement at work will subsequently increase (Meyer and Gagne, 2008, p.61). Apple Inc. also, applied the Maslows theory in their management. Most of the companys focus is to meet the needs of their individual workers, from the most basic, up to the higher level needs. The company offers good salary to their works, and apart from this, the employees are acknowledged in form of rewards such as percentage of up to 5 of their monthly salaries. This gives the employees a greater motivation as well as a feeling of recognition of the work they are doing for the organization. Other rewards includes giving them material products of the company such as iPhone or mac gadgets. Two-Factor Theory This theory of motivation was developed in 1950s by Fredrick Herzberg, who was a psychologist. From the research he conducted, he concluded that performance of employees is directly connected to their mental health (Lundberg, Gudmundson and Andersson, 2009, p.892). The theory is closely related to Maslows theory of the hierarchy of needs. The data used in the research was obtained from two hundred individuals who were engineers and accountants by profession. They were asked about their feelings (either positive or negative) about their work. The outstanding factors that he concluded from the research were the motivator and hygiene factors. Motivators focuses on work, where satisfaction is realized. It includes several factors such as recognition, growth or progression and work itself. Hygiene factors are those that may lead to the general dissatisfaction as well as lack of motivation is they unavailable. Business policies, salaries, working conditions, mutual relationship between management and the employees, benefits and personal life are some of the examples. The organization have partial control over these factors. Factors such as individuals behavior and personal relationships are out of control of the organization (Albrech, 2011). According to Herzberg, there is a clear distinction between the job satisfaction factors and the job dissatisfaction factors. From his studies, he found that progression needs are the main real motivators of the workers. The workers only feed dissatisfied by the hygiene motivators, bur are motivated the rest of the motivating factors. According to Stone and Ryan, (2009, p.80) if a manager desires to fully motivate their employees, then they should create a conducive working environment where all the employees are entitled to equal recognition, growth in terms of job promotion and stimulation. Employees get motivated if they are allowed to feel responsible for the output of the production process or any product produced from the work done. When managers encourage such kind of recognition, the employees will be motivated to attain their individual success, and also, the organizations targets. Most of the workers are encouraged, especially when the work that they are doing are seen by t he management and other colleagues as meaningful (Zhang and Bartol, 2010, p.122). Apple Inc., for example applied the Two-Factor Theory in their management. The employees are always recognized for their efforts in producing the quality product that the company produces. They praise and recognize their employees by offering then bonuses, as well as job promotions in different departments within the company. These are examples of the motivating factors. The workers finds their environment to be challenging and interesting at the same time. In terms of hygiene factors, the salaries of the Apple Inc. employees are appropriate and satisfies the needs of most of their workers. Apart from the good salary that the employees receive, the management offers to all their workers a health care plans. This ensures that the employees feel secure, work in a conducive environment and up to-date equipment that makes their work efficient (Stone, Deci and Ryan, 2009, p.79). Tesco Company in their practice have adopted this two factor theory in their practice, where the employees dissatisfactions are completely dealt with by the management. The management pays attention to all factors that possibly cause satisfaction as well as dissatisfaction. In this manner, the employees feel motivated due to timely response to their communication. The managers should offer a total job freedom to the employees, provide periodic reports on the employees progress and provide specialization to workers as they prove to be achieving best in their respective production sections. Through application of this Two-Factor motivational theory, the employees get motivated and subsequently, there will be an increased employee engagement. Expectancy Theory of Motivation The theory was first initiated by Victor Vroom back in the year 1964. This theory stresses on the final outcomes unlike the Herzberg and Maslow theories that dwells on the needs. According to this theory, the motivation that an individual employee has is as a result of the individuals desire of the reward ahead after completing the assigned task. Once enlisted, keeping in mind the end goal to hold able representatives, administration can utilize many instruments. One of the instruments available to them is Expectancy Theory hypothesis recommends that a person's apparent perspective of a result will decide the level of inspiration (Chiang and Jang, 2008, p.317). A few workers are roused by cash, while others incline toward acknowledgment for a vocation well done, a corner office, or the parking spot nearest to the building. Every individual is unique. In this manner, nobody measure fits all arrangement will work. There are three key parts to Expectancy Theory, hope, instrumentality, and valence. Anticipation can be depicted as the conviction a man has that the more exertion they put into an undertaking, the good the result will be (Chalofsky and Krishna, 2009, p.195). The theory relies on individual perceptions of individuals. The senior staff may feel that the workers are motivated due to the service and improved working environment, this will never mean that the junior staff will equally recognize it. This theory requires management of the valence, instrumentality and expectancy in equal measures to ensure that the working environment is suitable for general operations by all the employed workers. Hallmark, which is one of the leading company in manufacturing cards applies this Vrooms theory in motivating their company workers. Their employees are motivated to achieve their tasks through instilling of confidence to individual employees. This results in high performance in terms of the outputs of the companys products. The company is concern on their employees abilities, whereby, they improve their expectancies in their abilities to perform better in accomplishing their tasks. The resources, as well as all the necessary training skills are provided by the company hence creating a positive valance among the employees which will be subsequently translated into success and quality performance. The Four motivators The four motivators can also be included as part of the theories that defines motivation. Identified motivation, intrinsic, introjected and extrinsic (external) motivation are the key motivators discussed. These motivators are well known in increasing the employee engagement. In external motivations, it is predominantly dependent on the environmental characteristics such as rewards given after doing certain given or assigned work (Hsu and Wang, 2010, p.410). In most cases, people work hard just because they are being paid. This means that the better the salaries, the more the effort individuals will apply. As opposed to external motivations, in the intrinsic motivations, people are motivated from within, whereby, they do not require external or material rewards to be provided. In the introjected, a person feels self-motivated to achieve the goals of the organization or individual goals, but, in the event that the person fails to explore or exploit their potential, guilt arises. This feeling of guilty separates the intrinsic and introjected motivation. For the case of identified motivation, an individual neglects what he/she understands it should be accomplished. All these for motivators needs to be identified for the various individuals working in each organization. They are crucial in dictating the employee engagement in the work place. Individuals have varying triggers of motivators which needs to be critically analyzed, and that is the work of the management (Lin and Lu, 2011, p.1156). According to Schunk and Zimmerman, (2012) all the theories of motivation are in harmony, and if the management is keen in observing them, then the engagement of the workers is greatly improved. For workers to be motivated, management need to provide a constant feedback to the rest of the employees, which is essential as it enables to evaluate their performance. Workers will be updated on their progress, understand their strengths and weaknesses and subsequently use the feedback in their subsequent tasks. Their achievements needs to be recognized by the through various means such as rewards (Elliot, Dweck and Yeager, 2017). This boosts their morale and makes them to exploit their full potentials in providing future services to the organization. Effective management motivates individuals and triggers quality engagement of the employees. The employees requires privacy and periods of minimum interruptions which makes them more productive. Minimum interruptions increases the employees con centrations in their respective assigned duties. Providing open periods to employees makes them free to communicate with each other and share ideas (Halbesleben and Bowler, 2007). This interaction of employees boosts their engagement. Google, for example, offers multiple types of rewards to their employees in their quest to boost the motivation of their employees. They offer benefits such as reimbursements for expenses in legal affairs, financial support and medical care support to all of their employees. They also listen to their employees, and at the same time offer flexible working schedules. All these offers motivation, and subsequent improved employee engagement in the work place. Comparison of the Theories All the motivation theories discussed here are similar in the fact that, all create motivation for workers or employees. The Herzberg and Maslow theories have a close similarities as the safety and psychological needs that Maslows theory focuses are equally the same as Herzbergs hygiene factors. Both needs are basic to every living individual. For one to attain or obtain safety status outlined in the Maslows hierarchy, money, hygiene factor (according to Herzberg) must be used or earned in terms of salary. Both theories maintains that certain needs are responsible for boosting individuals behavior. Expectancy theory on the other hand, describes the engagement of employees on certain actions or behavior in their quest to come up with a desirable outcome, which is concurrent to the extrinsic motivation. Expectancy theory explains the reason behind particular approach that the employees use in completing assigned tasks, and extrinsic theory is a basic reason for employee performance in the work place. Conclusion Motivation is the key to employee engagement in every working place. The management, in this case, plays critical role in ensuring that there is good engagement of employees for work to flow smoothly. Motivation ensures flexibility of staff members and general workers. Working hours that are favorable to all employees motivates them, and makes them accountable on every task. The theories also, explains that there should be good flow of communication which is key motivator to the company staff and all the employees. When the senior staff uses appropriate language and other means of communication to the junior staff, all workers feel motivated, and in return, the engagement is greatly improved. Listening to employees and adopting their ideas increases productivity. 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