by Nigel Holmes

Created on: October 31, 2009

Employees who are motivated and happy take fewer sick days, work harder to satisfy your customers, and are less likely to leave So what do you as an employer have to do to attain this happy state?

The good news is that there's no secret. Ever since Frederick Herzberg published his Two Factor Theory of Job Satisfaction, we've know there are two components to motivation. There are those aspects of the job that can reduce motivation, and there are other factors that make work more enjoyable. These are known as hygiene factors, and satisfiers.

Hygiene factors are things in the work environment which cause frustration if they're not right. Attending to them reduces dissatisfaction, but once they're fixed, doing more doesn't increase motivation. For example, imagine you work in an office where the roof leaks. Every time it rains you'll be distracted, and probably annoyed, by the drip, drip, drip. Fix the roof and you'll concentrate more on your work. But going further by painting an elaborate mural on the ceiling won't make you work any harder.

This illustrates the importance of decent working conditions. If employees are too hot or cold, feel a draft, or have to work in poor light or noisy conditions, they will be distracted from their jobs and productivity will suffer.

Another example is having the right tools for the job. If hand tools are needed, make sure they're available and in good condition. If part of the job requires a PC, see that it's able to run all the software as needed and doesn't keep crashing.

Turning to the second component of motivation, satisfiers are things that make the actual work more enjoyable. The start point is to give people interesting work. You can do this by adding responsibilities to the job description, but the real key is to give employees some decision-making authority. Let them decide how a task should be achieved, then give them the responsibility for actually doing it.

Secondly, it's human nature for people to want to know how they are doing. A good manager provides feedback, but why not challenge employees to come up with their own performance measures?

People also like to get some recognition for their efforts, although the form this should take depends on the individual. Not everyone wants to be Employee of the Month; some would rather just be allowed to head home early on Friday after a particularly successful week.

Personal development is another satisfier. Most people want to feel that they are growing in their jobs but this doesn't have to mean attending formal training classes. It could involve developing some new skills so as to provide backup for vacations, gaining a better appreciation of the upstream and downstream functions within the business, or learning techniques to help analyze and solve problems. Whatever it is, employees should be encouraged to learn and grow.

The last point to cover is the role of pay in motivation. Research is ongoing, but Herzberg believed that pay is a hygiene factor. In other words, an employer should pay a fair rate for the job because if people think they are being taken advantage of, they will be demotivated. However, once pay is perceived to be fair, increases don't result in higher motivation.

The bottom line on motivation is this: managers should try to remove those irritants that distract from getting the work done, and then concentrate on making the work itself more interesting and satisfying.

For further reading: Herzberg

Learn more about this author, Nigel Holmes.
Click here to send this author comments or questions.