Leadership is a relatively new movement in the fields of business and psychology. Most see the need for a leader and the results of a leader’s actions, but grasping the concept of leadership is in the early stages. Of the many jobs a leader has, one could argue that motivating his or her followers to be one of the primary roles. But what exactly is motivation? Where does it come from? How can it be best utilized? Bauer and Erdogan (2016) define motivation as “the desire to achieve a goal or a certain performance level, leading to goal-directed behavior” and Pinder (2011) describes motivation as forces that guide the direction, intensity, and persistence of performance behaviors. Motivation is thought to derive from different environments, intrinsically
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The Equity theory in particular is centered around how individuals feel when compared to others in the workplace. If one worker feels they are working harder than another and then finds out that the first worker receives a higher salary, the worker is likely to lose motivation to work as hard for a lesser salary. It is important to note that this theory is about fairness, not equality, and specifically to understanding reactions to fairness or unfairness in the workplace. Cojuharenco and Patient (2013) examine organizational justice in their research. One of the strongest points they bring up revolves around conflict resolution in the workplace. Once a conflict arises, the usual response from management is to go to one of the parties and asked what happened, then go to the other party and ask if that was correct. This results in a one sided story, as the second individual spends most of their time responding to information rather than addressing what happened from their point of view. This can lead to feelings of resentment or strife which would decrease motivation to …show more content…
Some of the biggest takeaways from this theory are for managers or authority of any level to keep communication open and to pay attention to reactions from individuals. This second element is highly important as Cojuharenco and Patient (2013) point out that an employee’s attention to justice in the workplace is “selective”. The researchers elaborated saying that employees are most likely to remember instances of injustice or unfairness, rather than when all attempts were made for justice and fairness. However, this is not to say that one outweighs the other. Supervisors should give time to discuss each complaint without using past instances of corrective justice or fairness to bolster the organization’s defense. This is to give the employee full respect to their thoughts and feelings. Other application aspects are focused on subliminal elements found in an office. Elements such as office dress code, language, holidays observed, and décor should all be carefully
The Equity theory in particular is centered around how individuals feel when compared to others in the workplace. If one worker feels they are working harder than another and then finds out that the first worker receives a higher salary, the worker is likely to lose motivation to work as hard for a lesser salary. It is important to note that this theory is about fairness, not equality, and specifically to understanding reactions to fairness or unfairness in the workplace. Cojuharenco and Patient (2013) examine organizational justice in their research. One of the strongest points they bring up revolves around conflict resolution in the workplace. Once a conflict arises, the usual response from management is to go to one of the parties and asked what happened, then go to the other party and ask if that was correct. This results in a one sided story, as the second individual spends most of their time responding to information rather than addressing what happened from their point of view. This can lead to feelings of resentment or strife which would decrease motivation to …show more content…
Some of the biggest takeaways from this theory are for managers or authority of any level to keep communication open and to pay attention to reactions from individuals. This second element is highly important as Cojuharenco and Patient (2013) point out that an employee’s attention to justice in the workplace is “selective”. The researchers elaborated saying that employees are most likely to remember instances of injustice or unfairness, rather than when all attempts were made for justice and fairness. However, this is not to say that one outweighs the other. Supervisors should give time to discuss each complaint without using past instances of corrective justice or fairness to bolster the organization’s defense. This is to give the employee full respect to their thoughts and feelings. Other application aspects are focused on subliminal elements found in an office. Elements such as office dress code, language, holidays observed, and décor should all be carefully