Motivated…To Be Or Not To Be?

Do we define “work” as a cause that an individual should be intrinsically motivated to engage himself in, or it is a mundane transaction accomplished for monetary reward?

Work motivation is an issue confronting academicians, researchers and practicing managers all over the world for a long time. In current times, a shift has definitely taken place where a large section of managers believe that all the motivation that you need to survive can be translated into monetary motives. They argue that money typically can be used to obtain outcomes relevant to the satisfaction of most of needs listed by Abraham Maslow (that has stood like a rock for last 62 years, ever since he propounded them in 1943).

It can buy food, clothing, housing, security, social relations and esteem, and to some extent, it can satisfy self-actualization needs as well. They further argue that though money alone will not make a person self-actualized, but it will enable individuals to do what they like with their spare time and to some extent to become what they would like to be.

Look at the recent phenomenon where a large number of younger professionals seem to have a desire to leave the corporate rat race early so as to lead a life which is more balanced and integrated while pursuing their own interest. The catch here is making enough money so that they can retire early. Thus, they argue that it is possible to explain Maslow’s hierarchy of needs in this monetary framework.

Do you agree with this view? You may not, but the logic seems pragmatic.

Is there a need, therefore, to re-look at it in today’s context? Let’s try to revisit the issue of motivation from the perspective of the validity of some of the fundamental theories of motivation which have been guiding corporations across the world for the last sixty years.

To begin with, let’s be a devil’s advocate for a minute. One of the major issues raised by many practicing managers is the practical significance of money, which has emerged as a prime source for motivation in today’s workplace. Although the motivational potential of rewards has been talked about for quite some time, it is only in the late 1980s that the importance of rewards—money in particular—has been recognized. Edward Lawler, Distinguished Professor of Business at the University of Southern California, Marshall School of Business, who perhaps has done a considerable amount of research in this area, also holds a somewhat similar view. According to him:

“A great deal of evidence existed to suggest that pay was important to employees and that it could motivate them, yet it has systematically ignored on distorted”.

The situation gets a little complicated in today’s context because the way in which pay reflects performance is perhaps more important than the way it used to get defined maybe a decade back. The variable-pay system is in vogue at all forms of organizations in India today. This seems to indicate that it has been recognized that an adequate system of performance-based pay does have an impact on the motivation level of employees, especially when a lot of experimentation is taking place in various organizations with newer and innovative pay-plan designs.

To make matters more complicated, let me bring in Thomas Patten, a not-so-well- known researcher from the USA. Patten argued that in today’s world, the basic needs of human beings can be captured by two negative drives. These are greed and fear. Fear-greed motivation theory, as postulated by Patten, has economic self-interest as its core.

In support of his argument, Patten cited exchange theory in sociology, public choice theory of political science and the emerging sociobiology, all being focused on self-interest. He argued that in current times, where loss of jobs due to downsizing, M&A, rising labour costs and globalization, are realities, well-paid jobs are increasingly being perceived as the only means for providing a secured and gratifying existence.

A secure existence reduces fear. The more fear is reduced, the greater one’s feeling of security. Greed, on the other hand, is universal and drives people crazy. What else other than this drive can explain the crash of the US financial markets in 2008 or continuance of stress-induced premature deaths of young professionals of Wall Street?

The proposition from Patten is indeed thought provoking, because it triggers off the perennial debate over the intrinsic nature of human beings. What is an average human being driven by: greed or self-actualization?

In organizational behaviour, work motivation is considered a basic psychological process which explains why employees behave as they do in the workplace. Both the content and process theories of motivation, however, relate motivation with behaviour.

I think the fundamental difference one needs to understand is in the meaning that we add to “work.” For millennials today, the meaning of work assumes far greater importance compared to merely monetary reward and employee benefits. It has been recognized now that the quality of the output and its continual sustenance in any organization would be far better if employees are predominantly motivated by their interest, enjoyment, love for the task they are performing and the challenge that their work provides. In the case of millenials, their work outputs are more profound than if they are solely achieved through their satisfaction of physiological, safety, belongingness or recognition needs.

However, we see the opposite of the same phenomenon as well. In today’s world, more numbers of organizations are searching for potent variable pay framework to motivate their employees by linking compensation to performance and productivity. The assumption here is that people will perform better if they are provided with higher incentives.

Research studies, conducted in various work settings, however, many a times support an opposing view. According to Alfie Kohn, a researcher who spends a great deal of time investigating the impact of intrinsic motivation:

“As for productivity, at least two dozen studies over the last three decades have conclusively shown that people who expect to receive a reward for completing a task or for doing that task successfully simply do not perform as well as those who expect no reward at all”.

Why these contradicting views? The answer probably lies in how we define “work”. Do we define “work” as something perceived as a noble cause that an individual should be intrinsically motivated to engage himself in, or it is a mundane transactional one that is accomplished in lieu of monetary reward through extrinsic motivation?

Finding a simplistic answer is indeed difficult. Especially, after digging into the conflicting outcomes discovered by various researchers.

One possible explanation could be that with the increasing proliferation of consumer culture, and higher deemed comfort levels, most people feel that their lower needs are inadequately satisfied. This perhaps leads to the temporary disappearance of their higher needs, and consequently their desire to reach out towards them.

I would like to end this article by quoting the late V.S. Mahesh, the HR guru turned academic who spent his whole life in search of bringing excellence in corporate India. Once he commented:

“From the time, man’s ability and skills at work were used as a commodity to be bought through extrinsic rewards, and management practices were built around such a trade, intrinsic motivation for work began to be eroded. It is not at all surprising then, that management of industrial enterprises is grappling with the problem of quality all the time”.

Till we find an answer to this complex question, perhaps our mission to become world class as a country will remain a distant dream.