Motivating Employees

Motivating Employees

Motivating employees is not an easy task, due to the fact that what motivates employees

seems to change overtime. Different employees are motivated in different ways according to

their needs. For example, one employee will be motivated to do his task by way of

responsibility, while on the other hand another employee will be motivated by monetary rewards.

However, it is possible to motivate an employee only if they want to be motivated. As a result,

it is vital to identify the reason and create the atmosphere that encourages the non-performing

employees to refresh and motivate themselves. It is important to try and find out what really

motivates the employee. Trying to motivate an employee by wrong means could thus lead to a

waste of money, time and so on, while paving way to de-motivate the employee more. When it

comes to motivating employees this could be done intrinsically or extrinsically by using either

intrinsic or extrinsic rewards.

When it comes to intrinsic motivation, this basically means that employees are motivated to

do a particular task because of the pleasure or satisfaction that they get in performing the task

itself. In other words, intrinsic motivation comes from within an individual rather than from

extrinsic rewards such as monetary incentives (Silva, 2009). Intrinsic factors might include a

state of being, altruism, or ideals. Intrinsic factors energize a person's desire to achieve or attain

certain goals. For example, an intrinsically motivated person will perform a task given to him

willingly, either because he might find the task challenging or else interesting and satisfied with

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completing it. Finding what these factors are in each employee is the responsibility of managers

and supervisors. An organizational...