Workplace Motivation Paper

As corporations strive to boost earnings in an increasingly competitive environment, they inevitably turn their attention to the issue of employee productivity. When employees are unsatisfied with their current work situation, productivity decreases, tension builds in the workplace, and morale becomes very low. Companies have known historically that morale affects productivity, yet management has struggled to come to terms with the factors that can create positive morale and an environment that attracts and retains workers and encourages them to produce.

When I first started working for Acroprint, I did not see any type of motivational techniques. Production personnel were not permitted outside the production or break room area. Office personal and all but one warehouse personnel were not allowed in the production area. All employees were assigned a specific position and that is what each did all day, every day. Evaluations and pay raises were given every six months with no sign of advancement. This type or work motivation is called extrinsic, employees work for the pay, sick & vacation time, and insurance benefits. It was a quit, slow paced work environment. After a few years engineering designs improved to the product, which made assembly easier and faster. However, the increase in productivity was minimal. This invoked the managers to force employees to work faster by giving them a quota to meet and if their quota was not met, punishment would range from a warning to time off without pay and eventually dismissal. By doing this, employees started looking for employment elsewhere causing a tremendous amount of turnover.

Mr. Robbins, the owner decided to put a more decisive measure in place by allowing those employees willing to learn different positions and those who showed improvement promotions and an increase in pay. This type of motivational strategy is called intrinsic. Eventually, employees were able to apply for jobs in other departments. After a few more years passed, the company encouraged employees to recruit other members of their family into the company. One reason is the reason of good genes and brains. The Company believes that if a person is an asset to the company and sees that the offspring are developing into the same kind of person with the same kind of work ethics and brains, the company will do well to get the next generation of these people to work for them as well. This could also be because of continuity. Working for one company can become a tradition of sorts for some families and this assures the company that their work ethic and other company traditions continues without the company having to re-orient the employee of such rules and such a work culture.

Acroprint believed in the merits of a multi-generation staff often give out incentives to their employees that can bring in qualified candidates to fill in certain positions in the corporation. Among the incentives that Acroprint gave to their employees who did bring in successful applicants that belong to their family are vacations, raises, commissions and other such incentives. There are also families who want their members working in the same company as they are in so that they can keep track of their loved one's progress career wise as well as be able to have another thing to share, this being a company that they have in common. This kind of a mentality has indeed created a few companies that are composed of a few families only, with brothers, sisters and parents as well as a few cousins working side by side. Whether or not this kind of a set up is ideal remains to be seen in the companies that encourage such a set up. Unfortunately, the hiring of relatives came to a halt. As to the reason, other employees felt they were being treated unfair compared to those who had family members working in other departments.

Every business enterprise wishes to continuously improve the job satisfaction levels of employees as much as possible within their particular constraint and resource allowance. As can be seen from the number of theories, illustrations and conditions, most of which are extremely fluid, there