What is Motivation and theories of motivation

1. MOTIVATION
The processes that account for an individual’s intensity, direction,
and persistence of effort toward attaining a goal.
KEY ELEMENTS
1. Intensity: how hard a person tries
2. Direction: toward beneficial goal
3. Persistence: how long a person tries
THEORIES OF MOTIVATION
• EARLY THEORIES
• CONTEMPORARY THEORIES
EARLY THEORIES OF MOTIVATION
• Need Hierarchy theory
• X and Y Theory
• Two Factor theory
• Mc Clelland theory of Need
Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs Theory
Physiological Needs
Every individual needs to take care of the basic requirements required to
sustain. These requirements include food to eat, clothing to wear and shelter
to live in. These necessities are relatively independent of each other but are
finite.
Safety Needs
Everybody wants to stay in a protected environment with minimal danger so
that they can have a peaceful life. Safety needs basically includes protection

2. from physiological danger like accident and having economic security like
bank accounts, health insurance
In an enterprise, it includes job security, salary increment, etc. The
managerial practice to satisfy this involves offering pension scheme,
provident fund, gratuity etc.
Social Needs
We have all heard that man is a social animal, we want to be there with those
people where we are loved and we are accepted as we are; nobody wants to
be judged. This is a common requirement every human desires.
This theory helps managers to think about encouraging their employees by
identifying employee needs. In short, it presents motivation as constantly
changing force, expressing itself to the constant need for fulfilment of new
and higher levels of needs.
Esteem
Esteem means the typical human desire to be accepted and valued by others.
People often involve in a profession or hobby to gain recognition, earn fame
and respect. According to Maslow, the needs of humans have strict guidelines
- the hierarchies rather than being sharply separated, are interrelated.
Self-Actualization
Self-actualization means realizing one’s full potential. Maslow describes this
as a desire to complete everything that one can, to become the most that
one can be.
X and Y Theory
X-Theory
This theory believes that employees are naturally unmotivated and dislike
working, and this encourages an authoritarian style of management.
According to this theory, management must firmly intervene to get things
done. This style of management concludes that workers −
 Disfavor working.

3.  Abstain responsibility and the need to be directed.
 Need to be controlled, forced, and warned to deliver what's needed.
 Demand to be supervised at each and every step, with controls put in
place.
 Require to be attracted to produce results, else they have no ambition
or incentive to work.
McGregor observed that X-type workers are in fact mostly in minority, and
yet in mass organizations, such as large-scale production environment, X
Theory management may be needed and can be unavoidable.
Theory Y
This theory explains a participative style of management, that is, distributive
in nature. It concludes that employees are happy to work, are self-motivated
and creative, and enjoy working with greater responsibility. It estimates that
workers −
 Take responsibility willingly and are encouraged to fulfill the goals they
are given.
 Explore and accept responsibility and do not need much guidance.
 Assume work as a natural part of life and solve work issues
imaginatively.
In Y-type organizations, people at lower levels are engaged in decision
making and have more responsibility.
TWO FACTOR THEORY
This theory, also called the Motivation-Hygiene Theory or the dual-
factor theory, was penned by Frederick Herzberg in 1959. This
American psychologist, who was very interested in
people’s motivation and job satisfaction, came up with the theory. He
conducted his research by asking a group of people about their good and
bad experiences at work. He was surprised that the group answered

4. questions about their good experiences very differently from the ones
about their bad experiences.
Factors for satisfaction (motivators/satisfiers) and factors
for dissatisfaction (hygiene factors/ dissatisfiers).
Performance, recognition, job status, responsibility and opportunities for
growth all fall under motivators/ satisfiers.
Hygiene factors/dissatisfiers are about salary, secondary working
conditions, the relationship with colleagues, physical work place and the
relationship between supervisor and employee.
In his theory, Herzberg claims these factors function on the same plane.
In other words, satisfaction and dissatisfaction aren’t polar opposites.
Taking away an employee’s dissatisfaction – for example by offering a
higher salary – doesn’t necessarily mean the employee will then be
satisfied.
Intrinsic factors are related to job satisfaction, while extrinsic
factors are associated with dissatisfaction.
MC CLLELAND’STHEORY OF NEEDS
Need for Achievement: The drive to excel, to achieve in relation to a
set of standards, to strive to succeed.
Need for Power: The need to make others behave in a way that they
would not have behaved otherwise.
Need for Affiliation: The desire for friendly and close personal
relationships
CONTEMPORARY THEORIES

5. • ERG Theory
 Equity Theory
 Expectancy Theory
 Reinforcement Theory
 Goal Theory
 Self Determination Theory
• ERG THEORY
Existence Needs
Include all material and physiological desires (e.g., food, water, air, clothing, safety,
physical love and affection). Maslow's first two levels.
Relatedness Needs
Encompass social and external esteem; relationships with significant others like family,
friends, co-workers and employers . This also means to be recognized and feel secure as
part of a group or family. Maslow's third and fourth levels.
Growth Needs
Internal esteem and self-actualization; these impel a person to make creative or
productive effects on himself and the environment (e.g., to progress toward one's ideal
self). Maslow's fourth and fifth levels. This includes desires to be creative and
productive, and to complete meaningful tasks.
• EQUITY THEORY
Individuals compare their job inputs and outcomes with
those of others and then respond to eliminate any inequities.
Referent Comparisons:
• Self-inside
• Self-outside
• Other-inside
• Other-outside

6. • REWARDS AND SATISFACTION: If the rewards received are
equitable, then they feel satisfied and motivated.
• EXPECTANCY THEORY
The expectancy theory was proposed by Victor Vroom of Yale
School of Management in 1964. Vroom stresses and focuses on
outcomes, and not on needs unlike Maslow and Herzberg.
The Expectancy theory states that employee’s motivation is an
outcome of how much an individual wants a reward (Valence), the
assessment that the likelihood that the effort will lead to expected
performance (Expectancy) and the belief that the performance will
lead to reward (Instrumentality).
Thus, the expectancy theory concentrates on the following three
relationships:
 Effort-performance relationship: What is the likelihood that the
individual’s effort be recognized in his performance appraisal?
 Performance-reward relationship: It talks about the extent to which
the employee believes that getting a good performance appraisal
leads to organizational rewards.
 Rewards-personal goals relationship: It is all about the
attractiveness or appeal of the potential reward to the individual.
Advantages of the Expectancy Theory
 It is based on self-interest individual who want to achieve
maximum satisfaction and who wants to minimize dissatisfaction.
 This theory stresses upon the expectations and perception; what is
real and actual is immaterial.
 It emphasizes on rewards or pay-offs.

7.  It focuses on psychological extravagance where final objective of
individual is to attain maximum pleasure and least pain.
Limitations of the Expectancy Theory
 The expectancy theory seems to be idealistic because quite a few
individuals perceive high degree correlation between performance
and rewards.
 The application of this theory is limited as reward is not directly
correlated with performance in many organizations. It is related to
other parameters also such as position, effort, responsibility,
education, etc.
• REINFORCEMENT
Reinforcement Theory of motivation aims at achieving the desired level
of motivation among the employees by means of reinforcement,
punishment and extinction. Reinforcement approach, which can be both
positive and negative, is used to reinforce the desired behavior.
The Reinforcement Theory was proposed by B.F. Skinner and his
associates. It is based on the concept of “Law of Effect”, i.e., the
behavior of individual towards positive consequences tends to repeat,
but the behavior of individual towards negative consequences tends not
to repeat.
Following are the methods for controlling the behavior of the employees −
 Positive Reinforcement − Positive reinforcement explains that, when an
employee gives a positive and a required behavior, the response towards them
should be positive. This stimulates the occurrence of a behavior. Reward to an
employee who performs well reinforces his/her desire to perform better because
of positive results of doing so.

8.  Negative Reinforcement − Negative reinforcement takes place when certain
deterrent(s) or obstruction(s) is removed and the employee(s) responds to a
desired behavior after such removal. For instance, an employee who commutes
from a long distances wraps up a few projects faster than desired; but, when he
is told by the manager to take the projects home for a couple of days and
complete them, it stimulates him/her to work as expected. By removing the
negative stimuli, the desired behavior is reinforced.
 Punishment − Punishment refers to imposing negative consequences or
removing positive consequences with a view to preventing employee(s) from
repeating undesirable and uncalled for behaviors. It can, therefore, be both
positive and negative.
 Extinction − Extinction refers to extinguishing a learned behavior by withholding
a positive reinforcement or reward that has encouraged the behavior.
• BANDURA’S SELF EFFICACY
The individual’s belief that he or she is capable of performing a
task.
How can it be increased?
1. Enactive Mastery: gain experience with job.
2. Vicarious modeling: become more confident seeing someone
doing the task.
3. Verbal persuasion: somebody tells you about your skills.
4. Arousal: lead to energized state.
• GOAL THEORY
In 1960’s, Edwin Locke putforward the Goal-setting theory of
motivation. This theory states that goal setting is essentially linked to
task performance.It states that specific and challenging goals along

9. with appropriate feedbackcontribute to higher and better task
performance.
In simple words, goals indicate and give direction to an employee
about what needs to be done and how much efforts are required to
be put in.
Advantages of Goal Setting Theory
 Goal setting theory is a technique used to raise incentives for
employees to complete work quickly and effectively.
 Goal setting leads to better performance by increasing motivation and
efforts,but also through increasing and improving the feedback
quality.
Limitations of Goal Setting Theory
 At times, the organizational goals are in conflict with the managerial
goals. Goal conflicthas a detrimental effecton the performance if it
motivates incompatible action drift.
 Very difficultand complexgoals stimulate riskier behaviour.
 If the employee lacks skills and competenciesto perform actions
essential for goal, then the goal-setting can fail and lead to
undermining of performance.
 There is no evidence to prove that goal-setting improves job
satisfaction.
• SELF DETERMINATION
Self-DeterminationTheory (SDT) represents a broad framework for the study of
human motivation and personality. SDT articulates a meta-theory for framing
motivational studies, a formal theory that defines intrinsic and varied extrinsic
sources of motivation, and a description of the respective roles of intrinsic and
types of extrinsic motivation in cognitive and social development and in individual
differences.

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