TeamCGrouppaper1

Assignment 1: Teamwork and Motivation
Carlton Wilkinson
Team C
Leadership and Organizational BUS520
Dr. McGrath
February 15, 2015

INTRODUCTION
Motivation is defined as the process that initiates, guides, and maintains goal oriented behaviors. It increases the alertness of the workers to work, which increases productivity and capability of the organization. Motivation is a key component in establishing any form of organizational productivity. In order to be successful, companies must utilize the three components of motivation; which are activation, persistence, and intensity. A company must be able to analyze, evaluate, and understand the characteristics of a team member and utilize their skills that will contribute to the design, along with the structure of an organization. As the owner of a small company, our motivational plan will consist of increasing sales, while lowering cost to the consumer and building a reputation of on-time delivery.
COMPONENTS OF A MOTIVATIONAL PLAN
Productivity of employees is a key element to the sustainability and success of any company. Considering that we are a small company of only 50 employees, it is essential that we keep our employees enthused about going to work. According to Carter, the conditions that can cause problems with motivation and morale entail employee satisfaction, career security, compensation, job enrichment, good work environment, and a general feeling by employees that their efforts are being appreciated (Carter, 2013). Clearly, it is critical to our company to establish a positive and safe work environment that inspires employees to make quality products. “When employees are motivated, the sales of merchandise may not only be at expected levels but go above and beyond more than requested” (Carter, 2013). We understand that happy employees means high job satisfaction and performance, which is why we provide our employees with an assortment of amenities, services, and incentives. Here at Woo Woo’s, we understand that our employees have families that value them as much as we do so we strive to try to accommodate them in maintaining work life and family life balance by providing an onsite childcare facility. Additionally, as part of our wellness initiative program and an effort to promote sound fitness along with good health, we will provide a fitness center at no cost to our employees. “Meeting the needs of employees improves worker performance, reduces employee insecurities, boost future job security, and shows workers they can still manage their daily lives”. (Imberman, 2012). Success can only occur if we provide our employees with services to support the care of not only their children but their health as well. It relieves some of the stress of trying to balance between personal and professional life. We also believe investing in our employee’s education, in order to develop professionally within our business. Tuition reimbursement is provided to all our employees that want to further their education. An additional incentive provided to our employees, will consist of compensation for employee of the month and annual safety bonus.
MOTIVATIONAL THEORY
Here at Woo Woo’s, we will utilize the expectancy theory as the motivational support that centers our plan to build and continue a successful company. According to Vroom, expectancy theory behavior results from conscious choices among alternatives whose purpose is to maximize pleasure and to minimize pain. Vroom realized that an employee 's performance is based on individual factors such as personality, skills, knowledge, experience and abilities. He stated that effort, performance and motivation are linked in a person 's motivation (Vroom, 1964). There are three variables that supports Vroom’s theory and they are expectancy, instrumentality, and valence.
Expectancy - The belief that increased effort will lead to increased performance
Instrumentality - the belief that if you perform well that a valued outcome will be received. The degree to which a first level outcome will lead to the second level outcome
Valence - the importance that the individual places upon the expected outcome.
At Woo Woo’s, we want our employees to feel appreciated for their commitment, dedication and hard work. Supporting our employees is a goal that we strive to maintain. “Even the small wins can boost individual’s motivation and performance” (Amabile and Kramer, 2011). Our mission at Woo Woo’s is to maintain a successful company, provide excellence for our employees and their families, and great customer assistance to our customers. Here at Woo Woo’s, we make sure that our employees have the support from supervisors needed in order to complete their task and have the right skills to fulfill our company mission.
3 WAYS TO MOTIVATE THE MINIMUM WAGE SERVICE WORKER
“Sixty-nine percent stated that they motivate such employees to better performance with incentives such as; bonuses, prizes or promotions” (Workforce, 1998). “Finally, 53 percent said they’ve had to give benefits to minimum wage workers because they were unable to retain them with pay alone” (Workforce, 1998). Here are a few recommendations to motivate low waged workers as similar to Burger King Theory (Workforce, 1998):
Make the work environment a fun place to work. Burger King Restaurant employees usually celebrate birthdays, anniversaries and recognize outstanding performance with a party. Store employees will organize softball teams and bowling leagues. Encourage activities that bring unity and teamwork.
Offer flexible schedules.
Offer bonuses - Burger King offers an anniversary bonus to employees for completing each year of service. The compensation escalates with the employees’ years of service.
Offer benefits - Burger King offers a benefit program for full-time employees at its company-owned restaurants (3 percent are company-owned) who average 30 hours of work a week. Usually when workers see that a company is offering great incentives as mentioned above they are more inclined to be motivated to perform better.
WORK TEAM GUIDE
Teamwork is an essential component to accomplish a task. You must have the right attitude, the right behavior and a leadership outlook to overcome difficulties, in order to achieve goals. It is obvious in most team environments there will be challenges to overcome. Furthermore, it is important to communicate the culture of each individual worker in order to enhance team performance regardless if there is no pressure, because the team’s enthusiasm along with their spirit with differently reflect the quality of the performance of their work. Within cross functional teams there are also some advantages and disadvantages as well.
Advantages: You can greatly increase creativity and problem solving with the use of cross-functional teams because of their composition.
Disadvantages: The team can take significantly longer to develop cohesion because members come from different experiences and backgrounds. Moreover, a team leader must take control in managing team relationships carefully because there may be a high level of conflict in these teams due to unit rivalry, egos and possible conflict between the interests of the various parts of the organization represented by team members.
Below is a list of some examples to lead a work team:
Collecting, organizing and analyzing information
Planning and organizing meeting times
Solving Problems
Gaining team commitment from everyone
Devolving responsibility/accountability to teams
TEAM REFLECTION
Reflecting on my individual experience with working with my team, I can truly say that I enjoyed my experience. We did not have just one leader; however we had three leaders. We had three individuals who took the initiative to guide us through our project. They helped us stay focused and organized. We met a total of 6 times through free conference call, which I was able to set up and give to our group leaders. We did run into a few issues while during our project such as schedules, times zones, and personal and family issues. Others issues we faced we people added to our group at the last minute. In the future I would take charge and use more of my leadership skills throughout the project and not just when needed. I would take more of and initative and not just take a behind the scene role. The most important lesson learned from this experience is no matter who the leader is as long as you have a group of hard working students you can do an excellent job through teamwork and motivation.

CONCLUSION
In conclusion, motivation is the essential key within an organization when establishing productivity. A company has to take the three components of motivation and use the skills of each member of the team to showcase why the company can and will strive for excellence. With any organization, in order to keep the morale uplifted, managers and supervisor have to find ways to keep the employees enthused each week while coming to work. Happy employees mean job satisfaction and higher performance levels; this enables a small company to provide incentives to employees for a job well done and makes the employee’s realize that they picked the right organization to work for. The mission at our company, Woo Woo’s, is ensuring that we are successful and we provide the best customer service that any small business can offer. Working together as a team and tackling each disadvantage and advantage of a team environment, can only showcase the reason for building a stronger organization. A company with a prominent dynamic culture will prove our method of making our company marketable, relevant and a force to be dealt with in the business. Building a great team is important and having the right people in place can only enhance the success of this company on a long term playing field.

REFERENCES
Carter, T. (2013). Global Leadership. Journal Of Management Policy & Practice, 14(1), 69-74.
(n.d.). Retrieved January 31, 2015, from http://education-portal.com/academy/lesson/cross-functional-teams-definition-advantages-disadvantages.html
Expectancy Theory. (n.d.). Retrieved February 15, 2015 from http://valuebasedmanagement.net/methods_vroom_expectancy_theory.html
Amabile and Kramer 's Progress Theory: Using Small Wins to Enhance Motivation. (n.d.). Retrieved February 15, 2015, from http://www.mindtools.com/pages/article/progress-theory.htm
Imberman, W. (2012). Motivating Employees: What Works? What Doesn 't Work?. Foundry Management & Technology, 140(11), 23-26. Workforce, August 1998, Vol. 77, No. 8, p. 57.

References: Carter, T. (2013). Global Leadership. Journal Of Management Policy & Practice, 14(1), 69-74. (n.d.). Retrieved January 31, 2015, from http://education-portal.com/academy/lesson/cross-functional-teams-definition-advantages-disadvantages.html Expectancy Theory. (n.d.). Retrieved February 15, 2015 from http://valuebasedmanagement.net/methods_vroom_expectancy_theory.html Amabile and Kramer 's Progress Theory: Using Small Wins to Enhance Motivation. (n.d.). Retrieved February 15, 2015, from http://www.mindtools.com/pages/article/progress-theory.htm Imberman, W. (2012). Motivating Employees: What Works? What Doesn 't Work?. Foundry Management & Technology, 140(11), 23-26. Workforce, August 1998, Vol. 77, No. 8, p. 57.