Strategies to Motivate and Manage Employees

Introduction:- Motivation is one kind of behaviour of man which related with economics, psychology to qualified morality, initiation, direction, intensity and persistence with desire object, hobbies, goal and ideal activities. At present environment, success of any commercial organization depends on employees using their full talents & motivation. There are available theories and practices, managers often view motivation as something which is mysterious to them. The core thing of motivation is to give people what they really want most from the work. The more the managers provide what they want, the more they can expect what they are looking for like productivity, quality, and services. A positive motivation philosophy and practice should improve productivity, quality, and service. Motivation helps people to achieve goals, to gain a positive perspective, to create the power to change, to build self-esteem and capability, to explore potentiality with creativity, to manage their own developments and their own abilities.

Description: There are few popular method of motivation, for example, An employee stock ownership plan (ESOP) is a way in which employees of a company can own a share of the company they work for profit sharing also one kind of motivation, scanlon plan, it is a type of gain sharing plan that pays a bonus to employees for incremental improvements, merit plan, gain sharing, annual bonus etc, these all are the way to reward people. Dessler discussed (1999), the scanlon plan is actually an early version of what today is known as a gainsharing plan, an incentive plan that engages many or all employees in a common effort to achieve a company’s productivity objectives;any resulting incremental cost-saving gains are shared among employees and company. (588)

According to Adair (2003), “selecting the right man for right job, punishing the bad and rewarding the good, winning the goodwill of those under them, altering allies and helpers, keeping what they have gained, being strenuous and industrious in their own work” (p.16). this strategy should be followed properly to get more from the employee.If we look at the disadvantages of motivation, actually there are no real disadvantages to successfully motivating employees, but there are many obstacles to overcome. Barriers may include unaware or absent managers, inadequate buildings, outdated equipment, and entrenched attitudes, for example: people might think that weare not getting paid extra to work harder etc.

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McGregor’s X and Y theories and Maslow’s hierarchy of need, although these theories date back some years, they are still valid today. the main theme of their theory, it will be helpful for building a climate of honesty, sincerity, and trust.Nickson said, (2007), performance management is about getting better results from the organization, (page, 169) People may want more status, higher pay, better working conditions, and flexible benefits. But it is easy to find out what really motivates employees by asking them in performance appraisals, attitude surveys, and informal conversations what they want most from their jobs. People might want, for example; more interesting work, more efficient bosses, more opportunity to see the end result of their work, greater participation, greater recognition, greater challenges, more opportunities for development, friendly environments, helps from others, respect and flexibility.Clearly one of the most important aspects of enhancing performance is performance appraisal.A recent survey by IRS (2005a) suggests that over 90 per cent of workplaces have some form of performance appraisal, Nickson (2007)

Clegg (2003) said, “It can’t be so depressive that your staff, your peers, your boss, your friends and family can achieve more and yet they don’t. Often all that is latching is the motivation succeed. Motivation is one of those terms that can mean very different things depending on exactly where you sit. According to the dictionary it’s about giving someone a motive or an incentive or rather more darkly, about inducing something. If I am motivating someone else, it’s easy to see that it is positive.

Who can be motivated :-Anyone can be motivated and a trained up manager can be the one to do it. In fact, the potential for motivation starts with a responsible person .The cynical view of motivation is that it is a matter of subtle manipulation; that motivation is just a way of getting other people to do what you want them to do. Probably the hardest individual motivation is dealing with the high performer, some-one who is already doing the job well. So, why bother to motivate them at all? In part because of retention. Just become someone does a job superbly well, it doesn’t mean that they want to stay in it. They are susceptible to outside lures that makes positive motivation to stay a real benefit for the company” (page.4).

Manager’s responsibility/role:

Harzing (2004) said, there is an indication of a lack of commitment to the organization by employeesas as we have seen in the context of Africa (Blunt & Jones, 1992).Corporations in Japan have been successful in harnessing the wider societal cllectivisism to corporate life, in order to foster commitment by employees in a reciprocal relationship with the corporation, (240)

A manager should find someone doing something well and tell the person that the company is appreciating his work.. The manager should make sure the interest he showed is genuine which is without being bore or something just for showing people that he is interested to do this job . If the manager has ideas as to how employees’ work could be improved, he shouldn’t shout them out, but help them to find their way to do more efficiently the same job because we know that, it is not necessary to be able do everything better. A manager should help to the employee to make it clear what levels of support employees can expect. The Manager should have proper trained up to be a mentor of the employee. they should know the position, time, situational demand to exchange any idea with them or any kind of teaching, training if required, sometimes managers need to keep silent, and wait for the proper time to teach or trained up the employee, because if every time managers try to teach them, it might be the cause of unexpected situation to the employee, so sometime managers should keep quiet to make a real situation to say something to the employee. According to Bell (1998), ‘well timed silence hath more eloquence than speech’ (p124)

The reason for Pay for performance, Dowling (2008) discussed, “to increase the pay of those employees with superior performance, to reduce upward and pressure on base salaries, to detect those employees whose performance was unacceptable and take steps to remove them from the organisation” (Page 351). A manager should be able to find out or identify factors that demotivates staff – they may be physical like any kind of equipment, or psychological like boredom, unfairness, barriers to promotion, lack of recognition etc. Among these sorts of problems, some can be dealt with quickly and easily; others require more planning and time to work through. The fact that a manager concerned to find out what is wrong and do something about it is in itself a motivator. Working environment is one that is full of mistakes and penalizes error .Sometimes, it might happen that some mistakes promote as learning opportunities. However staff need to understand the kind and levels of support they can expect. Motivation practice and relationship building often hesitate because staff do not feel they are receiving adequate support. Many people say they are working for money and claim in conversation that their edge benefits are an incentive. But money actually comes low down in the list of motivators, and it doesn’t motivate for long . Edge or fringe benefits can be effective in attracting new employees, but benefits rarely motivate existing employees to use their potential more effectively. Actually company should consider policies, that affect flexible work, reward, promotion, training and development, and participation, Dowling (2008).

Reward’s impact:

As clegg said (2000), Reward people and recognition are important tools for any organization or work places .Reward can vitally enhance employee’s morality with explore potentiality through the organization and increase the realization of belongings of the employee’s. though a great deal of research has been conducted on merit pay, employees who have worked under a merit pay system have been given little opportunity to express what is in their mind about the job and what they think of this reward system. As the definition of merit, it seems relatively straightforward, for example, in the context of retention, promotion; since everyone who is “meritorious” can be rewarded, there is no need to compare different kinds of achievement. The paper reports on a performance-based pay plan implemented in a large company and employees’ reactions to the plan. Employees should have the right t to say their honest opinions on merit pay and indicate whether they believed the concept to be worthwhile. The reply was resoundingly positive, with forceful support for the idea of merit-based compensation. The effective use of money as a motivator, employees attach a high value to pay, employees believe good performance will result in higher pay, employees have enough control over the job and superior performance to more positive than negative result. Dessler (1999) told in his discussion, remuneration, benefits and rewards are ways in which an organisation recognises and remunerates its employees.Financial rewards such as salary, merit increases, benefits and employee bonuses can reinforce desirable or undesirable behaviours.For example, term based reward that have been well designed help to reinforce and encourage team behaviours.Individual recognitiosn by a manager as a, ‘wel done’;can be also help to encourage and reinforce positive behaviours.However, an organisation that encourages term based behaviours but rewards individuals will find it difficult to institute a teaming culture. (420).

Reward system and designing

In corporate culture where non-management employees earn raises through seniority only, there is always a group calling for merit raises. The common tendency to ‘take it easy’ is greatly increased by bringing a number of men together on similar work and at a uniform standard rate of pay. When a naturally energetic man works for a few days beside a lazy one, the logic of the situation is unanswerable. A question can comes in the energetic employee’s mind that is why should I work hard when that lazy one gets the same pay that I do. that sentiment expressed in practically so many employee’s mind. But the fact is that their supervisors and co-workers do not share their self-assessment.Performance-related pay is a method of remuneration that links pay progression to an assessment of individual performance. Pay increases awarded through are Performance-related pay normally consolidated into basic pay although sometimes they involve the payment of non-consolidated cash, while the focus of this factsheet is individual, consolidated Performance-related pay as a means of pay progression, Performance-related pay can be defined more broadly to include many differing systems that link individual and group performance to pay, as for example bonus schemes, Dr.Gilam (2004).

How a manager measure performance and what should be the strategy of rewarding strategy, in this case Dr.Gilam (2004)’s opinion is, “on first examination this model of strategic reward management seems highly rational, but it makes significant assumptions.First consider the main driving force of the rewads strategy.The business strategy and external operating environment

• Organisation’s business strategy
• Required employee behaviours
• Reward strategy
• Organisation’s core reward values
• Reward process Reward structure
• Internal Operating Environment

Fig:-Key elements of reward system design

Paying for Indivisual job performance is, for many organisations, at the heart of a reward strategy, this raises what for many employees is a highly contentious issue.the putting at risk of a employees think about pay in terms of base pay (Schuster and Zingheins, 1992): The fixed amount which traditionally has increased yearly to reflect inflation and often, length of service.Base pay will also change of course, upon promotion to a more responsible job.For some organisations base pay is of declining importance.This raises the question:how can the traditional reward objectives of attracting, retaining and motivating people be achieved while making the pay budget most cost effective.One of the key decisions that needs to be taken into account is whether to pay the variable elements as a lump sum bonus or to consolidate this into salary.The trend in the USA has been for variety pay to be one off cash bonus (Kanter 1987).This is hardly surprising given the cost saving that the organisation enjoys.By not raising base pay, one-off cash bonuses do not affect future base pay increases or other associated payments such as overtime and, of course, pensions.” (Page.436) However, in order for performance to be rewarded, it is first necessary to have an effective means of measuring that performance – most commonly via a performance appraisal or review system.

Using this approach, each employee’s performance is ranked on the scale, like ranging, for example, from unsatisfactory to superior. Some systems allow for management discretion in translating these scores into levels of pay rise. However, it is more usual for the performance element of the pay rise to be determined by the use of formula or a matrix system as an example each grade of employee, level of the employee or zone of work of the related employee to each of the performance categories. This may involve the use of a comparison ratio, this term given to the relationship between each employee’s current salary and the mid point of their grade. Thus for an employee at the mid point of their pay range, the comparison ratio would be hundred percent., Dr.Gilman (2004).

Performance related pay in public sector:

Considerable interest in linking pay to performance in the public sector dating back many years, this has proved harder to translate into practice. If we want to know the placeses where the performance pay does occur, as an answer, we will get the result is, it often takes the form of non-consolidated bonus, or team based incentives, individual merit pay etc. However, there have been recent years of a high-profile initiatives such as the introduction of a performance related pay scheme for employee, which has resulted in some discernible performance improvements. A number of distinct issues arise when introducing performance-related pay into a public sector setting, including the real difficulty of measuring individual effort in certain roles and actual result of the findings, Martin (2000). Moreover, public sector workers such as nurses, teacher, trainer are arguably motivated by a public service which could actually be undermined by some forms of performance-related pay, performance related pay in a public service setting can help employees to work more effectively rather than to work harder without a correct instruction, with the proper guideline which encouraging employees to focus on key objectives what they actually have to do.This is a very important part to perform at the best level .Again we can say that there are various forms of incentive pay and bonuses in the public sector, as an example, public sector workers do respond to financial incentives and, while responses are sometimes small, this reflects the fact that the incentives are also small. Any overall benefits to society in respect of higher levels of public service are harder to assess.So, whenevr the resposibility is small or less harder than other job, the incentives also become less, this is completely different in case of higher responsibility.The higher the responsibility the higher the incentive rate is. If we want to make effective Performance-related pay, employees need to perceive a clear and prompt link between the effort expended and the reward that will be obtained, and it is necessary to feel that the level of reward on offer is based the effort. These are the main issues for employers implementing performance related pay, Martin (2000).

The role of the higher manager is make sure to the effective implementation of Performance-related pay and necessary steps should be taken to involve this group at an early stage in arranging systems, and to ensure consistency and transparency while the management team assessing performance of the employee. Some time it can be happen that all managers make a certain proportion of staff as a group for each performance pay. The management should be careful in those serious, potential for unlawful discrimination for example by gender, ethnicity, discrimination. It is important for appraising managers to have proper training and awareness of these issues and for monitoring of merit pay awards to take place .

Training and Development:

Taining and practice can be helpful to perform very well., in this case Martin (2000) discussed, “Reference information on matters such as employment legislation and training material on almost any business subject readily available through the interest and through the internet and through organisations’s intranets.This means better informed personnel staff.When used for training, such material creater the potential for greater performance from all employees in their job areas.” (page149) If we talk about distribution of pay awards, pay might not be the only motivating factor, even it might be proven that it is not so important for some kind of employees. The problem is occured during times of low inflation when the pay bill increase is usually limited to relatively small percentage. Even where the performance related pay may have a motivational impact for high performers, and it might be unacceptable to the people of the bottom performers, even they might be demotivated from that. After a very careful assesment and careful consideration of pay distribution, the use of performance management techniques in support of performance related pay can help to tackle such kind of issues, it means it can be helpful for those who are bottom performer in the work place Martin (2000). In the case of identification of development needs, a major concern for human resource practitioners is that the when they will go for finalize the award like pay awards on the performance basis, review process may inhibit an open, clear and honest discussion of an employee, then training and development might be a needAs Armstrong (2006), in this case management development activities might need, the management development strategy will be concerned overall with what the organization intends to do about providing for its future management needs in the light of business plans.The startegy will be concerned with the roles of the parties involved and with the approaches the organization proposed to use to develop its managers. (pages 594-95) One solution is to separate the pay review aspect of performance measurement from the broader performance and development review. By arranging separate meetings some weeks or months to asses the performance of a employee and the development requirement can be set up.. But still it is ime-consuming in nature, the processes associated with Performance-related pay can be very time-consuming. In general, it is important to allow sufficient time away from day-to-day duties for managers and employees to be able to engage in the performance related pay process respectively. Armstrong discussed (2006), learning is the process by which a person acquires and develops new knowledge, skills, capabilities and attitudes.A williams (1998) defined it, learning is goal directed, it is based on experience, it impacts behaviour and cognition, and the changes brought about are relatively stable, (559).

Performance-related pay is approaching to succeess, so an reliable and effective arrangements must be in place to define, measure, appraise and manage performance. The focus should be on encouraging high performance by effective performance management and appraisal systems and only this time higher on pay as an incentive to help achieve that goal. To create and maintain a sustainable high-performing workplace, the whole range of financial and non-financial rrewards or incentives should be be carefully planned to ensure that they are supported by Performance-related pay . If the manager can’t afford significant pay differences between high and low performers, or if the manager believes that his staff is underpaid in relation to the cost of living in labor market, then he should postpone the implementation of merit pay for non-management employees, but it is in rare case. Instead of this, give everyone predictable seniority and reward the high performers with positive response, new responsibilities, and promotions will be more acceptable. A manager should put his managerial time and attention into better coaching and counselling of employees with performance problems, and more timely corrective action, including removal of poor performers who demoralize the rest of the workforce, or to find out the strength and weakness in the employee and find a solution to help them to come out from their limitations.

Conclusion:-

If the management is happy to implement merit pay, then they should separate the performance and pay reviews by at least several weeks or months. At the time of the pay review, management should set a pay decision on their performance which is progressing day by day or on progress observed toward the goals set in the performance review. Also the management should make sure that the pay ranges are wide enough to make the employee happy after winning the reward.

In true sense, there is no pay system on earth that will satisfy all the employees. But a successful management team can have a pay system that supports their goal for a high-performing and motivated staff.. Thats why motivation is a basic and important tool for a commercial organization to go ahead with creative structure and innovative changing aspect of globalization.

Reference:

Adair, J (2003) Effective Strategic Leadership, Panbook, 2nd edition (page.16-38)

Armstrong, M (2006), A handbook of Human resource management practice, Kogan page, UK, 10th edition, pages (559, 594-95)

Bell, C (1998) Managers as Mentors, A bard press, Inc.production (page.124-135)

Clegg, B (2000) Instant Motivation, Kogan page ltd.1st edition (page.4-25)

Dessler (et.al), (1999), Human resource management, Prentice Hall, AustraliaPages (420-432, 588-590)

Dr.Gilman, M (2004), The Management of Human Resourses, Pearson Education Limited, (Page.436- 4450)

Dowling, P, Festing, M& Engle, A (2008), International Human Resource management, Cengagae Learning, 5th edition (Page351-368)

Harzing, A &Ruysseveldt, J (2004), International Human resource management, Sage Publications, London, Page (240)

Martin, M & Jackson, T (2000) Personnel Practice, Cromwell Press, 2nd edition (page149-158)

Nickson, D (2007), human resource management, Elsevier Publications, Uk, pages169-172

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