Understanding and Applying Motivation Theories in Business Settings

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The importance of motivation in the business setting
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Introduction
The term motivation is derived through the word motive, which means desire, needs, wants and
drives within the people. It is termed as the process for stimulating the individuals for actions
regarding the accomplishment of the goals. In the context of business, the psychological factors
are known to stimulate the behaviour of individuals. There are certain reasons for which,
employee motivation is significant as it allows the management for meeting the goal of the
company. Hence, the present study focuses upon the significance of motivation with respect to
the business settings.
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Discussion
Types of motivation
Extrinsic motivation
As opined by Heckhausen and Heckhausen, (2018), the extrinsic motivation is known to be geared
for the external rewards as well as the reinforcers such as, praise, money and awards. These are
the examples of external rewards. However, the external reinforcers are procedures and policies,
disciplinary action, and the setting of boundaries. The extrinsic motivation is considered to be
less effective as it comes through outside of an individual. The external reinforcers on the other
hand, come through a form of control. Such as, laws comprises of social control, the procedures
and policies comprises of internal controls and similar other controls as well. This can be related
to the business context as, most of the people are craves for recognition within their workplace
and this provides them with the motivation and acts as a reward. This helps them in taking new
challenges and responsibilities within the workplace following a set of boundaries. Hence, this
can act as an external reward for them and can lead to job satisfaction as well.
Intrinsic motivation
This kind of motivation is seemed to be geared towards the internal rewards as well as
reinforcers. For instance, individuals can celebrate their success when they do well and can also
compete within themselves when they don’t. Some of the examples based on internal rewards are
achievement, enjoyment and also a sense of competence. As stated by Brunstein and Heckhausen,
(2018), however, some of the examples based on internal reinforcers are must, should that is
referred to as guilty conscious or the moral instincts and the toxic shame that is in built within
the individuals. The internal rewards are also associated with the higher academic as well as
occupational achievement. This seems that motivation is strong when the work is done for fun or
rather for the feeling of accomplishment. The internal rewards within a business setting can
include an accomplishment of any task or rather, the success of any project which may lead to a
satisfaction of the particular task.
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Addiction motivation
This type of motivation is denoted as something for which, individuals can feel driven or rather
can get addicted to that thing. In many cases, motivation do not lead towards a positive direction
as, addiction is considered as an unhealthy relationship of trust and love through an activity or
object. However, the needs for survival such as needs for eating, is internal reinforcer as, it can
cause pain through the form of hunger if someone do not eats. Hence, people can get an internal
reward when they eat their food (Heckhausen et al., 2019). Therefore, the same is known to be true
when people are in resistance of something that they are addicted with. The pain acts in a form of
a craving and withdrawal symptoms. On the other hand, the later stages of addiction does not act
as a reward rather, the reinforcer seems to get stronger. Regarding the business setting, it can be
related to some people who are highly career oriented and are workaholics. Their addiction to
their works provides them the sense of satisfaction and pleasure within themselves.
Subconscious motivation
Addiction acts as an example for this type of motivation as, it may be too uncomfortable for
individuals to know whether they are relying upon anything. Hence, the subconscious mind of
the people, protects them to face the reality through the system based on defence mechanisms
that is referred to as denial. However, the other types of subconscious motivations may involve
different neural networks that are created early within life that is related with implicit memory.
For example, people who have accident proneness might comprise of a subconscious desire for
punishing themselves or may be are guilty for any past mistake (Schultheiss and Wirth, 2018).
People who are seemed to push other people away, may consists of a part of themselves, that is
known to sabotage opportunities regarding intimacy for protecting from the abandonment. For
instance, an organization leads to success only then, when they get good and best productivity
from their workers and hence, the organizations are totally dependent upon their workers and
employees for the business success.
Hence, all kinds of motivation consist of certain values that help in the setting of business
environment. well motivated employees have the ability for providing certain advantages to the
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organizations. Apart from all these types of motivation, there are certain theories of motivation
that are followed within the business context or by the organizational cultures.
Motivation theories
Maslow’s hierarchy of needs motivation
This theory was proposed by the American psychologist who was Abraham Maslow in the year
of 1943. This theory consist of five stages related to the human needs and are depicted as the
hierarchical levels in a pyramid. The physiological needs comprises of the biological
requirements such as shelter, food, warmth and drink. The safety needs comprises of protection
from the fear and elements such as natural disaster, security, law and stability as well. The need
of love and belongingness refers to the social feelings that depict the need of interpersonal
relationship that motivates the behaviour. However, the esteem needs comprises of the self
esteem and dignity of an individual such as achievement, independence and also the desire for a
good reputation and status as well. At last, the needs of self actualization depict the realization of
personal potential and the personal growth as well.
According to the views of Kooij and Kanfer, (2019), this theory can be related to a business setting
as; the physiological needs can be related to the factor of money and job which can be depicted
as the basic need to have food. The safety needs can be related to the job security and a stability
of a position. The lover and belongingness can be related to the social relationships within the
workplace that motivates and regulates one’s behaviour. The esteem needs can be related to
professional achievement, prestige of a person and a stable and recognized position within the
workplace. Hence, the self actualization need can also be related to personal and professional
growth of a person within the workplace or rather to achieve a desired position.
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Maslow’s hierarchy of motivation
Source: (Fallatah and Syed, 2018)
Herzberg’s two factor theory
This theory is referred to as the motivation and hygiene theory or rather a dual factor theory. This
was proposed by Frederick Herzberg in the year of 1959. He was an American psychologist for
proposing this model regarding motivation of people along with their job satisfaction as well. As
per the respective psychologist, the satisfaction of job relies upon two kinds of factors that are
factors of satisfaction such as satisfiers or motivators and dissatisfaction such as dissatisfiers or
hygiene factors (Proulx ewt et al., 2018). The hygiene factors are related to salary that is the
secondary conditions of working, colleagues relationship and the physical; workplace as well.
This also includes the relationship within an employee and the supervisor. Hence, the motivation
factors may include appraisal systems within the workplace, hike in salary and also satisfaction
of job as well.
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Conclusion
Based on the above discussion, the study has focused upon the role of motivation within the
business settings. This involved several types of motivation that drives the business context and
also various theories of motivation have also been highlighted in the above study. Hence, it can
be concluded that, motivation keeps the productivity of the employees high that helps the
organizations to be prosperous and successful as well.
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References
Brunstein, J.C. and Heckhausen, H., 2018. Achievement motivation. In Motivation and
action (pp. 221-304). Springer, Cham.
Fallatah, R.H.M. and Syed, J., 2018. A Critical Review of Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs.
In Employee Motivation in Saudi Arabia (pp. 19-59). Palgrave Macmillan, Cham.
Heckhausen, J. and Heckhausen, H., 2018. Motivation and action: Introduction and overview.
In Motivation and action (pp. 1-14). Springer, Cham.
Heckhausen, J., Wrosch, C. and Schulz, R., 2019. Agency and motivation in adulthood and old
age. Annual review of psychology, 70, pp.191-217.
Kooij, D.T. and Kanfer, R., 2019. Lifespan Perspectives on Work Motivation. In Work Across
the Lifespan (pp. 475-493). Academic Press.
Proulx, C.D., Aronson, S., Milivojevic, D., Molina, C., Loi, A., Monk, B., Shabel, S.J. and
Malinow, R., 2018. A neural pathway controlling motivation to exert effort. Proceedings of the
National Academy of Sciences, 115(22), pp.5792-5797.
Schultheiss, O.C. and Wirth, M.M., 2018. Biopsychological aspects of motivation. In Motivation
and action (pp. 407-451). Springer, Cham.
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