Linkage between Alderfer’s Need Theory and Job Enrichment

This essay explores the linkage between Alderfer’s Need Theory and Job Enrichment. It discusses how job enrichment can motivate employees and improve efficiency in organizations. The essay provides examples from companies like Amazon and Google, and also highlights the negative impact of not providing job enrichment, using Apple Inc as an example.

Running head: MANAGEMENT
Management
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author note

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Introduction
The essay throws a light on the linkage between the Alderfer’s need theory and Job
Enrichment in the various organizations. Job enrichment is defined as the common kind of
technique of motivating the different employees working in the organization as this will
provide greater level of satisfaction in the tasks which are being performed by them. This is
mainly described as the process through which the management of the organization tries to
motivate the self-driven employees by assigning them with additional responsibility which is
normally reserved for the different higher officials in the organization.
Alderfer’s Need Theory
The ERG theory condenses the five needs of the Maslow’s Hierarchy Theory into
major three categories which are as follows:
Existence Needs is inclusive of the physiological desires along with materials which
is inclusive of food, water, shelter and affection which is the first two levels of Maslow (Berg
& Smith, 2017).
Relatedness Needs is inclusive of external and social esteem which is inclusive of the
relationships with significant others which is inclusive of family, co-workers along with
family members and this is inclusive in the third and fourth level of Maslow’s hierarchy
theory (Michael, Kwao & Gyamfi, 2015).
Growth Needs is inclusive of self-actualization and internal esteem which helps in
making the individuals more creative and productive and this is inclusive in fourth and fifth
level of the Maslow’s hierarchy theory (Botha & Venter, 2016).
Analysis of Job Enrichment in Providing Motivation

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Job Enrichment is a common tool which is present in the different organizations in
providing the different employees with higher level of satisfaction in the different tasks
which are being performed by them. Moreover, this means that providing the employees with
extra and additional responsibilities which was previously reserved for the manager and high-
ranking position. There are different organizations such as Amazon wherein the higher
officials try to provide the employees with greater freedom to perform the different tasks with
their own planning and controlling the performance (Fried et al., 2014).
Job Enrichment is the main and fundamental part of motivating, attracting and
retaining the different talented individuals particularly in the different kinds of areas of work
wherein work is boring or repetitive in nature. The employees feel motivated in Amazon
Company as Job enrichment helps in offering benefits to employees in terms of increased rate
of motivation and job involvement along with satisfaction (Berg & Smith, 2017). More
autonomy is being provided to the different employees working in the organization as this
helps in adding status to one’s job.
Linkage of Alderfer’s Need Theory with Job Enrichment
There is a proper and accurate linkage between the job enrichment aspect along with
the Alderfer’s need theory. It can be seen that in different organizations, this is essential in
nature to meet the different needs of the employees which will improve the overall efficiency
of the employees in performing the different kinds of tasks. () has commented that theories of
Maslow and Alderfer have tried to dominate the field of motivational theories for a few
decades (Sanda, Asikhia & Magaji, 2014).
As per the Alderfer’s need theory, this can be analyzed and identified that the
existence, relatedness and growth needs are required to be taken care in an appropriate
manner as the workers get achievement along with recognition. From the job enrichment

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aspect, this can be analyzed and identified that personal development is essential which is
required to be analyzed by the employees working in the organization to gain competitive
advantage. For instance- There are different criticisms which had been raised against Apple
Inc as the higher officials did not provide the employees with greater job satisfaction and the
company used to include the different kinds of unethical kind of practices (Lazaroiu, 2015).
There were no such inclusion of the health and safety of the employees working in the
organization and this reduced the morale of the employees. Furthermore, this was noticed that
due to the low morale of the employees, this increased turnover of the employees and
increased absenteeism (Omolo, 2015).
From the above instance, this can be analyzed and identified that the job enrichment
plays a vital role in the Alderfer’s need theory as the theory represents in providing
motivation and satisfaction to the different employees which will be helpful in managing the
different kinds of tasks in an efficient manner. The job enrichment aspects help in satisfying
the different desires of the different employees working in the organization which will help
them in motivating their hard work and efforts (Srivastava & Kanpur, 2014).
There is inclusion of flexibility in the different tasks which are being performed by
the employees in the different companies (Oldham & Baer, 2015). Due to the inclusion of
flexible working conditions in the organizations, job enrichment motivates the different
workers to provide the best performance and improve the overall morale of the employees in
an effective manner. Alderfer’s need theory includes the growth needs of the different
employees in which the enriched job provides different kinds of opportunities along with
recognition and growth to the employees in performing the different tasks (Whittington et al.,
2017).

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For instance- This can be seen that in Amazon and Google, there is huge
motivational aspects which are being adopted by the higher officials in managing the
different requirements of the employees. This has been noticed that the companies tried to
improve the health and social well being of the different individuals and this helped the
company in becoming satisfied with the different tasks which are being performed by me.
Lastly, due to the job enrichment and job enlargement concepts, the companies are being able
to motivate the employees and reduced the turnover of employees in the organization.
However, on the other hand, Apple Inc is unethical in their approaches as the company do not
provide any kind of motivation to the different employees which will be effective. This has
increased the overall ineffectiveness of the performance of the different employees working
in the organization and this was a huge disadvantage for the company as this led to lowering
of the profit and revenue of the organization.
Conclusion
Therefore, from the above this can be concluded that there is huge linkage between
the Alderfer’s need theory and job enrichment in different kinds of organizations. From the
entire analysis, there were different instances which were provided in order to understand the
importance of job enrichment to motivate and retaining the different talented employees in
the organizations in an efficient manner. The jobs are being designed in such a manner which
helps in analyzing the different interests of the employees in a manner which will improve
the overall efficiency of the tasks which are being performed by employees. The recognition
is being provided to employees as the jobs are being designed to make the different tasks
more interesting and remove the boring approach to become more effective in nature.
Furthermore, the linkage between the Alderfer’s need theory and job enrichment tried
to provide the different kinds of aspects which can be controlled in the organization which is

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inclusive of absenteeism and lower morale of the different employees who were performing
in different organizations. Lastly, the job enrichment tries to provide employees by rotating
the jobs performed by employees to remove the boredom and meet the certain physiological
needs of the different job holders.

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References
Berg, D. N., & Smith, K. K. (2017). The Professional Life of Clayton Paul Alderfer. The
Journal of Applied Behavioral Science, 53(2), 156-179.
Botha, A., & Venter, J. M. P. (2016). The effect of life stages on needs satisfied by credit
used, according to Alderfer’s existence relatedness growth theory. RISK
GOVERNANCE & CONTROL: Financial markets and institutions, 324.
Fried, Y., Laurence, G. I., Shirom, A., Melamed, S., Toker, S., Berliner, S., & Shapira, I.
(2014, January). The Relationship Between Job Enrichment and Abdominal Obesity:
A Longitudinal Field Study Of Apparently Healthy Individuals. In Cardiology (Vol.
128, Pp. 70-70). Allschwilerstrasse 10, Ch-4009 Basel, Switzerland: Karger.
Lazaroiu, G. (2015). Employee motivation and job performance. Linguistic and
Philosophical Investigations, 14, 97.
Michael, K., Kwao, F. D., & Gyamfi, H. (2015). Job Satisfaction, A Motivation Factor For
Improving Work Output, A Case Study Of Koforidua Polytechnic.
Oldham, G. R., & Baer, M. (2015). Job Enrichment. Wiley Encyclopedia of Management, 1-
2.
Omolo, P. A. (2015). Effect of motivation on employee performance of commercial banks in
Kenya: A case study of Kenya Commercial Bank in Migori County. International
journal of human resource studies, 5(2), 87-103.

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Sanda, A. O., Asikhia, O. U., & Magaji, N. (2015). Effect of Job Enrichment On Employee
Satisfaction in Selected Private Universities in South-West Nigeria. International
Journal of Development Research. ISSN, 2230-9926.
Srivastava, S., & Kanpur, A. (2014). A study on quality of work life: key elements & It’s
Implications. IOSR-JBM, 16(3), 54-59.
Whittington, J. L., Meskelis, S., Asare, E., & Beldona, S. (2017). Creating Meaning in Work
through Job Enrichment. In Enhancing Employee Engagement (pp. 43-51). Palgrave
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