Motivation is the process of guiding one’s behaviour in achieving their goals. Motivation boosts the inner drive to achieve one’s target without any external force. It is basically an inner state of feeling. Motivation involves the biological, emotional, social and cognitive forces that activate behaviour.
Various authors have motivation in different ways. Few are mentioned underneath:
Berelson and Steiner:
“A motive is an inner state that energizes, activates, or moves and directs or channels behaviour goals.”
Lillis:
“It is the stimulation of any emotion or desire operating upon one’s will and promoting or driving it to action.”
The Encyclopaedia of Management:
“Motivation refers to degree of readiness of an organism to pursue some designated goal and implies the determination of the nature and locus of the forces, including the degree of readiness.”
Dubin:
“Motivation is the complex of forces starting and keeping a person at work in an organization.”
Vance:
“Motivation implies any emotion or desire which so conditions one’s will that the individual is properly led into action.”
From the above definitions, the following features or nature of motivation can be derived:
1. Motivation is an inner feeling which energizes a person to work more.
2. The emotions or desires of a person prompt him for doing a particular work.
3. There are unsatisfied needs of a person which disturb his equilibrium.
4. A person moves to fulfil his unsatisfied needs by conditioning his energies.
5. There are dormant energies in a person which are activated by channelizing them into actions.
Types of Motivation
When a manager wants to get more work from his subordinates then he will have to motivate them for improving their performance. They will either be offered incentive for more work, or may be in the space of rewards, better reports, recognition etc., or he may instill fear in them or use force for getting desired work.
The following are the types of motivation:
1. Positive Motivation:
Positive motivation or incentive motivation is based on reward. The workers are offered incentives for achieving the desired goals. The incentives may be in the shape of more pay, promotion, recognition of work, etc. The employees are offered the incentives and try to improve their performance willingly.
According to Peter Drucker, the real and positive motivators are responsible for placement, high standard of performance, information adequate for self- control and the participation of the worker as a responsible citizen in the plant community. Positive motivation is achieved by the co-operation of employees and they have a feeling of happiness.
2. Negative Motivation:
Negative or fear motivation is based on force or fear. Fear causes employees to act in a certain way. In case, they do not act accordingly then they may be punished with demotions or lay-offs. The fear acts as a push mechanism. The employees do not willingly co-operate, rather they want to avoid the punishment.
Though employees work up-to a level where punishment is avoided but this type of motivation causes anger and frustration. This type of motivation generally becomes a cause of industrial unrest. In spite of the drawbacks of negative motivation, this method is commonly used to achieve desired results. There may be hardly any management which has not used negative motivation at one or the other time.
Sources of motivation
Apart from the above-mentioned categories, few other sources can be:
It is a strong motivator of learning. Since, people adapt rather quickly to surprising events, curiosity must be sustained in order to be a continuing source of motivation. To keep the learners alert, instructors can employ such strategies as varying their tone of voice, using relevant humour occasionally, etc.
2. Learning Task Relevance :
Students are more motivated to learn things that are relevant to their interest.
3. Goal Setting :
It is an important source of motivation. When individuals set goals, they determine an external standard, to which they will internally evaluate their present level of performance. Setting goals improves self-motivation and performance to a greater extent. When learners set goals, they seek to gain favorable judgments of their competence or avoid negative judgments of their competence.
The recommendation to foster a learning goal orientation runs counter to much current educational practice, which attempts to instil learner confidence within a performance goal orientation.
4. Motive Matching:
It is the degree to which learning tasks meet particular students’ needs or align with students’ values. A need can be defined as “any type of deficiency in the human organism or the absence of anything the person requires or thinks he requires for his overall wellbeing.” The instructor should be sensitive to individual’s needs for achievement and for affiliation.
5. Self-Efficacy :
Motivation also comes from learner’s beliefs about themselves. According to Bandura, self-efficacy involves a belief that one can produce some behaviour, independent of whether one actually can or not. Learners can be sure that certain activities will produce a particular set of outcomes. These expectations are referred as outcome expectations.
Motivation is one of the forces that lead to performance. Motivation is defined as the desire to achieve a goal or a certain performance level, leading to goal-directed behavior. When we refer to someone as being motivated, we mean that the person is trying hard to accomplish a certain task.
Theory of motivation
The main content theories of motivation are:
Let us have a brief discussion of each of them one by one:
Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs:
The theory is based on a simple premise: Human beings have needs that are hierarchically ranked. This theory was propounded by Abraham Maslow. There are some needs that are basic to all human beings, and in their absence nothing else matters. As we satisfy these basic needs, we start looking to satisfy higher order needs. In other words, once a lower level need is satisfied, it no longer serves as a motivator. Maslow identified five needs of human beings which may be presented in the form of a pyramid:
Maslow’s need hierarchy theory suffers from certain criticism:
ERG Theory:
ERG theory, developed by Clayton Alderfer, is a modification of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. Instead of the five needs that are hierarchically organized, Alderfer proposed that basic human needs may be grouped under three categories, namely, existence, relatedness, and growth. Existence corresponds to Maslow’s physiological and safety needs, relatedness corresponds to social needs, and growth refers to Maslow’s esteem and self-actualization.
Herzberg labeled factors causing dissatisfaction of workers as “hygiene” factors because these factors were part of the context in which the job was performed, as opposed to the job itself. Hygiene factors included company policies, supervision, working conditions, salary, safety, and security on the job. The presence of these factors doesn’t motivate the employees but their non-presence highly dissatisfies them.
In contrast, motivators are factors that are intrinsic to the job, such as achievement, recognition, interesting work, increased responsibilities, advancement, and growth opportunities. According to Herzberg’s research, motivators are the conditions that truly encourage employees to try harder. The non-presence of these factors doesn’t dissatisfy the employees but their presence highly motivates them.
According to expectancy theory, individual motivation to put forth more or less effort is determined by a rational calculation in which individuals evaluate their situation. This theory was given by Porter, L. W., & Lawler, E. E. (1968). According to this theory, individuals ask themselves three questions.
Key Takeaways:
Perception refers to the way we look into things after having contact with the external environment and our five sensory organs react and interpret. It also refers to identifying, organising and analysing the information collected by our sensory organs.
Stephen P. Robbins defines perception as:
“Perception may be defined as a process by which individuals organise and interpret their sensory impressions in order to give meaning to their environment.”
Features of Perception-
Components of Perception-
(1) Perceptual Inputs:
This is the first stage in the perception process where the perceiver comes across various information in the formal objects, events, people etc. All these factors exist in the environment itself. These factors provide stimuli to the perceiver. When the perceiver interacts with a stimulus, sensation takes place which starts perception process.
Stimuli may be in the form of-
a) Objects.
b) Events.
c) People.
This involves three elements:
(a) Selection of Stimuli:
Various forms of stimuli exist in the environment. As human being is also a part of the environment, he receives the stimuli from it. There are basically two type of factors in the environment. One is internal factor, which relates to the perceiver. Second is external factor which is related to stimuli.
(b) Organisation of Stimuli:
Arranging stimuli in some form so as to make sense. Various forms of organising stimuli are-
i. Figure Ground:
This is one of the principles of collecting information. This principle is known as figure ground principle. Here, while collecting information, two things are kept in mind, first is focus and second is background.
Decision is made on the basis of the focus keeping in consideration the background of the matter. E.g. in most of the organizations, good performance is taken as the focus for promotions and their relations with the superiors are taken as background, whereas it is just the opposite in some organizations where relations with the superiors are taken as the focus whereas the performance is taken as the background. This varies from organization to organization.
ii. Perceptual Grouping:
On the basis of the proximity and similarities various stimuli are grouped together into recognizable patterns. This grouping of stimuli helps the individuals in perceiving things in a proper manner or in a manner in which they want to perceive. Grouping is also done by them accordingly.
iii. Simplification:
Every person tries to decrease the burden whenever he is overloaded. Here we are talking of overload of information. In order to reduce this load, people try to simplify the process or contents of the matter. This they do by eliminating the less important or less required information and concentrating upon the important information. This decreases their work load and helps them in understanding things in a better manner.
iv. Closure:
This is known as the winding up of the matter or filling the gap to make things meaningful or understandable. This is followed whenever the manager realizes that there is some gap in the information which he has received or when he finds the information incomplete. So, through his own experience, past history and analysis he fills the gap of incomplete information and makes the information complete.
(c) Interpretation of Stimuli:
After selecting and organizing stimuli the next step is interpretation. Here the perceiver interprets things according to his thinking styles, state of mind, environment, circumstances, objectives, beliefs etc. This is done by making assumption about people, by using past experience etc.
i. These outputs may be in the form of covert action like development of attitudes, opinions, beliefs, impressions etc. about the stimuli.
ii. It may also result into overt action. e.g.
(a) See an ad-stimuli (Input).
(b) Perceive the product as good (Mechanism).
(c) Buy the product (overt output).
Factors influencing perceptual process
The factors which affect perceptual mechanism are of three kinds:
1. Characteristics of the Perceiver.
2. Characteristics of the Perceived or target, and
3. Characteristic of the Situation.
A brief discussion of each one of them are given below:
1. Characteristics of the Perceiver (Internal Factors):
These are the personal characteristics of the individuals:
(i) Needs & Motives:
Individuals perception is basically determined by their inner needs and motives. They take things differently according to their different needs and motives. Different needs results in different stimuli, similarly people select different items to satisfy their needs. According to Freud, “Wishful thinking is the means by which the Id, a part of personality, attempts to achieve tension reduction.” In such cases, people will perceive only those items which suit their wishful thinking.
(ii) Self Concept:
How actually a person views other or the rest of the world will clearly decide that how he thinks about himself, or what his self-concept is. It is largely based upon individual’s complex psychological make-up. Self-understanding helps understanding others.
(iii) Beliefs:
A person’s belief has direct impact on his perception. It is very difficult for an individual to think beyond his personal beliefs because most of the times people go as per their beliefs and they perceive in the same manner.
(iv) Past Experience:
People’s perception is greatly influenced by their past experiences. A person, having good experience in past will perceive accordingly and vice versa.
(v) Current Psychological State:
Current psychological or emotional state of people plays an important role in perception. Present position of the person defines how a person will perceive thing. Like, a person in a good mood will perceive in a different manner as compared to a person who is not in a good mood.
(vi) Expectations:
Again, expectations are major players in deciding how a person will perceive. Expectations are related with the state of anticipation of particular behaviour from a person. E.g., If a person thinks that Mr. Y will never do anything good to him then even if Mr. Y is right that person will always remain under an impression that Mr. Y is wrong.
2. Characteristics of the Perceived or Target:
(i) Size- The bigger is the size of the perceived stimulus, the greater the possibility that it is perceived & vice versa. People tend to understand things better when it is explained in a clearer manner and they understand the same accordingly.
(ii) Intensity- More intense the external stimulus is, the more likely it is to be perceived e.g., a loud sound, bright colour etc. is more likely to attract attention than a soft sound or relatively dull colour.
(iii) Frequency- The greater the frequency of repetition of things, the greater will be the perceptual selectivity. This is also in accordance with the repetitive theory of learning.
(iv) Status- Perception is also influenced by the status of the perceiver. High status people can have greater influence on perception of an employee as compared to low status people.
(v) Contrast – The stimulus which is in contrast with the surrounding environment attracts more attention as compared to the stimuli that blends in.
Time, place and situation at the time of the communication plays an important role in perception.
Such situational factors can be further classified as:
(i) Physical setting- This includes place, location, light, heat, ventilation, basic amenities etc. If all these things are proper then people may perceive positively and vice versa.
(ii) Social setting- This includes human resources i.e., the people around you or the affected parties or the people concerned about you or the persons you are concerned about or the people who you work with.
(iii) Organizational setting- This includes the hierarchy in the organization, organizational setup, structure etc. All these influences the perception.
i. Perception is a selective process as people can sense only limited amount of information in the environment. They are characteristically selective.
ii. By selection certain aspects of stimuli are screened out and others are admitted.
iii. Such a selectivity in perception can be brought about by different factors which can be broadly classified as external and internal factors.
I. External Factors in Perceptual Selectivity:
External factors are in the form of the characteristics of perceptual input or stimuli.
Impact of external factors on the perceptual selectivity:
(1) Size:
May affect the perceptual selectivity by affecting the attraction of the perceiver. Usually, bigger is the size of perceived stimulus, higher is the probability that it attracts the – attention of the perceiver and he may select it for perception. E.g., Letters of larger size in books catch attention of the readers and they tend to read it before reading the entire text.
(2) Intensity:
More intense the external stimulus is, the more likely it is to be perceived e.g., loud sound or strong odour, bright light. E.g., Commercials on TV are slightly louder than the programme.
(3) Repetition:
Repeated external stimulus is more attention getting than a single one.
(4) Novelty and Familiarity:
Either a novel or a familiar situation can serve as attention getter.
E.g., Job rotation makes people more attentive to their new job or communication in a familiar jargon is better accepted.
(5) Contrast:
Stimuli which stand against the background or which are not what people expect, receive more attention.
E.g. –
i. Bold letters
ii. Differently dressed person.
iii. Different colour
(6) Motion:
Moving objects draw more attention as compared to stationary objects.
E.g., TV commercials get more attention than print advertisements.
All these factors must be used judiciously e.g., a loud supervisor may put off subordinates instead of attracting their attention.
II. Internal Factors in Perceptual Selectivity:
These are related to the individual’s complex psychological makeup:
(1) Self Concept:
The way a person views the world depends a great deal on the concept or image he has about himself.
Peoples own characteristics affect the characteristics they are likely to see in others. They select only those aspects which they find match with their characteristics.
(2) Beliefs:
A fact is perceived not on what it is but what a person believes it to be.
The individual normally censors stimulus inputs to avoid disturbance of his existing beliefs
(3) Expectations:
We expect trade union officials to use rough language.
A Mental set about beliefs, expectations and values filter perception.
(4) Inner Need:
People with different needs select different items to remember or respond to and experience different stimuli.
When people are not able to satisfy their needs, they engage in wishful thinking to satisfy the needs not in the real world but in imaginary world. In such cases people perceive only those items which are consistent with their wishful thinking.
(5) Response Disposition:
Refers to a person’s tendency to perceive familiar stimuli rather than unfamiliar ones.
E.g., In an experiment people with dominant religious values took lesser time in recognising such related words as priest or minister. Whereas they took longer time in recognising words related with economic values such as cost or price.
(6) Response Salience:
It is the set of dispositions which are determined not by the familiarity of the stimulus situations, but by the persons own cognitive predisposition.
E.g., a particular problem in an organisation may be viewed as a marketing problem by the marketing person but as control problem to the accounting person and as human resource problem to the personnel person.
The reason is that people are trained to look at the situation from one point of view only, not from other point of view.
(7) Perceptual Defence:
Refers to the screening of those elements which create conflict and threatening situation in people. They may even perceive other factors to be present that are not a part of the stimulus situation.
Perceptual defence is performed by:
(a) Denying the existence of conflicting information
(b) Distorting the new information to match the old one
(c) Acknowledging the new information but treating it as a non-representative exception.
Key Takeaways:
Learning means acquisition of knowledge or skills by way of studying or experience. Learning can also define as a permanent change in behaviour due to direct and indirect experience. It means a change in behaviour, attitude due to education and training.
Nature of Learning
Nature of learning means the characteristic features of learning. Learning involves change; it may or may not guarantee improvement. It should be permanent in nature, that is learning is for lifelong.
The change in behaviour is the result of experience, practice and training. Learning is reflected through behaviour.
Factors Affecting Learning
Learning is based upon some key factors that decide what changes will be caused by this experience. The key elements or the major factors that affect learning are motivation, practice, environment, and mental group.
Coming back to these factors let us have a look on these factors −
These are the main factors that influence what a person learns, these are the root level for our behaviour and everything we do is connected to what we learn.
How Learning Occurs?
Learning can be understood clearly with the help of some theories that will explain our behavior. Some of the remarkable theories are −
a) Classical Conditioning Theory.
b) Operant Conditioning Theory.
c) Social Learning Theory.
d) Cognitive Learning Theory.
Classical Conditioning Theory:
The classical conditioning occurs when a conditioned stimulus is coupled with an unconditioned stimulus. Usually, the conditioned stimulus (CS) is an impartial stimulus like the sound of a tuning fork, the unconditioned stimulus (US) is biologically effective like the taste of food and the unconditioned response (UR) to the unconditioned stimulus is an unlearned reflex response like salivation or sweating.
After this coupling process is repeated (for example, some learning may already occur after a single coupling), an individual shows a conditioned response (CR) to the conditioned stimulus, when the conditioned stimulus is presented alone. The conditioned response is mostly similar to the unconditioned response, but unlike the unconditioned response, it must be acquired through experience and is nearly impermanent.
Operant Conditioning Theory:
Operant conditioning theory is also known as instrumental conditioning. This theory is a learning process in which behaviour is sensitive to, or controlled by its outcomes.
Let’s take an example of a child. A child may learn to open a box to get the candy inside, or learn to avoid touching a hot stove. In comparison, the classical conditioning develops a relationship between a stimulus and a behaviour. The example can be further elaborated as the child may learn to salivate at the sight of candy, or to tremble at the sight of an angry parent.
In the 20th century, the study of animal learning was commanded by the analysis of these two sorts of learning, and they are still at the core of behavior analysis.
Social Learning Theory:
The key assumptions of social learning theory are as follows −
a) Learning is not exactly behavioural, instead it is a cognitive process that takes place in a social context.
b) Learning can occur by observing a behaviour and by observing the outcomes of the behavior (known as vicarious reinforcement).
c) Learning includes observation, extraction of information from those observations, and making decisions regarding the performance of the behavior (known as observational learning or modelling). Thus, learning can occur beyond an observable change in behaviour.
d) Reinforcement plays an important role in learning but is not completely responsible for learning.
e) The learner is not a passive receiver of information. Understanding, environment, and behavior all mutually influence each other.
Cognitive Learning Theory:
Cognition defines a person’s ideas, thoughts, knowledge, interpretation, understanding about himself and environment.
This theory considers learning as the outcome of deliberate thinking on a problem or situation based upon known facts and responding in an objective and more oriented manner. It perceives that a person learns the meaning of various objects and events and also learns the response depending upon the meaning assigned to the stimuli.
This theory debates that the learner forms a cognitive structure in memory which stores organized information about the various events that occurs.
Learning & Organizational Behaviour
An individual’s behaviour in an organization is directly or indirectly affected by learning.
Example − Employee skill, manager’s attitude is all learned.
Behaviour can be improved by following the listed tips −
a) Reducing absenteeism by rewarding employees for their fair attendance.
b) Improving employee discipline by dealing with employee’s undesirable behavior, drinking at workplace, stealing, coming late, etc. by taking appropriate actions like oral reprimands, written warnings and suspension.
c) Developing training programs more often so as to grab the trainees’ attention, provide required motivational properties etc.
Reinforcement:
Reinforcement is the process of strengthening or developing a person’s behaviour. If positive comments and results are experienced, the behaviour is reinforced. If negative outcomes are experienced, the behaviour is not repeated again.
Reinforcement hypothesis is the method of shaping behaviour by controlling the consequences of the behaviour. In reinforcement theory a combination of rewards and/or punishments is used to strengthen desired behaviour or put out unwanted behaviour. Any behaviour that elicits a consequence is called operant behaviour, because the individual operates on his or her environment. Reinforcement theory focuses on the relationship between the operant behaviour and the related consequences, and is also called as operant conditioning.
Major contributor of this theory was B.F. Skinner who developed modern ideas about reinforcement theory. Skinner argued that the internal needs and drives of individuals can be ignored because people learn to exhibit certain behaviors based on what happens to them as a result of their behaviour. Management team must always try to shape employee behaviours to get better contributions to the company. This can involve supporting positive behaviours or reducing negative behaviours.
Basically, there are two types of reinforcement:
2. Negative Reinforcement: In negative reinforcement, an unpleasant event that precedes a behaviour is removed when the desired behaviour occurs. This procedure increases the likelihood that the desired behaviour will occur. Just as there are positive reinforcers, there are the stimuli that strengthen responses that permit an organism to avoid or escape from their presence. Thus, when we perform an action that allows us to escape from a negative reinforcer that is already present or to avoid the threatened application of one, our tendency to perform this action in the future increases.
Key takeaways:
References:
