Work motivation has been an important component of industrial and organizational psychology since the 1930s (Donovan, 2001:55) and continues to play an important role in organizational research (Büssing, 2001:372). The amount of research on motivation has varied through time. During the 1930s and 1940s, work motivation became prevalent through drive theories i.e. reinforcement or need theories. While the 1950s and 1960s showed a decrease in the amount of attention on work motivation, however further theories were developed based on the cognitive perspective which provided the basis for future theories in the 1960s such as Vroom (1964) or Locke (1968). The 1980s were characterized by researcher trying to co-ordinate the various theories together which resulted in a focus on goal based theory (Kanfer, 1990:76). While most of the drive theories have fallen out of favor in the research community (Kanfer, 1990) the theories remains strongly in the today's literature (Donovan, 2001:53). Research in work motivation has lead to a large scope of result “about both the factors and processes of behavior and performance in the workplace” (Büssing, 2001:372). Even though most people have an intuitive idea of what motivation is it can be difficult to describe or define properly (Petri et al, 2004:16). Motivation can easily be explained by classifying an employee function at three levels (Mol, 1990:42).
Tags: Work motivation, Work inspiration, Work motivation theories, Employee motivation, Motivation theories
[...] GST is widely accepted and one of the most popular work motivation theory (Donovan 2001:63-64) Bandura's social cognitive Theory Overview: Social cognitive Theory is based on Bandura's Social Learning Theory but is more goals oriented such those goals held by individual are one of the main determinants in behaviour. Social cognitive Theory (SCT) was developed by Bandura (1986) and is comprised of four main characteristic which interact with one another (Donovan, 2001:66-68) Goal establishment: Refers to the process by which individuals create goals and standard that corresponds to their desired behavioural state. [...]
[...] On the whole it seems that the VIE model does provide a valid and useful valid model of work motivation as it is often used as the basis of organisational compensation and is relatively clear cut and coherent (Donovan, 2001:58) Goal based theories Overview: Goal based theory have existed in the work literature for a long time. As early as Ach in 1935 in determining tendencies to Lewin (1961) research on level of aspirations and Ryan (1958) research on intentions, goal have had a predominant place in the work motivation study. [...]
[...] However work motivation is generally defined in the motivational literature as set of energetic forces that originates both within as well as beyond an individual's being, to initiate work-related behaviour, and to determine its form, direction, intensity and duration (Pinder, 1998:11). In order to make sense of what work motivation is, people often assign work motivation with a state or behaviour (overt or covert). For example deprivation level, effort, degree of satisfaction are common synonym of work motivation (Campbell and Pritchard, 1976:64) however motivation is not directly apparent (Kanfer, 1990:78) which is part of the reason why motivation is so hard to define, “Work motivation is simply a term used which identify a body of theory which can be distinguished from other theoretical domains” (Campbell et al, 1976:64). [...]
[...] Firstly Kanfer (1990) heuristic framework is analysed and then Büssing (2001) taxonomy of work motivation is investigated and used in this chapter Kanfer (1990) Heuristic Framework for motivational theories The three groups of theories Kanfer (1990) created to sort out the different work motivation theories are: Need-motive-value theories, Cognitive choice theories and Self-regulation-metacognition theories. Kanfer classification of the motivation theories comes as a result of the different nomological construct and processes they focused on Need-motive-values theories consist of theories such as but not limited to Maslow's hierarchy of need, Deci's cognitive evaluation theory, Atkinson's achievement theory (1957) and Hackman and Lawler job characteristic theory (1971). [...]
[...] Instrumentality theory of work motivation: Some experimental results and suggested modifications [monograph], Journal of Applied Psychology, 53: 1-25. Greenberg, J. (1982). Approaching equity and avoiding inequity in groups and organizations. In J. Greenberg & R. Cohen (Eds.) Equity and justice in social behavior. New York: Academic Press. pp: 389-436. Greenberg, J. (1988). Equity and workplace status: A field experiment, Journal of Applied Psychology, 73: 606-613. Greenberg, J. and Ornstein, S. (1983). High status job title as compensation for underpayment: A test of equity theory, Journal of Applied Psychology, 68: 285-297. [...]
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