Motivation is subjective!
Any economic organisation will seek to coordinate the actions of groups of people and to motivate those people to carry out certain tasks, hence motivation is a large part of a firm's ability to progress and achieve its overall objective and bottom line goals, therein lies the art & science of employee motivation!
Some multinationals (no less) have made the grave assumption that the planet is inhabited by essentially one race and culture and that we are all motivated in the same way.
Ofcourse the seminal work of Maslow and many other motivational theorists are not to be underestimated but a deeper understanding of operating environment and culture is required by the international human resources manager.
To some its obvious, if there is a positive correlation between the hours worked and the money earned provided you like your job, then a recipe for motivation is found; the American style may work for some, mostly individualistic cultures but not for others, a hard lesson learnt by the giant Lincoln electric.
Lincoln's piecework & bonus reward system was exceptional and attracted those who were willing to work hard to earn big, hence turnover was below industry average, there was never any problem to get staff to work overtime, in fact the company had to make a rule that employees were disallowed from commencing work more than half an hour prior the start of their shift. A match made in heaven you could say!
To the company's horror in the early 1990s when it made a number of international acquisitions, this reward system didn't sit too well with the French and other nations, sick leaves were high, no willingness to work overtime and turnover was higher than industry average.
In a century of doing business, Lincoln made losses due to the failure of the acquisitions.
Lincoln would have faired well by employing a comprehensive study to truly understand what motivates employees in different countries.
Some would rank flexibility higher than financial reward as their community requires their attendance to frequent functions and if pushed too far would rather find a different employer.
Intrinsic rewards verses extrinsic rewards, self motivation and sense of belonging to an organisation all may play a role, motivation is essentially subjective, there is no one solution fits all across oceans!
Any economic organisation will seek to coordinate the actions of groups of people and to motivate those people to carry out certain tasks, hence motivation is a large part of a firm's ability to progress and achieve its overall objective and bottom line goals, therein lies the art & science of employee motivation!
Some multinationals (no less) have made the grave assumption that the planet is inhabited by essentially one race and culture and that we are all motivated in the same way.
Ofcourse the seminal work of Maslow and many other motivational theorists are not to be underestimated but a deeper understanding of operating environment and culture is required by the international human resources manager.
To some its obvious, if there is a positive correlation between the hours worked and the money earned provided you like your job, then a recipe for motivation is found; the American style may work for some, mostly individualistic cultures but not for others, a hard lesson learnt by the giant Lincoln electric.
Lincoln's piecework & bonus reward system was exceptional and attracted those who were willing to work hard to earn big, hence turnover was below industry average, there was never any problem to get staff to work overtime, in fact the company had to make a rule that employees were disallowed from commencing work more than half an hour prior the start of their shift. A match made in heaven you could say!
To the company's horror in the early 1990s when it made a number of international acquisitions, this reward system didn't sit too well with the French and other nations, sick leaves were high, no willingness to work overtime and turnover was higher than industry average.
In a century of doing business, Lincoln made losses due to the failure of the acquisitions.
Lincoln would have faired well by employing a comprehensive study to truly understand what motivates employees in different countries.
Some would rank flexibility higher than financial reward as their community requires their attendance to frequent functions and if pushed too far would rather find a different employer.
Intrinsic rewards verses extrinsic rewards, self motivation and sense of belonging to an organisation all may play a role, motivation is essentially subjective, there is no one solution fits all across oceans!
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