Motivating a Theory Y practitioner!

The chapter ‘Motivation’, during my undergrad, was one of the most interesting chapters to me. During the span of eight semesters, I repeatedly studied motivation in eight subjects (management, psychology, OB, sales force management etc.) After being confident in the theories like Maslow’s need theory, Hertzberg’s theory, Equity theory, and all, I thought I had mastered in this topic. But, when it came to apply in my workplace I then understood the thing ‘motivation’ is more an art than science.

As a theory ‘Y’ believer and a practitioner, I was self-motivated to the work and I was always ready to take on more responsibilities, work more hours, and take everything as an opportunity to learn. I thought this would continue till the rest but, at one point of time, things started changing. Now, at this date (when I am writing this blog), I am not so excited about my work. Nowadays, I seldom check my emails before reaching my office compared to early morning coffee-time reply and I have strictly changed my office time from late night works to general time of 10-5. I am not so interested to take on more responsibilities. The view of “Through increased responsibilities, I am learning more and more” is now changed into “I am making all the hard efforts to make my boss earn more and more”. When I thought about it, I came to the conclusion that this is because of the lack of motivation. And, now I think, practitioners of theory Y also need continuous motivation. 

“What sorts of needs are unfulfilled to get demotivated?” I questioned myself. I had a good paycheck, a decision making authority, a respect from the subordinates, recognition from the clients and a very good appraisal.  There is no point on getting demotivated. And then after weeks of incubation, I identified that my workplace had missed an important component “flow of positive energy/synergy”. One of our team members wasn’t supportive/receptive, was too defensive and didn’t appreciate our feedbacks/inputs. Although we tried a lot, we couldn’t change the person and, to my surprise, our days passed on unwanted arguments to the level which at some point of time disrupted the balance in our team. Despite having other needs fulfilled, this eroded the motivation in our team. That’s not an unfulfilled need but one of the most important things for a group where they work as a team.

This made me understand more that motivation is not only about unfulfilled needs, desire, hygiene, satisfaction but also about the passion of the team, the synergy they create, and the positive energy they pass on. Unlike traditional school of thoughts, it is not only your supervisor or your subordinate responsible to motivate you, but you are responsible to pass on the energy, confidence, and motivate your team. Motivation is not about top-down, bottom-up or across-the-line, in fact it has no approach. One single person is not responsible to motivate you; rather you are responsible to motivate every single person in your team. 

Taking the role of a Human Resource Personnel

My decision to join a startup company 17 months back made me lucky enough to gain experiences over all the departments. I am fortunate to get the opportunity to play the role in a HR department. Me, myself, being an employee and also playing the role of a HR personnel provided me the opportunity the learn things from both perspective, and, most importantly, I learnt how to balance the interest of employee and an employeer.

By nature, employer wants the employee to work the most at a lowest possible cost. But, in the other hand, employee wants to get the maximum payment with a minimum level of effort on it. Here is where the HR role comes in, becoming a spokesperson of both and bridging the gap between expectation and delivery. Here are some of my insights on the role of a HR personnel:

• Always have a smiling face, keep your voice calm and try to make it full of melody.
  
• You are the one to find if everyone is OK and ready for the job. So, go and talk, talk and talk with everyone. Make them excited, make them prepared, make them enthusiastic.
  
• If you find an employee in a problem make sure the employee feels that his problem is recognized and will be given attention. (It is not always necessary that you put effort in solving the problem, but create such an environment where the employee thinks you are trying to help him/her)
  
• Be proactive, identify the team players and the isolated ones. Conduct events to socialize the latter ones.
  
• Never make delay to thank employees. Thanking for a job is the best incentive that an employee can get.
  
• Create a self-motivated work teams.
  
• Always make the employee feel special and communicate that they are important for the organisation.
  
• Keep your personal ego outside the main door of the office.
  
• Maintain the same level of professional relationship with the colleagues who may be (1) your high school's best friend or (2) your ex's new boyfriend.
  
• Make sure that they like you. If they don't, it's time to hop the job.

HR management is not only about forecasting the HR needs, writing job description, vacancy announcement, recruitment, selection, placement, orientation, training, compensation management, appraisal ... blah blah blah but also a deep study of human behavior and the exploration of the ways to mould the employee behaviour in ways that benefits the organisation. Always remember a HR mantra, "person-job-fit and person-organisation-fit is the key to HR success".