Module Title: Management Science

Module Code: MT307

Student ID: 20640776
Assignment 1

Management Science: Employee Motivation and Its

Application To and Together with Change Management
Strategies
1. Employee Motivation, and its use in Change
Management
Employee motivation is the level of energy, commitment, and creativity that
employees apply to their jobs. In the increasingly competitive business
environment of recent years, finding ways to motivate employees has become a
pressing concern for many managers.
Within an organisation, employee motivation techniques are based, as Douglas
McGregor argued, on the general assumptions by managers about human nature
and tendencies. Whether or not they have a base in reality is irrelevant, as long
the manager acts as though they do, and accordingly uses a stick and carrot
style of management with strict controls over individual skill and discretion, or
conversely, encourages initiative and responsibility and adopts a more open
style of management (Burnes, 2000).
Employee motivation, however, cannot be pursued independently of the
environment in which the organisation operates organisational success is
dependant upon the level to which the organisation fits the environment
constraints industry norms, national culture, and levels of uncertainty. This
does not, however mean that managers are constrained to work within the
environment by adapting their internal structures to it. They can also attempt to
change the environment in which they operate to ensure profitability (Burnes,
2000).
There are two main and opposing schools of thought about what exactly
motivates employees, the classical and human relations approach.
When the Classical approach was developed by the likes of Frederick Taylor, it
emphasised the fact that the main motivation to work was money. People were
seen as lazy and unwilling to take the initiative, and thus the jobs that they were
expected to do were deskilled and lacked responsibility to cater for their negative
characteristics.
Though it did lead to increased productivity, it became increasingly clear that
this process of deskilling also led to employees feeling frustrated and unfulfilled
at work. A series of experiments which came to become known as the Hawthorne
Experiments challenged the belief of the Classical approach that money was the
main motivator. It was found that by treating workers with special attention, their
morale, and thus motivation and performance, could be improved (Burnes,
2000).
Enter the human relations approach. Abraham Maslow suggested a hierarchy of
needs, with what people require to motivate them dependant upon a persons
current level of fulfilment. The five levels of need that Maslow introduced were
physiological, safety, social, self esteem, and finally, self actualisation. The
Page 1 of 6

Module Title: Management Science

Module Code: MT307
Student ID: 20640776
Assignment 1
hierarchy of needs has been criticised as been too simplistic, but it does give a
good indication of the need (and thus motivation) of employees, and that they
tend to change as the employees become more fulfilled.
Another key milestone in the development of motivational theory was the
splitting by Frederick Herzberg of factors affecting employee motivation into
what he called hygiene factors, and what he called motivational factors.
Satisfaction is primarily the result of motivational factors such as achievement,
recognition, work tasks, responsibility, promotions, and personal growth.
Dissatisfaction is primarily the result of hygiene factors,

but their presence has little effect on long term satisfaction. These included, pay
and benefits, relationships with co-workers, supervision, status, job security and
salary. As with Maslow's hierarchy of needs, it is simplistic to apply this generic
categorisation to all employees, but the theory is useful for understanding why
some benefits may fail to motivate employees(Thomson, 1995).
These theories have had a major impact on the beliefs of what is required to
motivate employees, which in turn has changed the way that job design is
approached. The need for employees to feel fulfilled has led to job enlargement
programmes designed to give employees variety and responsibility in their day
to day work as a method of increasing their motivation. Burnes (2000) gives an
example of Volvo successfully moving away from the traditional assembly line to
team based car assembly to increase job satisfaction and decrease staff turnover
and absenteeism. Also because of the realisation among management of the
social needs of their employees, the importance of informal peer groups in
employee motivation has come to be accepted.
Knowing what motivates employees is only half the equation. The second half is
how management can effect this motivation. Ideas such as job design, and
employee benefit schemes have already being discussed, however there are also
a number of soft motivation methods that are especially pertinent during
organisational change. Thus, according to Paton and McCalman (2000),
Managers need to:
-

Apply communication skills throughout the organisation.

Provide leadership to all concerned.

Have the ability to facilitate and orchestrate group and individual

activities.

Have negotiation and influencing skills.

Have knowledge of and the facility to influence the rationale for change.

When applying these together with motivation theories, a number of practical

points come up for use in change management:
During change, employees often feel as if their job security is threatened. They
naturally focus on the negative effects the change could have on them. Thus
management need to reassure employees of the need for change, and where
possible, their own security in the organisation to prevent employee resistance to
change. Also a sense of urgency and a desire to change need to be held by
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Module Title: Management Science

Module Code: MT307
Student ID: 20640776
Assignment 1
employees. This can be done, where time allows, by allowing them to contribute
to, and thus feel ownership of the change process. Even in coercive, high level
management driven change, they need an understanding of the difficulties
facing the organisation, and a clear direction to prevent the uncertainty that
usually accompanies, and can cripple, change.
In summary, organisational change is only as comprehensive as the employees
carrying the change allow it to be. Thus good change management must be as
much employee orientated as it is goal orientated if it is to achieve the required
results.

2. Change Management: Tools, Timelines and

Expectations
Organisational change can be described as the process of moving from a current
condition to a future state. It is recognised that in the increasingly competitive
business environment of today, organisational change is essential to ensure
survival.
Understanding what sort of organisational change is
required is key to
facilitating it. For example, is it an organisational culture change or a change in
work processes that is required?
There are a number of different
Employee makes
tools that can be used to to
mistake.
determine this. Of importance in
change management are those
Supervisor shouts at
Employee scared to ask
methods which try to understand
employee.
supervisor for help.
the dynamic and behavioural
complexity of a situation so that it
can be approached correctly. An Illustration 1: A simple positive
example of this is cause mapping, feedback loop
it uses a map of concepts linked together to show cause and effect (Williams,
2008). It can identify positive feedback loops which can cause a situation to
spiral out of control and need to have a regulator added to them.

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Module Title: Management Science

Module Code: MT307
Student ID: 20640776
Assignment 1
Illustration 2 gives a good overview of the type of change that organisations may
require, applicable change theories, and the time scales that they require to
enact. Identifying these are
Large Scale
useful in helping to manage
Transformational
expectations of change, and
Q2
Q1
may
even
lead
to
the
Level:
The
organisation
adopting
a
Level:
The
Level:
The Organisation
Organisation
Level:
The Organisation
Organisation
Focus:
Structures
Focus:
Culture
Focus:
Structures and
and Processes
Processes
Focus:
Culture
different, realisable strategy.
Approach:
Bold
Approach:
Approach: Bold Stroke
Stroke
Approach: Emergent
Emergent Change
Change
It can be seen that change can
be thought of as basically
varying in 2 axes. This gives us
a good basis for starting to plan
change
initiatives,
and
suggests approaches which
could be used to effect change
at
various
levels
in
the
organisation and on different
facets of the organisation.

Stable Environment

Rapic Change

Slow Change
Level:
Level:
Focus:
Focus:
Approach:
Approach:

Turbulent Environment

Individual/Group
Individual/Group
Attitudes/Behaviours
Attitudes/Behaviours
Planned
Planned Change
Change

Level:
Level:
Focus:
Focus:
Approach:
Approach:

Individual/Group
Individual/Group
Tasks
Tasks and
and Procedures
Procedures
Tayloristic
Tayloristic or
or Kaizen
Kaizen

Q4
Small Scale
Incremental

Q3

Illustration 2: A Framework for Change

(Burnes, 2000 pp308)

On the left hand side of

illustration 2, soft organisational aspects are the main focus, while on the right
hand side hard, quantifiable aspects are the main focus. Though some argue that
the two are interlinked - changing the structure of an organisation places people
in a new organisational context with new roles, and thus forces them to adapt
their attitudes and behaviours(Burnes, 2000). Generally though, these 2 types of
change are pursued separately.
In quadrants one and two, the emergent approach to change is applicable as it
recognises the difficulties in trying to achieve organisation wide change. It views
successful change as less a result of detailed plans then on reaching an
understanding of the complexity of the issues concerned and identifying the
range of available options. It assumes that change is unpredictable, and
recognises and addresses the political side of change, where groups in

an organisation struggle to protect their own interests. It accepts that if

proposed changes contradicts culture, they will be hard to implement in an
organisation (Burnes,2000). It also recognises that ideally the change process
needs to be from the bottom of the organisation up, rather than a top down
process, though this is not always possible.
Kotter (1995) suggests eight steps for achieving successful organisational
change, the missing of any of which can cripple the change process. These
important steps are:
1. Establishing a sense of urgency.
2. Forming a powerful guiding coalition.
3. Creating a vision.
4. Communicating the vision.
5. Empowering others to act on the vision.
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Module Title: Management Science

Module Code: MT307
Student ID: 20640776
Assignment 1
6. Creating short term wins visible performance improvements that
encourage belief in the change process.
7. Consolidating improvements and producing still more change.
8. Institutionalising new approaches to prevent regress to old attitudes and
behaviours.
These keys try to take account of the complexities of change and mitigate them.
A number of them (steps 1, 4, 5 and 6) are methods of motivating employees.
Rosabeth Moss Kanter sees quadrant two as a bold stroke of structural change,
which has a clear and rapid impact on an organisation, but rarely leads to any
long term change in habits and culture. These bold strokes are initiatives taken
by a few senior managers. Because of their nature, they can often be
implemented through a rapid directive or coercive style. They are usually
complemented by a host of subsequent smaller change initiatives(Burnes,2000).
In quadrant one, the relatively small scale initiatives used have benefits in the
long term rather than the short term. Over time they can lead to a change of
culture. To achieve cultural change, involvement and empowerment of
employees is essential and this requires managers to facilitate open organisation
wide communication. There are also typical concrete methods of consolidating
cultural change such as change in reward, recruitment and promotion structures
(step 8).
In quadrant four of illustration two, change aimed at individual behaviour and
attitudes is addressed. This is often through the planned approach to change,
which was championed by Kurt Lewin. The planned approach is suitable for small
scale change. Part of its base is action research. This is where collaboration of
the organisation (senior managers), the subjects of the change, and an
independent change agent, can provide a forum for investigation of the change
required. The three parties analyse and solve the problem through a series of
iterations, which often result in a redefinition of the situation and problem as
they learn and their attitudes change. It stresses involvement of those concerned
and thus achieves a belief in the change process. As well as stressing
cooperation, the approach also recognises that there has to be a realisation that
change is necessary by those involved in the change. Once the desired change
has been agreed, and implemented, forces have to be applied to keep it there.
One of its drawbacks is that it does not address the political side of change, and
relies on the good will and collaboration of those involved. Because of its
simplicity, this change model is only applicable to small scale change(Burnes,
2000).

In the third quadrant of illustration two, small scale technical change to small
groups of an organisation are addressed. According to Kaizen, the famous
Japanese approach, continuous improvement of products and processes is
essential for keeping ahead of the competition (Holbeche, 1998). This idea of
continuous improvement that is its basis is what makes it suitable for the
dynamic business environment of the 21 st century. A top management driven
formal announcement is given to allow employees to conceive and implement
improvements continuously in the organisation. It is based on the idea that each
employee understands their job best, and that employees are trustworthy.
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Module Title: Management Science

Module Code: MT307
Student ID: 20640776
Assignment 1
Feedback is given at small monthly team meetings, where any improvements
made must be reported (Gonhalekar and Karamchandani, 1994). Kaizen is also a
form of empowerment and motivates employees by giving them responsibility
and allowing them to take the initiative.
In summary organisational change is key to an organisations survival. Because it
is such a wide topic, no change theory is applicable to all situations, and they
have to be chosen based on their applicability to a situation.

References
1. Burnes, Bernard. 2000. Managing Change: a Strategic Approach to
Organisational Dynamics pp 59-62, 66-67, 208, 267-273, 286, 289, 291,
295, 259-370. Third Edition. Harlow, Prentice Hall
2.

Gondhalekar, Shrinivas & Karamchandani Vandana, 1994. Robust Kaizen

Systems, The TQM Magazine. Vol. 6. No. 3 pp 5-8.

3. Holbeche, Linda, 1998. Motivating People in Lean Organisations pp42.

Woburn, Butterworth-Heinemann.
4. Kotter, John. 1995. Leading change: why transformation efforts fail.
Harvard Business Review, March April.
5. Paton, Robert A. and McCalman, James. 2000. Change Management: A
Guide to Effective Implementation. London: Sage Publications.
6. Thomson, Rosemary, 1993. Managing People pp 50-53. Oxford,
Butterworth-Heinemann.
7. Williams, Terry, 2008. Management Science in Practice. pp 104-105 .
Chichester, John Wiley and Sons Ltd.

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