Performance Management and Motivation: An Organizational Analysis

This essay critically analyzes the relationship between performance management, employee motivation, and organizational efficiency. It defines motivation as a key driver of employee behavior and explores how it impacts performance, referencing Maslow's hierarchy of needs. The essay examines the importance of effective performance management in driving employees towards organizational goals and discusses how underperformance can be addressed through support, flexible work practices, and proper managerial training. It also highlights factors that demotivate employees, such as lack of incentives, unsafe working environments, and poor management, and suggests strategies to improve employee efficiency through motivational incentives, fair practices, and recognition. The essay concludes by emphasizing the importance of understanding individual needs and implementing tailored motivational techniques to enhance employee performance and combat underperformance.

Running head: PEFORMANCE MANAGEMENT
PEFORMANCE MANAGEMENT
Name of student
Name of university
Author Note

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Motivation is defined as the key driving force that lead an individual towards any
respective determined goal. In other words, motivation can be defined as the key driving
force for an individual to behave or act in a certain manner (Pinder 2014). As per the article,
it can be stated that motivation is one of the key driving force in organizational
management that is instrumental in manipulating the efficiency of the employees. With the
help of this essay, critical analysis of the provided article has been cited to help explain in a
simpler manner about the inter relation of efficiency, underperformance and motivation in an
organization.
Every organization performs and produces its output depending on one of the major
factors within the organization. The employees are one of the most vital elements of an
organization who are fundamental in driving the organization towards its respective goal
(Kinicki & Kreitner 2012). Motivation is one of the important factors that influence the
performance of the employees in the organization. It can be explained that motivation acts as
a reinforcement that pushes the employees towards a defined direction.
With positive affirmation regarding the validity of the statement, it can be cited that
effective performance management and motivation are the primary dynamics to drive the
employees to perform efficiently and effectively in an organization (Miner 2015).
With reference to Maslow’s theory of Self Actualization, Cherry (2014) stated that
every individual has definite needs that can be classified in to five different layers depending
upon the necessity and priority. The first layer being the basic physiological need, the second
layer in the pyramid being safety and security, the third layer being the sense of belonging,
the fourth being self esteem and the fifth layer consists of Self Actualization. This principle
mostly affects the employees in an organization and they are motivated as long as these levels
of needs are met and fulfilled.

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Employees or the workforce is one of the key elements of the organization, which is
the active in the performance of the organization. In this manner the performance of the
employees are extremely crucial in terms of productivity. The fluctuations in the performance
of the employees affect not the individuals but the organization as a whole as well (DuBrin
2013).
The foremost strength of the article the detailed definition and application of
motivational incentives to the employees to drive them or encourage them towards a invisible
and redirected goal. The use of incentive is manipulating for the employees who are
unwilling to perform due to the belief of getting lesser appreciation and incentives for the
efforts contributed to the work. Jerome (2013) with reference to Maslow’s Hierarchy theory
stated that the effective measures to calculate and study the needs and listen to the opinion of
the employees. This is one of the crucial steps to understand and analyze the gap or the pit
fall that can rectified, indirectly motivating the employees in a indistinguishable manner
The weaknesses that can be determined according to the article provided is that, the
psychometric test that is to be conducted on the employees might not always bear the honest
opinion of the employees who are sometimes driven by self consciousness and the sense of
job security. This is because an individual might realize or believe that an honest opinion
could lead to a penalization through predetermined ways of harassment and bullying at
workplace. This is due to the levels of security with reference to Maslow’s Theory of Self
Actualization.
Adding justification to the given statement, underperformance is defined as a
condition where an individual is unable to perform as per the incorporated standards of
performance or the levels that have been determined by the organization. Since efficiency and
performance are interrelated, therefore underperformance is the outcome of inefficiency of

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the employees or the inability of the managers to ineffectively manage the flaws or motivate
the employees.
To progress underperformance and inefficiency of the employee, contribution of
assistance as well as flexible work practices and defining the roles can be encouraging.
Combating underperformance can be a complicated job depending upon the managerial steps
that can be taken.. Underperformance can be tackled with proper support and flexibility in the
workplace. In order to achieve such, the managers should have proper knowledge and
training to handle underperformance issues efficiently and understand the ways of motivating
the employees.
The efficiency of the employees can also be improved by proper understanding of the
issues that obstruct the employees in terms of productivity and performance. The issues that
cause de motivation among the employees should be acknowledged and rectified accordingly.
The flexibility of the management should ensure that employees come up for
suggestions about improving performance. A rigid management would by no means be able
to evolve itself and strengthen its gaps if it fails to mismanage the de-motivated employees.
In order to achieve better efficiency among the employees, the process of Resupply, Retrain,
Refit, Reassign and Release, should be functional.
The management should be volatile and flexible enough to give unbiased and equal
chance to all of its employees to exhibit their potential in terms of performance. Sometimes
disappointment can lead to demotivation amongst the employees that in turn can affect
efficiency (Hvidman & Andersen 2013).
The diversity in an organization can also lead to inefficient performance of employees
due to discontentment and clash between employees under grounds of knowledge,

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understanding, capability and superiority. This difference can result in the demotivation of
employees on grounds of giving necessary efforts from one’s end, which in turn can result in
the underperformance and the inefficiency of the employees in terms of work and
performance (Moore et al. 2012).
Inefficiency can also result from a sense of insecurity and safety like an unsafe and
unhealthy working environment, that might affect the employees in an negative manner.
Detrimental relationships and lack of cooperation from the managers can also obstruct the
employees to direct themselves successfully. Less remuneration is one of the major reasons
of inefficiency among the employees and it can be considered in general that most of the
employees are working for a better standard of living and earning. With a low pay grade the
motivation of the employees are blown to bits. The wrong employee-job consistency can also
lead to a de-motivated employee due to failure to achieve the allotted standards of the job
requirement, since better efficiency and productivity can be achieved by placing the
appropriate candidate in their key domain (Driskell & Salas 2013).
In order to help the employees cope with the discontentment and de-motivation, the
employees should be imparted with motivational inspiration and incentives by identifying
their respective needs and demands. As well as managing the organization protocols and
resources to keep the employees motivated in terms or better facilities could also be
beneficial in terms of efficient productivity.
To impart justice and evenness in the methodology conduction proper vocational
communiqué would be helpful in better understanding of the situation and their outcomes.
The rewards and recognitions in terms of better performance and efficiency amongst the
employees acts a reinforcement and the primary driving force of the employees (Shields et al.
2015).

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The validity of the application of the methods of motivating the employees is a good
strategic tool to combat ineffectiveness. Khan (2012) highlighted the main purpose of
motivation that it can only be implemented after understanding the issues and the levels of
requirement of the employees. For example, the increment of remuneration would be
motivational for the employees with low scale salary than that of the employees with middle
or higher pay grade (Luthans, Luthans & Luthans 2015).
This critical analysis has been done with reference to the article that has been
provided. Guclu and Guney (2017) states that motivation is one of the key strategies to
increase efficiency and productivity among employees, in an organization. On the contrary,
other organizations lay emphasis on supplementary organizational strategies other than
channeling and focusing on the pre existing workforce to make them efficient. They choose
to act through other organizational strategies apart from using the motivational strategy as
cited in the article.
With the help of this essay and under critical analysis of the article it can be
concluded that motivation is in one of the key dimensions to effectively handle the efficiency
of the performance of the employees in an organization. Imparting of motivation amongst the
employees can boost the self-actualization of the employees thus improving the productivity
of the employees and benefiting the organization in turn. The key for unleashing the hidden
talents and the abilities of the employees is possible through positive motivation.
With better incentives and reinforcements, the employees can be driven to outperform
their responsibilities and duties more efficiently. In order to achieve such by the manager
proper analysis of the individuals needs to be carried forward for proper observation,
identification and familiarization of the individual needs and demands. The motivational
techniques that can be implemented through principles of reward, recognition, punishment

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and competition whichever might be necessary, in diverse situations. The management
should be aware of the fact that every individual is different and the motivational techniques
that should also be different from each other. Thus, it can be justified that motivational
techniques used by the managers in order to enhance the efficiency among employees is one
of the best and basic strategic tools to effectively handle underperformance and inefficiency,
in a workplace.

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References
Cherry, K., 2014. Hierarchy of needs. The Five Levels of Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs.
About. com Guide.↑| Link.
Driskell, J.E. and Salas, E. eds., 2013. Stress and human performance. Psychology Press.
Guclu, H. and Guney, S. (2017). The Effect of the Motivation Techniques Used by Managers
to Increase the Productivity of their Workers and an Application. Business Management
Dynamics, 6(7), pp.1-18.
Hvidman, U. and Andersen, S.C., 2013. Impact of performance management in public and
private organizations. Journal of Public Administration Research and Theory, 24(1), pp.35-
58.
Jerome, N., 2013. Application of the Maslow’s hierarchy of need theory; impacts and
implications on organizational culture, human resource and employee’s
performance. International Journal of Business and Management Invention, 2(3), pp.39-45.
Khan, M.I., 2012. The impact of training and motivation on performance of employees.
Kinicki, A. and Kreitner, R., 2012. Organizational behavior: Key concepts, skills & best
practices. McGraw-Hill Irwin.
Luthans, F., Luthans, B.C. and Luthans, K.W., 2015. Organizational behavior: An evidence-
based approach. IAP.
Miner, J.B., 2015. Organizational behavior 1: Essential theories of motivation and leadership.
Routledge.

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Moore, C., Detert, J.R., Klebe Treviño, L., Baker, V.L. and Mayer, D.M., 2012. Why
employees do bad things: Moral disengagement and unethical organizational
behavior. Personnel Psychology, 65(1), pp.1-48.
Pinder, C.C., 2014. Work motivation in organizational behavior. Psychology Press.
Shields, J., Brown, M., Kaine, S., Dolle-Samuel, C., North-Samardzic, A., McLean, P.,
Johns, R., O'Leary, P., Robinson, J. and Plimmer, G., 2015. Managing Employee
Performance & Reward: Concepts, Practices, Strategies. Cambridge University Press.