MHR 405

• Motivation refers to the forces within a person that affect his or her direction, intensity, and persistence of voluntary behavior o Particular level of effort (intensity) o Certain amount of time (persistence) o Particular goal (direction
• Although is definition is still being debated, employee engagement is defined as an individual’s emotional and cognitive (rational) motivation, particularly a focused, intense, persistent, and purposive effort toward work-related goals
Employee Drives and Needs
• To understand how to create a more engaged and motivated workforce, we need to understand the motivational “forces” or prime movers of employee behavior o Drives (Also called primary needs) are defined as hardwired characteristics of the brain that attempt to keep us in balance by correcting deficiencies
 Drives accomplish this task by producing emotions to energize us to act on our environment. A few drives that are consistently identified in research include the drive for social interaction, understanding the environment, competence or status, and defending oneself against physiological and psychological harm.
 Everyone has drives and is born with them. They are prime movers of behavior because they generate emotions. o Needs are goal-directed forces that people experience. They are the motivational forces of emotions channeled toward particular goals to correct deficiencies or imbalances.
 Suppose you arrive at work to discover a stranger sitting at your desk. Seeing this situation produces emotions (worry, curiosity) that motivate you to act. These emotions are generated from drives, such as the drive to defend and the drive to know.
 The emotional reactions to seeing the stranger sitting at your desk represent the forces that move you, but you channel those emotions towards specific goals
• Everyone has the same drives, they are hardwired through evolution. The type and intensity of emotions formed in a particular situation varies from one