Foundations of employee motivation- summary of chapter 5 of

Organizational Behavior by Mcshane, S. (8th edition)

MARS model of individual behavior and performance

For most of the past century, experts have investigated the direct predictions of individual behavior and
performance.

 One of the earliest formulas was: performance = person X situation

Person: individual characteristics

Situation: external influences on the individuals behavior

Another formula
Performance = ability X motivation
The skill-and-will model

AMO model
Ability-motivation-opportunity
Limited interpretation of the situation

MARS
Four variables

 Motivation
 Ability
 Role perception
 Situational factors

All factors critical influences on an individual’s voluntary behavior and performance

These are direct predictors of behavior on the workplace.

Employee motivation

Motivation: the forces within a person that affect his or her direction, intensity, and persistence of
voluntary behavior.
Direction refers to the path along which people steer their effort. Motivation is goal-directed.
Intensity is the amount of effort allocated with the goal.
Persistence refers to the length of time that the individual continues to exert effort toward an objective.
Employees sustain their effort until they reach their goal or give up beforehand.

Ability

The natural aptitudes and learned capabilities required to successfully complete a task.
Aptitudes are the natural talents.
Learned capabilities are the physical and mental skills and knowledge you have acquired. They tend to
wane over time when not used.
Aptitudes and learned capabilities are the main elements of competencies.

Role perceptions

The degree to which a person understands the job duties assigned to or expected of him or her.
Role clarity exists in three forms:

 When employees understand the specific duties or consequences for which they are accountable.
 When employees understand the priority of their various tasks and performance expectations.
 Understanding the preferred behaviors or procedures for accomplishing tasks.

Situational factors

Individual behavior and performance depend on the situation.

Two main influences:

 The work context constrains of facilitates behavior and performance

 Situations provide cues that guide and motivate people

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Types of individual behavior

Task performance

The individual’s voluntary goal-directed behaviors that contribute to organizational objectives.

Three types:

 Proficient task performance

Prforming the work efficiently and accurately
 Adaptive task performance
How well employees modify their thoughts and behaviors to align with and support a new or
changing environment.
 Proactive task performance
How well employees take the initiative to anticipate and introduce new work patterns that benefit
the organization.

Organizational citizenship

Organizational citizenship behaviors (OCB’s): various forms of cooperation and helpfulness to others that
support the organization’s social and psychological context.

Counter-productive work behaviors

Voluntary behaviors that have the potential to directly or indirectly harm the organization.

Joining and staying with the organization

Maintaining work attendance

Organizations are more effective when employees perform their jobs at scheduled times.

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Personality in organizations
Personality determinants: nature versus nurture
Personality is shaped by both nature and nurture.

Five-factor model of personality

The five broad dimensions representing most personality traits:

 Conscientiousness
Organized, dependable, methodical, and industrious
 Emotional stability
 Openness to experience
 Agreeableness
 Extraversion

Five-factor model and work performance

Personality mainly affects behavior and performance through motivation, specifically by influencing
employees’ direction and intensity of effort.
All of the five-factor model dimensions predict one or more types of employee behavior and performance
to some extent.
But

 The Big Five dimensions cluster several specific traits, each of which can predict employee
performance somewhat different from others in the same cluster
 The relationship between a personality dimension or trait and performance may be nonlinear.

Conscientiousness traits of industriousness and dutifulness are the best predictors of proficient task
performance.
Extraversion is the second best overall personality predictor of proficient task performance.
Agreeableness does not predict proficient or proactive task performance very well, but it does predict an
individual’s performance as a team member as well as in customer service jobs.
Openness to experience is a weak predictor of proficient task performance.
Emotional stability is moderately associated with proficient task performance. One of the best personality
predictors of adaptive performance.

Jungian personality theory and the Myers-Briggs type indicator

The Jungian personality theory is measured through the Myers-Briggs type indicator.

How people prefer to gather information occurs through two competing orientations:

 Sensing
Involves perceiving information directly through the five senses. It relies on an organized structure
to acquire factual and preferably quantitative details.
 Intuition
Insight and subjective experience to see relationships among variables.

Judging information consists of two competing processes

 Thinking
o Feeling
 Perceiving
o Judging

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Values in the workplace
Value system. People arrange their values into a hierarchy of preferences.
Each persons value system is developed and reinforced through socialization.
It is stable and long-lasting.

In reality, values exists only within individuals, they are personal values.
Groups of people might hold the same or similar values, these are shared values.
Organizational values: values shared by people throughout an organization.
Cultural values: values shared across a society.

Values and personality traits are related to each other, but differ in a few ways.

 Values are evaluative and personality traits describe what we naturally tend to do.
 Personality traits have minimal conflicts with each other
 Both are partly determined by heredity, but this has a stronger influence on personality traits.

Types of values

Schwartz’s values circumplex

10 categories:

 Universalism
 Benevolence
 Tradition
 Conformity
 Security
 Power
 Achievement
 Hedonism
 Stimulation
 Self-direction

Each category is a cluster of more specific values.

The 10 categories are clustered in four quadrants

 Openness to change
 Conservation
 Self-enhancement
 Self-transcendence

Values and individual behavior

Personal values influence decisions and behavior in various ways.

 Values directly motivate our actions by shaping the relative attractiveness (valence) of the choices
available.
 Values frame our perceptions of reality
 We are motivated to act consistently with our self-concept and public self-presentation

Several factors weaken the relationship

 The situation
 We don’t actively think about them much of the time
Values congruence

Values tell us what is right or wrong and what we ought to do.

Values congruence: how similar a person’s values hierarchy is to the values hierarchy of another entity.

Organizations also benefit from some incongruence, with diverse perspectives.

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Ethical values and behavior

Three ethical principles

 Utilitarianism
The only moral obligation is to seek the greatest good for the greatest number of people.
 Individual rights
Everyone has the same set of natural rights.
 Distributive justice
The benefits and burdens of similar individuals should be the same, otherwise they should be
proportional.

Moral intensity, moral sensitivity and situational influences

Moral intensity

The degree to which an issue demands he application of ethical principles.

Moral sensitivity

A person’s ability to recognize the presence of an ethical issue and determine its relative importance.
Includes cognitive and emotional level awareness that something is or could be morally wrong.

Several factors are associated with a person’s moral sensitivity:

 Expertise or knowledge of prescriptive norms and rules

 Previous experience with specific moral dilemmas
 Employees who are better at empathizing are more sensitive to the needs and situation of others,
which makes them more aware of ethical dilemmas involving others.
 How people define and view themselves
 Mindfulness, a person’s receptive and impartial attention to and awareness of the present situation
as well as to one’s own thoughts and emotions in that moment.

Situational factors

Ethical conduct is influenced by the situation in which the conduct occurs.

Supporting ethical behavior

Most large and medium-sized organizations maintain or improve ethical conduct through systematic
practices.

 A code of ethical conduct

 Train and regularly evaluate employees about their knowledge of proper ethical conduct.
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Values across cultures

Individualism and collectivism

Individualism: a cross-cultural value describing the degree to which people in a culture emphasize
independence and personal uniqueness.

Collectivism: a cross-cultural value describing the degree to which people in a culture empathize duty to
groups to which they belong ad to group harmony.

Those two are not opposites, the two are uncorrelated.

Power distance

A cross-cultural value describing the degree to which people in a culture accept unequal distribution of
power in society.
Those with high power distance value unequal power.

Uncertainty avoidance

The degree to which people tolerate ambiguity (low uncertainty avoidance) or feel threatened by ambiguity
and uncertainty.
High uncertain avoidance value structured situations in which rules of conduct and decisions making are
clearly documented.

Achievement-nurturing orientation

Reflects a competitive versus cooperative view of relations with other people.

Caveats about cross-cultural knowledge

 Too many studies have relied on small, convenient samples

 Cross-cultural studies often assume that each country has one culture.
 Cross-cultural research and writing continues to rely on a major study conducted among four
decades ago.

Organizational Behavior
Chapter 5
Foundations of employee motivation

Motivation: the forces within a person that affect his or her direction, intensity and persistence of voluntary
behavior.

 Employee engagement
 Employee drives and needs
 Expectancy theory of behavior
 Organizational behavior modification and social cognitive theory
 Goal setting and feedback
 Organizational justice
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Employee engagement
Employee engagement: individual emotional and cognitive motivation, particularly a focused, intense,
persistent, and purposive effort toward work-related goals.
An emotional involvement in, commitment to, and satisfaction with the work.
Also high level of absorption in the work and self-efficacy.

Most employees aren’t very engaged.

Actively disengaged employees tend to be disruptive at work, not just disconnected from work.

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Employee drives and needs

Drives: hardwired characteristics of the brain that correct deficiencies or maintain an internal equilibrium
by producing emotions to energize individuals. (primary needs).
Innate and universal.
The starting point of motivation because they generate emotions.

Needs: goal-directed forces that people experience.

Motivational forces of emotions channeled toward particular goals to correct deficiencies or imbalances.
The emotions we eventually become conscious aware of.

Drives and emotions → needs → decisions and behavior

Individual differences in needs

Everyone has the same drives.

People develop different intensities of needs in a particular situation.

Self-concepts, social norms and past experience amplify or suppress emotions, thereby resulting in
stronger or weaker needs.

 Need can be ‘learned’ to some extent.

 Regulate a person’s motivated decisions and behavior.

Maslow’s needs hierarchy theory

A motivation theory of needs arranged in a hierarchy, whereby people are motivated to fulfill a higher
need as a lower one becomes gratified.
Five categories, which Maslow called primary needs.

 Self-actualization
 Esteem
 Belongingness
 Safety
 Physiological

And

 The desire to know

  The desire for aesthetic beauty

Two drives that did not fit within the hierarchy

Organizational Behavior
Chapter 14
Organizational culture

Organizational culture: the values and assumptions shared within an organization.

 Elements of organizational culture

 Deciphering organizational culture through artifacts
 Is organizational culture important?
 Merging organizational cultures
 Changing and strengthening organizational culture
 Organizational socialization

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Elements of organizational culture

Shared values and assumptions relate to each other and are associated with artifacts.

Values: stable, evaluative beliefs that guide our preferences for outcomes or courses of action in a variety
of situations. Conscious perceptions about what is good or bad, right or wrong.
Shared values: values that people within the organization or wok unit have in common and place neat the
top of their hierarchy of values.

Shared assumptions: nonconscious, taken-for-granted perceptions or ideal prototypes of behavior that are
considered the correct way to think and act toward problems and opportunities.

Espoused versus enacted values

Espoused values: the values that corporate leaders hope will eventually become the organization’s culture,
or at least the values they want others to believe guide the organization’s decisions and actions.
Usually socially desirable.

Enacted values: when they actually guide and influence decisions and behavior. Values put into practice.

Content of organizational culture

Organizations differ in the relative ordering of shared values. (cultural content).

Problems

 People oversimplify the diversity of cultural values in organizations

 Most measures ignore the shared assumptions aspect of an organizational culture
 Many measures of organizational culture incorrectly assume that organizations have a fairly clear,
unified culture that is easily decipherable.
In reality, an organizational culture is typically blurry and fragmented.

Organizational subcultures

When discussing organizational culture, we are really referring to the dominant culture.
Dominant culture: the values and assumptions shared most consistently and widely by the organization’s
members.

Organizations are composed of subcultures, located throughout their various divisions, geographic regions,
and occupational groups.
Some subcultures enhance the dominant culture by espousing parallel assumptions and values.
Others differ from, but do not conflict the dominant culture.
Countercultures embrace values or assumptions that directly oppose

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Personal Values are “broad desirable goals that motivate people’s actions
and serve as guiding principles in their lives". [1] Everyone has values, but
each person has a different value set. These differences are affected by an
individual's culture, personal upbringing, life experiences, and a range of
other influences. [2]

Personal values are desirable to an individual and represent what is

important to someone. The same value in different people can elicit
different behaviours, eg if someone values success one person may work
very hard to gain success in their career whereas someone else may take
advantage of others to climb the career ladder.

A person can have many values with an individual assigning more

importance to some values over others. It has been shown that the values
that are most important to you often guide your decision making in all
aspects of your life such as career, religion, social circles, self-identity etc [1].

A personal value is a broad concept and one particular value can be applied
to various situations [1]. For example, if an important value to you is loyalty
this could be applied to your family, friends or work environment.

According to article by Jason Gordon values refer to what is important to an

individual. Values are stable feelings of importance that arise pursuant to
ones influences, such as life experiences, interactions, and relationships.
They are shaped early in life and become increasingly stable or permanent
throughout life. 

Values are the guiding forces behind decision-making, perception, and

behavior. Managers seek to understand their employees values. 
This understanding allows the manager to structure the work
responsibilities and goals to meet the individual employees values

The term "difficult employee" is typically used to refer to a worker who

fails to conduct him- or herself in a responsible and/or professional manner

in the workplace. Effectively dealing with such employees can be among

the greatest challenges that face small business owners and managers. Few

relish the prospect of disciplining or criticizing others in or outside the

work environment. But when difficult employees become an issue, their

failings must be addressed quickly and decisively lest they erode morale

and efficiency. A natural management response is delay, temporizing, and

wishful thought. When such traits are indulged, they just make things

worse.

THE WELL-BEHAVING WORKPLACE

Problematic employee behavior is doubly difficult because it may have

multiple causes not easily discerned. The causes may be work or home

related, behavior- or health-related, may be triggered by other employees

or outsiders, by changes of work, others' promotion, rising stress levels,

etc. For these very reasons, the small business owner or leading manager

will concern him- or herself initially, and always, with ensuring that

internal causes are minimized. There will be fewer difficult employees in

well-behaving work places than otherwise. As shown elsewhere in this

volume (see Corporate Ethics) companies with high ethics experience

much less unethical behavior. In well run operations, broad policy and

structural approaches serve as preventive measures; careful and above all

attentive management practices serve diagnostic purposes; and a clear,

sequenced, escalating, well-documented "coping" process can rapidly

bring closure.

Policy and Work Environment

A reasonably formal, reasonable orderly, well-organized, straight-forward,

crisp but friendly work environment helps instill the right expectation in

the workforce. Such an environment is almost always deliberate created

and maintained by management by such means as setting working hours,

initiating employees by having them read and sign brief but complete

employment policies, and passing on the general "rules of the road." The

more explicit, clear, and rational these are—and the more they are

observed to be enforced—the more they contribute to the right work

ambiance.

Maintenance of an efficient and visibly orderly work environment is only

indirectly related to handling difficult employees, but once problems

appear, this background is vital to the resolution of the problem. It is of

central importance that the workplace have rules, that these be public,

uniformly enforced, and equally applicable to all ranks. A somewhat

disorderly work environment with poorly established routines, floating

coffee breaks, many privileges, many exceptions to rules, temperamental

bosses or tolerated high-jinks (perhaps because the cut-up is a very good

salesman) and arbitrary rather than scheduled events make it much more

difficult, later, suddenly to "wake up" to the need for discipline. Another

way experts put this is that difficult employees are often a product of

shoddily-run workplaces.

Management Style
Assuming that the policies are good and the work environment is

reasonably disciplined, managerial performance in conformity with policy

will be consistent, alert, but also flexibly sensitive. In effect this means

that that managers in charge of individuals will pay attention to those they

supervise, maintain a proper but not a frosty or belligerent distance, apply

company policies rather than personal whim, assiduously avoid

inappropriate relations (like flirtation or special friendships), and promptly

and willingly provide both positive and negative feedback with an

objective air. Good management style will always involve clear and

prompt communications when changes threaten to disrupt—even when the

changes are positive. Good management will represent the next level up in

a straightforward way, neither deifying nor bad-mouthing it. Managers

will be loyal to their employees and promptly go to bat for them. They will
avoid turf-oriented behavior and support collective goals—and will

promote such attitudes in word and deed.

Methods of Discipline
The emergence of a difficult employee will take place quite early in a

well-management operation. Most of the time the "difficulty" will never

even surface because it will have been dealt with effectively in it nascent

stages. If it persist, the company will have in place a well-planned method

of dealing with it in stages. The process will be orderly but escalating,

beginning with information exchange and goal setting, followed by

reviews, by increasing sanctions such as warnings, opportunities for

appeal, notices, and finally discharge. In this entire process, management

will behave rationally rather than emotionally. It will briefly but fully

document the facts in writing because, in today's environment, that is

simply sensible. Such methods will be followed even in operations that

have at-will hiring policies—because the difficult employee may sue

anyway. Top management will take an appropriate role in supervising such

processes to ensure that policies are followed. Rarely if ever will a

problem employee, managed in a rational, methodical, and orderly manner

succeed in prevailing against the employer.

The pain, generally, of facing up to problems early is almost always

negligible compared to the "uproar" that results from neglect and

avoidance. Here the famous "Pay me now or pay me later" warning applies

in full. The general rule—assuming, again, that good policies are in place

and properly implemented—is to insist on rational and sensible behavior,

full disclosure of problems on both sides, and clearly spelled out

consequences which are actually applied.

SPECIFIC METHODS
Management experts cite several steps that entrepreneurs and managers

should take when dealing with a difficult employee.

 Importance of the Written Word. Companies should prepare and

mainting written policies/guidelines. These should include definitions

of poor performance and gross misconduct and detail performance

and termination review procedures.

 Taking Stock and Cutting Slack. In most business settings, workers

spend long hours in close proximity. Inevitably, each employees will

exhibit personality traits some of which may annoy coworkers,

managers, or the owner of the business. But a mildly overbearing,

cocky, or whiny demeanor on the part of an employee is not in itself

cause for intervention. An owner who attempts to stamp out every

personality manifestation that he/she finds to be mildly unpleasant

will quickly alienate his/her workforce and hamper the company's

 ability to focus its energy on business issues. But when employee

behavior begins to have a negative impact on coworkers or the health

of the business itself, the business owner must intercede quickly.

 Taking Control. If a problem employee emerges, the business owner

or supervisor should schedule a meeting to discuss the behavior. This

meeting time should be scheduled so that both the supervisor and the

employee can focus on the issues at hand and speak without being

disturbed. It is unwise to hold such a meeting when emotions are

running high; but issues must be addressed in a timely manner.

Performance problems, whether they take the form of

insubordination, tardiness, poor work performance, or problematic

behavior with other employees, may intensify or multiply if not

addressed. Employees who do not meet standards—whether

knowingly or unknowingly—will continue to do so if their

unacceptable behavior is not challenged.

 Hearing the Other Side. Small business owners often assume that

workers possess the same skills and knowledge that they do. But

some meetings with "difficult" employees reveal that their inadequate

work performance is rooted in a lack of skills. In such cases,

instruction and education, rather than disciplinary measures, are the

 keys to making the employee a valuable part of the workforce. In

other instances, the employee may be grappling with personal issues

that have had a deleterious impact on his/her performance. The owner

can, at his or her discretion, implement measures that may enable to

the employee to weather his/her difficulties and became a valuable

member of the workforce.

 Uniform Rules. Use the same criteria of performance and behavior

evaluation with all employees.

 The Facts. When confronting a difficult employee, business owners

and supervisors are encouraged to focus on two or three specific

instances when the worker exhibited problematic behavior.

Whenever possible, use measurable and observable facts to explain

the problem from your perspective. Establish the link between the

employee's unacceptable behavior and/or performance and the overall

health and direction of the company.

 Avoiding Adversarial Confrontations. By his or her own natural role,

the owner is employees ally and should try to convince the employee

that the meeting is in essence an effort to solve a problem both parties

share. If bad will is involved, that can be dealt with later.

 Consequences and Review. Small business owners and managers

need to make it clear to problem employees that consequences will

follow continued inappropriate or substandard behavior. Choose

these consequences with care, however. "Tell an employee who

doesn't give a hoot about climbing the corporate ladder that he or she

may lose out on a possible promotion, and you'll get no results,"

noted Entrepreneur's Robert McGarvey. "For a consequence to

matter and actually make a difference, it needs to matter to that

employee." One way in which owners and supervisors can serve

notice to a difficult employee that they are serious about imposing

discipline and correcting behavior is to schedule a follow-up

meeting during the initial meeting. Scheduling a second meeting puts

the employee on notice that his behavior and/or performance is

regarded as a serious matter that will be monitored on a regular basis.

 Acknowledging Improvements. Finally, business owners and

managers need to recognize instances in which a problem employee

makes a genuine effort to correct his/her workplace shortcomings.

Without such acknowledgements, an employee is more likely to slide

back into negative patterns of performance and/or interaction with

coworkers.
 Terminating Problem Employees. Some difficult employees will

resist all management efforts to convince them to change their

behavior or attitudes. In these cases, termination of employment may

be necessary. This is not a step to be taken lightly, especially if the

problem employee provides important services to the company (as in

the case of the verbally abusive employee who nonetheless is a good

computer programmer). But in some cases, it is necessary in order to

maintain—or restore—company morale and efficiency in other areas.

If behavior-related termination is warranted, small businesses should

make sure that they document the employee's shortcomings in

specific, quantifiable terms. Personnel files should include accounts

of specific incidents of poor performance; summaries of meetings

held with the employee and other company-initiated efforts to correct

behavior; and any formal warnings of probation or dismissal.