Motivational Tools and the Productivity of Office Professionals
Chapter One
Objectives of the Study
The primary objective of this study is to acquire a deeper comprehension of motivational tools imployed by public service and its effect on job performance.
This research therefore seeks to:
- Determine the effect of employee well-being on the level of effectiveness of the office professionals.
- Determine the effect of employee relationship with managers on the level of efficiency of the office professionals.
- Examine the effect of compensation on the level of effectiveness of the office professionals.
- Examine the effect of training and career development on the level of efficiency of the office professionals.
- Determine the influence of employee motivation on organizational productivity.
CHAPTER TWO
LITERATURE REVIEW
Conceptual Framework
Motivation
What is Motivation? James and Stoner (2009) Suggested that motivation can be seen as those psychological characteristics of humans that contribute to an individual’s level of commitment towards a goal. It comprises several elements that causes, directs, and sustains an individual’s behavior in a specific way. He went further to say that motivation is one of a number of elements that affect an organization’s productivity and performance levels respectively.
Jennifer and George (2006) defined motivation as a mental force that governs the direction of an individual’s behavior in an organization, an individual’s level of effort, and an individual’s level of determination when faced with obstacles. In addition she stated that even with appropriate strategies and administrative structures in place, an organization can only be productive if its employees are sufficiently motivated to perform at higher levels.
Hellriegel (1996) viewed motivation as any impact that brings out, guides, or sustains a person’s goal-directed behaviors. Ivancevich (1994) Suggested that motivation refers to those set of forces that triggers certain behaviors and regulates its form, course, intensity and duration. Obikeze (2005) viewed motivation as the process of guiding an employee’s actions towards a particular end via the manipulation of rewards.
Kreitner (1995) described motivation as the mental process giving behaviors the will-power, drive, and tendency to act in a certain way in order to attain certain unsatisfied needs. Young (2000) also suggested that motivation could be defined in relation to forces within employees that justifies the levels, directions, and resolution as regards efforts they expend in the workplace. George and Jones (2012) termed work motivation as self- induced forces that control the directions and behavioral patterns of the workforce in an organization taking into account their levels of commitment and enthusiasm towards the successful accomplishment of set goals.
Berelson and Staines (2003) opined that motivation is an inner state that inspires actions as well as direct and channel behavior towards a goal. Guay, Chanal, Ratelle, Marsh, Larose & Boivin (2010) argued that motivation deals with “the motives underlying behaviors”. In addition, (Broussard & Garrison, 2004) defined motivation simply as “those elements that pushes an individual to act or not to act”.
Beach (2005) described motivation as the individual’s readiness to expend energy so as to accomplish set goals. He is of the opinion that motivation relates to a person’s enthusiasm for specific patterns or behaviors. Also he further stated that the ambitions, needs and wants of a person may influence, direct and control their attitude. Davies (2005) suggested that the concept of motivation entails what goes on inside a person that results certain behaviors. As regards organizations, he stresses that an absence of motivation is reason enough for a civil servant not to attain gratification from the work.
Types of Motivation
Lin (2007) proposed that motivation can either be intrinsic or extrinsic. In the workplace as well as other settings, motivation is often classified as being naturally extrinsic or intrinsic (Martocchio, 2006). Lin, 2007; Ryan & Deci (2000) also identified several classes of motivation namely; extrinsic and intrinsic motivation.
Intrinsic motivation: can be referred to as motivation derived from within the individual or from the activity itself, it can be said to have an affirmative outcome on the conduct, performance and well-being of an individual (Ryan & Deci, 2000).
In the workplace, it springs from impulses that are characteristic of the work itself .It is what office professionals derive because of their success in completing a task. Such Intrinsically motivated rewards comprises the chance to showcase expertise and abilities, receive gratitude, good recognition, freedom, responsibility and mutual respect. A civil servant that is inherently inspired, according to George and Jones (2012) would be devoted to his job for as long as he believes the job is able to satisfy his wants. Intrinsically driven work conduct are behaviors performed for one’s own sake, that is, the inspiration to work emanates from within the individual. Here the civil servant is motivated because he derives happiness in doing the job.
Intrinsic Motivational Factors
Although there are various forms of intrinsic motivation, this study focuses on an employee’s wellbeing, employee’s relationship with co-office professionals as well as their managers as factors that may influence an employee’s productivity levels in an organization. Intrinsic motivation, derived from within an individual or from the nature of the work itself, positively influences behavior, wellbeing and productivity (Ryan & Deci, 2000). These factors are discussed below;
Employee Well-being
The concept of employee’s well-being in most organizations has become a thing of great interest in recent years. In today’s world, the increasing reliance on overall market forces places a considerable load on salary earners and those of working age as regards delivery of goods and services. Consequently this has adversely affected the health, safety and general wellbeing of the workforce. Therefore the well-being of a workforce cannot be underestimated as office professionals also have similar needs be it physical or emotional. These needs may vary ranging from welfare, security, health and a sense that they are capable of coping with life. Employees now look to their organizations for assistance in achieving this because a significant amount of their time and lives are expended at work. Most business establishments around the globe understand the necessity for a healthy workforce as they are crucial in enhancing an organization’s productivity levels and fiscal performance. As such, most organizations take giant strides in a bid to improve the welfare of their workforces by implementing several health and productivity programs that is aimed at promoting the well-being of their workforce.
CHAPTER THREE
RESEARCH METHODS
Research Design
Descriptive research design and causal research design as well as the survey method was used. Descriptive research design was used to describe some phenomena because it aids a researcher in gathering, summarizing, presenting and interpreting information for the purpose of clarification while the causal research design was used to describe the effect of one variable on another that is establish cause and effect relationship (Mugenda & Mugenda, 2003). The researcher also utilized the survey strategy for this study because it creates room for gathering large amounts of data from a sizeable population in a cost-effective way (Osuagwu, 2006).
Population of the Study
The study population was 475 office professionals in Nigerian Custom service. The research instrument would be surveyed on the workforce of the agency considering the fact that they all fall under the category of employees within an organization (Osuagwu, 2006; Ngechu, 2006).
sampling and sample size
The sample size was calculated using the “sample size determining for research activity table” by (Krejcie and Morgan, 1970). In estimating the sample size, a 5 percent margin of error (confidence interval) and 95 percent confidence level was used. The sample size for the study therefore is two hundred and seventeen (217) for a sample population of four hundred and seventy five (475)
The Sampling Technique
The stratified random sampling was utilized in this study. This was done by segmenting the office professionals based on their job status ranging from senior civil servant, junior civil servant, contract and casual office professionals. This technique is appropriate in order to ensure that every element in the sampling frame has an equal opportunity of being selected (Eshiteti, Okaka, Maragia, Odera & Akerele, 2013, Oladipo & AbdulKadir, 2011; Singh & Masuku, 2014).
Sources of Data Collection
Primary source of data was used for gathering data in this research work. It is the data collected for the purpose of the research, these are the responses generated or obtained from administered questionnaires (Mugenda & Mugenda, 2003).
The questionnaire research instrument was used in this research work to gather information because it helps to access a large number of respondents at a minimal cost. The data collected would be gathered, sorted, and analyzed with the use of Statistical Package for Social Sciences.
CHAPTER FOUR
PRESENTATION, ANALYSIS AND INTERPRETATION OF RESULTS
Socio-demographic Profile of the Respondents
This section shows the reported demographic profile of the sample, showing distribution in terms of gender, age, academic qualification, marital status and job status.
TABLE 4.2.1: Demographic Profile
CHAPTER FIVE
DISCUSSION OF FINDINGS RECOMMENDATIONS AND CONCLUSION
Discussion of Findings
Objective 1: To determine the effect of employee well-being on the level of effectiveness of the office professionals.
The findings of this study are based on statistical data analyses and hypothesis testing. The descriptive analysis of data collected revealed that the above stated employee well-being is a significant predictor of effectiveness. Therefore, the alternate hypothesis which states that employee well-being has a significant effect on the level of effectiveness of the civil servant is accepted and the null hypothesis rejected.
These findings corroborate the findings of Lin (2013) in the research titled assessment of intrinsic and extrinsic motivation on employee productivity. Findings from the study revealed that intrinsic factors like employee well-being and organizational policy have a significant effect on office professionals effectiveness which is also a measure of productivity. This was further validated by Jibowo (2007) establishing that intrinsic motivation is a significant predictor of employee effectiveness and plays a major role in improving civil servant performance and productivity levels in an organization. He further stated that managers should ensure that employee’s well-being is taken seriously and that office professionals are extrinsically well rewarded to remain intrinsically committed to their jobs.
Objective 2: To determine the effect of employee relationship with managers on the level of efficiency of the office professionals.
The findings from the study revealed that employee relationship with managers is a significant predictor of civil servant efficiency as a measure of productivity. As such the alternate hypothesis which states that employee relationship with managers has a significant effect on the level of efficiency of the office professionals was accepted while the null was rejected. Findings also showed that it had a minimal effect on the level of efficiency of the civil servant as such was not rated as highly as expected. This could be due to the fact that other factors could also affect the efficiency of office professionals which may not be intrinsic in nature. These factors could be extrinsic such as compensation, training and career development etc. also it could be due to other intrinsic factors like organizational policies which may not have been included in this study.
These findings agree with Centres and Bugental (2007) in their study of the relationship between motivational factors and office professionals performance using the two factor theory where effectiveness and efficiency were used as measures of performance. It was discovered that there was a significant relationship between both intrinsic and extrinsic factors and civil servant efficiency levels. Taylor (1992) further supported in his statement that extrinsic factors tend to be rated more highly than intrinsic factors especially for those at lower levels of the organization. He further stated that employees who enjoy friendly relationships with their co-office professionals both within and outside the workplace tend to be very efficient at their jobs than those who don’t.
Objective 3: To examine the effect of compensation on the level of effectiveness of the office professionals. The findings from the study reveals that compensation is a significant predictor of civil servant effectiveness. As such the alternate hypothesis which states that compensation has a significant effect on the level of effectiveness of the civil servant was accepted while the null was rejected. Findings also showed that compensation was rated highly by the respondents and is believed to have a great effect on the level of effectiveness of the office professionals. This could be due to the fact that extrinsic factors especially monetary rewards tend to appeal more to office professionals especially in developing nations where the standard of living is poor and basic amenities are lacking is seen as a way of fulfilling other needs which intrinsic factors may not provide.
These findings correspond with the findings of Taylor & Vest (1992) in his research, which investigated the influence of monetary incentives and its removal on office professionals performance and productivity; it was observed that subjects in the experimental group who received monetary incentives performed better than those who did not. Also (Assam, 2002) further pointed out in his study that extrinsic factors like adequate compensation tend to positively influence the level of a civil servant’s effectiveness much more than intrinsic factors.
Objective 4: To examine the effect of training and career development on the level of efficiency of the office professionals.
The findings from the study revealed that training and career development is a significant predictor of civil servant efficiency. As such the alternate hypothesis which states that training and career development has a significant effect on the level of efficiency of the civil servant was accepted while the null was rejected. Findings also showed that only “training and career development” was deemed statistically significant. This could be due to the fact that although extrinsic factors especially monetary rewards tend to appeal more to office professionals, training and career development provides them with opportunity for growth through skill acquisition. Also the lack of required tools, skills and resources necessary to carry out their work efficiently in an organization may also affect the level of efficiency of the civil servant. Furthermore, lack of adequate job schedule may also be responsible for inefficiency in most organizations.
Similarly, Lake (2000) in his study which is of importance to this research investigated the correlation between motivation and job performance using employee effectiveness, efficiency , commitment and innovation levels as a measure of performance. The study concluded that most office professionals in developed nations placed more importance on intrinsic factors than those in less developed nations who opted for extrinsic factors citing the need to satisfy other needs as a major criteria for their choice. He further stated that the need for career growth through training and development was deemed a major criterion for improved level of efficiency of office professionals citing the acquisition of necessary skills as a determining factor.
Conclusions
Employees are and should be considered the most vital above other factors of production, the most valuable resource available to an organization. This is because they are an integral part of the organization as such it is very important for organizations, in pursuit of a competitive edge, to ensure that the satisfaction of their employees is made a top priority. This is to ensure that employees display positive attitude to work through improved performance and productivity levels. Also it is important to note that a lack of adequate motivation results in low productivity and vice versa.
Furthermore the advent of Globalization has resulted in the ability of different organizations to source for employees across several countries and the previously existing barriers have been reduced, this has resulted in higher competition for personnel with the right skills and experience. As such it is important for employers and their managers who value their civil servant to recognize those factors that affect employee performance and productivity levels on the job or in the workplace and ensure they are fulfilled accordingly. (Brown & Yashioka, 2003; and Sinha & Sinha, 2012). The concept of motivation may be complex particularly in the workplace and may pose a serious challenge to managers as it is relative to individuals. This is because people differ in what they need and want as such what may be seen as a source of motivation to an individual may not seem so to another. As such managers tend to find it extremely difficult in coping with such a dilemma in trying to figure out how to keep members of the workforce motivated. Although, several factors may affect civil servant productivity levels in an organization such as organizational culture, leadership style, organizational strategy and structure etc. The aspect of Motivation however plays a major role in improving civil servant productivity levels and therefore should not be underestimated. This study concludes that employee motivation be it intrinsic or extrinsic in nature has a significant effect and is a predictor of productivity levels in an organization. It also concludes that both intrinsic and extrinsic factors of motivation appeal to employees and a right mix of both is essential in bringing out best performances from a workforce. These findings validate the Herzberg twofactor theory, Maslow’s hierarchy of needs theory and Vroom’s expectancy Theory. From the findings of the study one can deduce that most office professionals perceive extrinsic motivation as generally having a larger influence on the psychological aspects of employee productivity. We also found that intrinsic motivation is of importance to employee productivity, albeit to a lesser extent psychologically but rather as a part of the total package that is offered to the employee by an organization.
Recommendations
The following recommendations are made based on the findings of the study;
- Managers must ensure employees are adequately motivated. Employee well-being should be given due consideration and health and well-being programs should be organized to cater for the needs and welfare of employees.
- Management should encourage interpersonal relations amongst co-office professionals and their managers to promote a sense of belonging and unity amongst civil servant. Also managers should ensure employees are involved in decision making processes and given a chance to air their views.
- Also management must ensure they create a work environment that is conducive for office professionals with adequate working conditions as well as providing the right tools and resources to ensure civil servant effectiveness in discharging their respective duties.
- Furthermore proper scheduling of job activities is key to achieving efficiency in the workplace. Adequate compensation packages in form of monetary or non-monetary rewards are essential in order to ensure that employees stay productive. Management should ensure that rewards and benefits are fairly, justly and competitively allocated to employees.
- Management must also strive to ensure that all employees engage in training programs to acquire new skills and also have equal opportunity to utilize their skills and competencies. Management should make sure that career development opportunities are clearly communicated to employees.
- An established career path and an adequate development plan should be put in place for employees, development programs should be linked to each employees career needs and not just the organization’s needs. Employees should be selected for sponsored training programs fairly and justly.
- Organizations should ensure that performance management provides adequate information about strength and weaknesses of employees in form of feedback from employee evaluations.
- Employees who offer the same level of inputs with respect to skills, efforts, qualifications, experience, should be entitled to equitable outcomes in terms of pay, promotion, job security, and opportunity for advancement. Additional inputs and outstanding performance should entitle an employee to additional rewards.
Finally, this study recommends that management should make policies that aids in ensuring that employees are adequately extrinsically motivated to remain intrinsically motivated on the job. This will in turn enhance or boost employee morale resulting in a competitive edge through higher commitment levels, employee engagement, lower turnover and improved performance and productivity levels.
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