The work deals with different theories and approaches to how a manager can motivate the staff under his or her supervision.
Learning
It is quite obvious that proper motivation is a key to the successful performance in any work environment, culture or sphere of work. However, when working on certain business theory, including approaches to motivating the workforce, its developer thinks within the context of cultural and other subjective circumstances. First theories of work motivation were mostly developed in Western countries. It is surprising to know that despite many years of theoretical reflection, many approaches to cross-cultural job motivation did not adapt to the multi-cultural model. Many theories just divided employees of different cultures into Easterners and Westerners or in other words, individualists and collectivists.
Nevertheless, there are much more cultural factors than we usually consider. The culturally-sensitive equity model based on the recognition of factors important for either individualistic or collectivistic societies tries to make an account for those factors, including preferable inputs, outcomes, choice of referent other and motivation to reduce the inequity between the staff (Fadil et al. 2005). However, from my point of view, the motivation can change during one’s lifetime since if there is a strong corporate culture in the workplace the new employee can relate to it as well. Thus, not everything is determined by the national-based approach, although this theory has its strong point since many of our behaviours derive from the culture we grew in.
Reflection
In all the workplaces, I am familiar with there is a positive tendency to be sensitive and tolerant of the issue of the national and cultural background. However, the majority of managers pay not so much attention to how that background system of values can be used to motivate a subordinate to work better. On the other hand, such thing as ingroup confrontation vs. ingroup cooperation can make a significant distinction. A person with a strongly collectivistic mind will not be comfortable with the confrontational and competitive atmosphere in the group. Such situations have happened in the workplace familiar to me; the person in question had no motivation to work because of a lack of cooperation in the group. The best solution I would try to apply if I were a manager, is to find the group task that presupposes the cooperative performance rather than competitive.
Critique
I find the factors for motivation at work the most questionable point of all discussed theories. For example, such motivation factor as salary supposedly is not always something that determines the performance of someone with the collectivistic mind (Fadil et al. 2005). However, there are many personal and not only professional aspects to that. In the economically challenging situation, I believe, the issue of salary will be one of the priorities both for an individualistic and collectivistic person. Another problem lays in representing Western cultures as more competitive than Eastern ones. Competitiveness reflects personal motivation; however, the motivation of the group, the collaboration of its members can be as strong. Also, to enhance the level of job satisfaction and motivation and improve general outcome, it is important to install the communication between staff and supervisors based on mutual respect (Flannery 2011).
It means that the motivation for competitiveness should not be at least drawn out on the relationships outside of the group. Cooperative relationships are also an important part of any jobs that include danger to the life of either employee himself/herself or customers or patients. In such a way, although, most traditional approaches, including the Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, consider the personal safety as one of the main motivational factors, and it is considered reasonable, there are some exceptions. Otherwise, there would be no high-risk occupations like firefighters or police, and of course, no medical staff who work daily with diseases. Thus, motivation varies according to not only personal development or cultural background, but also each occupation has its specific aspects.
Reference List
Fadil, P, Williams, R, Limpaphayom, W & Smatt, C 2005, ‘Equity or equality? a conceptual examination of the influence of individualism/collectivism on the cross‐cultural application of equity theory’, Cross-Cultural Management, vol. 12, no. 4, pp.17-35.
Flannery, M 2011, ‘Creating and Sustaining an Effective Coaching Culture in Home Care’, Home Healthcare Nurse: The Journal for the Home Care and Hospice Professional, vol. 29, no. 5, pp. 275-281.