Motivation Concepts Vocabulary

Key Elements of Motivation

  • Motivation: Intensity, direction, and persistence of effort toward a goal.
    • Intensity: How hard a person tries.
    • Direction: Orientation that benefits the organization.
    • Persistence: How long effort is maintained.

Early Theories of Motivation

  • Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs: Widely recognized but not frequently researched since the 1960s.
  • Herzberg's Theory: Influential despite criticisms related to self-reports and methodology.
  • McClelland's Theory of Needs:
    • Need for achievement (nAch): Drive to excel.
    • Need for power (nPow): Need to influence others.
    • Need for affiliation (nAfl): Desire for close relationships.

Contemporary Theories: Content-Based

  • Self-determination theory (SDT): Motivation impacts well-being and performance.
    • Autonomous vs. controlled motivation.
    • Cognitive evaluation theory: Extrinsic rewards may reduce intrinsic motivation.
  • Self-concordance theory: Goal pursuit aligns with interests and values.
  • Regulatory focus theory: Promotion vs. prevention focus.
  • Job engagement: Investment of physical, cognitive, and emotional energies.

Contemporary Theories: Context-Based

  • Reinforcement theory: Behavior is a function of consequences. Behavior is environmentally caused.
  • Operant conditioning theory: People behave to get desired outcomes or avoid undesired ones.
  • Social-learning theory: Learning through observation and direct experience.

Contemporary Theories: Process-Based

  • Expectancy theory: Motivation depends on expectation of outcome and its attractiveness.
    • Effort–performance relationship.
    • Performance–reward relationship.
    • Rewards–personal goals relationship.
  • Goal-setting theory: Intentions to work toward a goal are a major source of motivation.
    • Goals direct attention, mobilize effort, encourage persistence, and facilitate strategy development.
    • Specific and difficult goals lead to higher performance when accepted.
  • Self-efficacy theory: Belief in one's ability to perform a task.
    • Increased through enactive mastery, vicarious modeling, verbal persuasion, and arousal.

Forms of Organizational Justice

  • Equity theory: Comparison of input/outcome ratios.
    • Inequity can lead to changes in inputs, outcomes, perceptions, referents, or departure.
  • Types of Justice: Distributive, procedural, informational, and interactional.

Integrating Contemporary Theories

  • Exhibit 7.9 provides a visual representation on how to integrate contemporary theories of motivation.

Implications for Managers

  • Consider contemporary theories when assessing motivation.
  • Foster autonomy and align actions with interests and values.
  • Use rewards and reinforcement, but understand the psychological aspects of motivation.
  • Adopt a promotion or prevention focus, depending on the task.
  • Apply motivation theories to enhance job engagement.
  • Set specific, difficult goals.
  • Consider the effects of self-efficacy.
  • Ensure fairness in resource distribution and decision-making.