OB IS FOR EVERYONE
Are managers manipulating
employees when they link
rewards to productivity?
Is this ethical
Why do some managers do
a better job of motivating
people than others?How important is fairness
to you?What can you do if you
think your salary is
“unfair”?When might job redesign
be most appropriate and
motivational too?
Ever wonder why employees
do some strange things?1 What is motivation?y most accounts, Vancouver-based
BC Lions head coach Wally Buono
is not a particularly warm person.^1Buono is a hard taskmaster with his BC
Lions players and coaches, and is not afraid
to make tough decisions. “In this business,
if you stay with the status quo you haven’t
improved yourself,” he said after his team
lost in the 2005 Western final.
Buono wants to coach winners, notlosers. As a coach, Buono has one of the
winningest records in the Canadian
Football League (CFL). His teams have
been to seven Grey Cups, and the BC
Lions had the third-longest winning streak
in CFL history by the middle of the season
in 2005. But then they started losing games.
Buono seems to motivate by being tough. He’s notafraid to criticize his players publicly, and will give them a
long list of their faults during contract negotiations. He
claims that he gives only two performance reviews to play-
ers: “Once when I warn you and once when I cut you.”
Buono’s players may not like him personally, but atthe beginning of the 2005 season they performed well.
Players spent hours in training each day because “guys
wanna get better,” explained slotback Geroy Simon.
Then the team fell apart.
This chapter examines the subject of motivation and
rewards in some detail. It looks at what motivation is, key
motivation theories, and how motivation theories and
reward systems can be used effectively in the workplace.B
107DEFINING MOTIVATION
Following the lead of professors Gary Latham of the Joseph L. Rotman School of
Management at the University of Toronto and Craig Pinder of the Faculty of Business at
the University of Victoria, we define motivationas the internal and external factors
that lead an individual to engage in goal-related behaviour. Motivation can affect the
intensity, direction, and persistence a person shows in working toward a goal.^2 Intensity
is concerned with how hard a person tries. This is what most of us focus on when we talk
about motivation. However, high intensity is unlikely to positively affect job perform-
ance unless the effort is channelled in a directionthat is useful. Finally, the effort requires
persistence.This is a measure of how long a person can maintain his or her effort.
Motivated individuals stay with a task long enough to achieve their goal.
BC Lions
http://www.bclions.com
motivation The internal and
external forces that lead an individ-
ual to work toward a goal.