Utilizing Motivational Theory and Personality Traits in the Workplace

Utilizing motivational theory and personality traits in the workplace

A manager may not always make the decision on who is within their employ. A manager may be hired, transferred, or promoted into a location with a pre-established staff and need to discover specific methods of motivation for an individual. The purpose of this paper is to explore the correlation of how an understanding of personality traits combined with knowledge of major motivation theories can be utilized by management to tailor motivation to the individual employee.

The subject

A subject employee was observed over the course of year. The subject was observed to be jocular, assertive, sociable and talkative: frequently engaging the rest of the staff, portraying commonality, and instigating after-work group activities. The subject displayed low workplace engagement and no organizational citizenship behavior. The theories in this paper will use this subject’s proposed personality model.

Assessing personality

The Five Factor Model is used to describe the five basic factors of personality. Those factors are openness, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness, and neuroticism. Using this model, the subject displays evident traits of extraversion. Major traits of extraversion are assertiveness, talkativeness, engagement with community and the external world, attention seeking, and positive energy or attitude.

Motivation

Fostering motivation in an unengaged employee is a crucial task for a manager. As is understanding the innate strengths an individual may possess. Combining knowledge of motivational theory and discovering an individual’s natural skills could prove a great tool to cultivating engagement. The theories of motivation that the author deemed most appropriate to cultivate engagement in an extravert employee are need theory and equity theory.

Need theory. McClelland’s Need Theory states individuals are motivated base on:

• Need for achievement: The drive to excel, to achieve in...