Employee Motivation in a Globalised Business Environment Essay

This essay delves into the critical topic of employee motivation within the dynamic landscape of a globalized business environment. It begins by establishing the significance of employee motivation as a key driver of performance, commitment, and innovation. The essay then examines various motivation strategies, contrasting traditional approaches like Theory X, which emphasize control and supervision, with modern strategies aligned with Theory Y, which prioritize employee empowerment, engagement, and a supportive work environment. It analyzes the ineffectiveness of traditional methods in today's global context, highlighting the need for strategies that foster a positive and inclusive work culture. The essay further explores the positioning of motivation strategies in a globalized business environment, emphasizing the importance of leadership, employee empowerment, and strategies that align with the expectations of a skilled and competitive workforce. The essay references key theories and research to support its arguments, providing a comprehensive overview of employee motivation in the global business arena.

EMPLOYEE MOTIVATION IN GLOBALISED BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT
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Table of Contents
Literature Review............................................................................................................................1
Employee Motivation..................................................................................................................1
Motivation Strategies that Lead to high Performance in Globalised Business Environment......1
Ineffectiveness of Traditional Motivation Strategies..................................................................3
Positioning of the Motivation Strategies in Globalised Business Environment..........................3
References........................................................................................................................................5

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Literature Review
Employee Motivation
Employee motivation is considered as one of the most important strategy that a business can
adopt to encourage its employees to perform their best. It is the level of energy, commitment and
creativity that a company plans for its employees so that they can add value to their work.
Finding ways to encourage the employees is one of the most important activity and concern of
the management. Ramlall (2004) defined employee motivation as a powerful tool that has an
impact on behaviour and triggers a tendency among the employees to continue. This means that
motivation act as an internal drive for the employees to satisfy their needs that they expect from
the organization and in turn help in achieving organizational goals. It is a procedure to aim the
psychological need of the employees and stimulate their performance. Further, the impact of
employee motivation help the employees to align their goals with that of the organization and
direct it towards offering best effort in that direction.
Motivation Strategies that Lead to high Performance in Globalised
Business Environment
There has been various motivation strategies used in the employees that has evolved from time to
time. Each of the strategies has their own role to play in motivating the employees in a global
sphere. The strategies used in traditional organization is very different from the one used in
today’s organizational space. Dobre (2013) stated that McGregor discussed about Theory X
which was used in traditional organization and is based on various assumptions about human
nature. Most of the traditional organization believed in a centralized decision making system.
The traditional organization believed that employees want to be directed and do not want to have

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safety and responsibility above all. Thus, traditional strategies of motivating the employees that
was adopted by traditional organization is that employees needs to be controlled and always
desire supervision. They believe that employees can only be motivated with the help of financial
means and by threat and punishment. This is because according to the traditional theory it is
believed that supervision and control is best way to manage irresponsible people and employees
should fear from their management. With time the other modern strategies of motivating
employees has been proposed by McGregor. These strategies fall under Theory Y that focus on a
much lenient and pleasant way of working (Sandhya and Kumar 2011). According to the theory
the strategies that can be used by the organization on a global environment is to create a pleasant
and supportive environment for the employees. The organization aim at satisfaction of the
employees by addressing their superior needs. The modern strategies of employee motivation
include a supervision free environment, employee safety policy, reward system, low control,
employee engagement and others. All this helps in creating a positive impact on the employees
and make them feel safe in the organization. This theory of employee motivation beliefs that
employees are not lazy and unreliable (Ramlall 2004). They have their own goals in life and can
work to attain it if guided in a creative manner.
In addition to X and Y Theory there is other theory as well such as Pattern A and B developed by
Chris Argyris. It also shows the type of motivational strategies that can be used by the
organization in a global sphere to motivate the employees over the time. Pattern A shows the
behavioural pattern of the employees attached to Theory X. pattern A shows that the employees
behaviour aligns with that of theory X. this means that such employees are not open, reject
taking risks and fail to perform in team. On the other hand pattern B employee’s shows
behaviour that align with theory Y and shows that they are open, enjoy taking experimentation

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and encourage others (Dobre 2013). Thus the strategy to motivate the employees should be taken
according to the behaviour of the employees.
Ineffectiveness of Traditional Motivation Strategies
Traditional motivational strategies that is shown by Theory X proves to be highly
ineffective in motivating the employees in today’s global environment. This is because the
traditional strategies focus at control and lack of employee empowerment. Thus through this
traditional strategies employees feel demotivated to work. They find it difficult to work in such
as pressurized environment and do not feel valued for the efforts that they give. Moreover, the
employees also do not get any scope of growth or future opportunity in organization using
traditional theories and find it difficult to continue in such an environment (Ramlall 2004). This
shows that traditional strategies of motivation in fully ineffective in motivating and encouraging
the employees and creating desired amount of positive result in global environment.
Positioning of the Motivation Strategies in Globalised Business
Environment
The positioning of motivation strategies in a globalized business environment should be a
positive one. There should be strategies that align with the behaviour of today’s employees and
help create positive outcome. Today’s employees working in a competitive global environment
are highly competitive and skilled to offer their best effort. They have adequate amount of
experience and has the ability to control themselves. Thus, motivation strategies in a globalized
environment should be the one with proper leadership that can create positive attitude among the
employees. Leaders play an effective role in motivation and should use an inclusive style to
make employees feel valued and trusted (Sandhya and Kumar 2011). Further, motivational
strategies should be one that empower the position of the employees in the organization by

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giving them freedom to make decisions and grow in such as globalised environment. Such
empowerment will help encourage growth and better work productivity. Thus, the employee
motivation strategies in the organization in such a globalised environment should position itself
in Theory Y because the modern employees demand freedom and reward for the efforts they put
in the business (Cho and Perry 2012). Too much control is not supported by employees in such a
modern environment.

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References
Cho, Y.J. and Perry, J.L., 2012. Intrinsic motivation and employee attitudes: Role of managerial
trustworthiness, goal directedness, and extrinsic reward expectancy. Review of Public Personnel
Administration, 32(4), pp.382-406.
Dobre, O.I., 2013. Employee motivation and organizational performance. Review of applied
socio-economic research, 5(1).
Ramlall, S., 2004. A review of employee motivation theories and their implications for employee
retention within organizations. Journal of American Academy of Business, 5(1/2), pp.52-63.
Sandhya, K. and Kumar, D.P., 2011. Employee retention by motivation. Indian Journal of
science and technology, 4(12), pp.1778-1782.