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THE NATURE OF WORK MOTIVATION
Motivation Equation:
Opening Case: Enterprise Rent-A-Car
Enterprise Rent-A-Car, the biggest car rental company in North America,
has over 6900 locations in the United States, the United Kingdom,
Canada, Germany, and Ireland, and has been ranked among the best 50
companies for new college graduates to start their careers. New entrylevel employees complete the Enterprise Management Training Program
teaching them all aspects of Enterprise’s business and how to provide
excellent customer service. Those who do well in the program are
promoted to the position of management assistant after about a year, then
to the position of assistant branch manager, and after five year experience
managing a branch, they often move on to management positions at
headquarters or became an area manager. Besides increasing levels of
empowerment and responsibility, and the opportunity to advance in the
company, Enterprise further motivates its employees with financial
incentives linking their pay to the performance and profitability of the
parts of the business they have responsibility for. Another motivational
factor is Enterprise’s philanthropic activities and initiatives to protect the
natural environment.
Inputs
Performance
Outcomes
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What is Work Motivation?
Psychological forces that determine the direction of a person’s behavior
in an organization, a person’s level of effort, and a person’s level of
persistence
1. Direction of Behavior
Behavior a person chooses to perform from the many potential
behaviors he/she could perform

Functional ways of motivation – help organizations to achieve
goals

Dysfunctional ways of motivation – hinder organizations to
achieve goals
2. Level of Effort
How hard a person works to perform a chosen behavior
3. Level of Persistence
How hard a person keeps trying to perform a chosen behavior
successfully when faced with obstacles, roadblocks, and stone walls
Distinction Between Motivation and Performance

Performance: evaluation of the results of a person’s behavior involves determining how well or poorly that person has
accomplished a task or done a job

Motivation: only one factor among many that contributes to job
performance

Factors other than Motivation that contribute to Performance:
personality, ability, difficulty of task, availability of resources,
working conditions, and chance or luck

high level of motivation does not necessarily result in high level of
performance - high level of performance does not necessarily imply
high level of motivation
Intrinsic and Extrinsic Motivation

Intrinsically motivated behavior: behavior performed for its own
sake – the source of motivation comes from performing the behavior
itself
o Employees who have intrinsic work values want challenging
assignments, the opportunity to make important contributions
and to reach their full potentials at work

Extrinsically motivated behavior: behavior performed to acquire
material or social rewards or to avoid punishment - behavior is
performed not for its own sake but rather for its consequences
o Employees with extrinsic work values desire some of the
consequences of working, such as earning money, having status
in the community, social contacts, and time off from work for
family and leisure
Theories of Work Motivation
1. Need Theory
2. Expectancy Theory
3. Equity Theory
4. Organizational Justice Theory
Effort
Time
Education
Experience
Skills
Knowledge
Job behaviors
Quantity of work
Quality of work
Level of customer
service
Pay
Job security
Benefits
Vacation
Job satisfaction
Feeling of accomplishment
Pleasure of doing
interesting work
Expectancy Theory
Theory about work motivation that focuses on how employees make
choices among alternative behaviors and levels of effort – how
employees decide which specific behaviors to perform and how much
effort to exert

Focuses on employees’ perceptions and thoughts or cognitive
processes

Assumes that employees are motivated to receive positive outcome
and avoid negative ones

Assumes that employees are rational, careful processors of
information and use information about their jobs, abilities, and
desires to decide what they will do and how much effort to put into

Does an individual believe that his or her inputs will result in a
given level of performance?
Employees will not be motivated to contribute their inputs to the
organizations unless they believe it will result in achieving a given
level of performance

Does an individual believe that performing at this level will lead to
obtaining the outcomes he/she wants?
Employees will be motivated to perform at given level only if that
level leads to desired outcomes

Only if answer to both questions is “Yes” the individual will be
motivated to contribute effort and other inputs

Identifies 3 major factors that determine motivation: valence,
instrumentality, and expectancy
1. Valence: How Desirable is An Outcome?
desirability of an outcome to an individual – can be positive or
negative and vary in size or magnitude
o Positive Valence: employee prefers having the outcome to not
having it
o Negative Valence: employee prefers not having the outcome
o Magnitude of Valence: how desirable or undesirable an
outcome is
2. Instrumentality: What is the Connection Between Job
Performance and Outcome?
Perception about the extent to which performance of one or more
behaviors will lead to attainment of a particular outcome – can be
positive or negative and vary in size or magnitude
o Employees will engage in desired behaviors and be motivated
to perform them at a high level only if they perceive that high
performance and desired behaviors will lead to positively
valent outcomes
o Can be measured from -1 to +1:

Perceived association between performance and outcome

-1: employee perceives that performing a certain behavior,
or performing it at a certain level, definitely will not
result in obtaining the outcome;

+1: employee perceives that performance definitely will
result in obtaining the outcome;

0: employee perceives no relationship between
performance and outcome
3. Expectancy: What Is the Connection Between Effort and Job
Performance?
Perception about the extent to which effort will result in a certain
level of performance
o Varies from 0 to 1:

Chances that putting forth a certain amount of effort will
result in certain level of performance

0: employee believes there is no chance that his/her effort
will result in a certain level of performance
2
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1: employee is absolutely certain that his/her effort will
lead to a certain level of performance
Combined Effects of Valence, Instrumentality, and Expectancy on
Motivation

To be motivated to perform desired behaviors and to perform them
at a high level:
1. Valence must be high
2. Instrumentality must be high
3. Expectancy must be high

If one of these three factors is 0, motivation will be zero
Equity Theory
Theory about work motivation that focuses on employees’ perceptions of
the fairness of their work outcomes and inputs

not the objective level of outcomes and inputs is important in
determining motivation, but the way an employee perceives his or
her outcome/input ratio compared to the outcome/income ratio of
another person (“referent”)

Outcome/Input Ratio: relationship between what an employee gets
from a job (outcomes) and what the employee contributes to the job
(inputs)

Focuses on relationship between inputs and outcomes
Equity
Exists when an employee perceives that the employee’s and the referent’s
outcome/input ratios are proportionally equal – in this case, the employee
is motivated either to maintain the status quo or to increase his/her inputs
to receive more outcomes
Inequity
Exists when outcome/income ratios between the employee and the
referent are not proportionally equal or lack of fairness

Overpayment Inequity: exists when a person perceives that his/her
outcome/input ratio is greater than the ratio of a referent

Underpayment Inequity: exists when a person perceives that his/her
outcome/input ratio is less than the ratio of a referent
Ways to Restore Equity
1. Change inputs or outcomes
2. Try to change referents’ inputs or outcomes
3. Change perceptions of inputs and outcomes (either own or the
referents’): employees who perceive overpayment inequity are
especially likely to change their perceptions (rather than their actual
inputs or outcomes) to restore equity
4. Change the referent
5. Leave job or organization or force referent to leave: leaving
organization is most prevalent in situations of underemployment
inequity
Effects of Inequity and the Research Evidence

Underpayment inequity and overpayment inequity are dysfunctional

Motivation is highest when equity exists and outcomes are
distributed on basis of inputs
Organizational Justice Theory
Perception of overall fairness in his/her organization

When procedures are perceived to be unfair and employees feel
unfairly treated, motivation suffers because all the relationship in the
motivation equation are weakened
1. Distributive Justice: perceived fairness of the distribution of
outcomes in an organization
2. Procedural Justice: perceived fairness of the procedures used to
make decisions about the distribution of outcomes in an organization
o Not concerned about actual distribution of outcomes
o Pertain to how performance levels are evaluated, how
grievances or disputes are handled, and how outcomes are
distributed
o Procedural Justice is High:

when employees are able to have input into procedures
used to determine the distribution of outcomes, and when
they have the opportunity to express own views and
opinions

when employees perceive procedures are used consistently
across employees, accurate information is relied on, and
procedures are unbiased

when having the opportunity to appeal judgments and
decisions
3. Interpersonal Justice: perceived fairness of interpersonal treatment
employees receive from the distributors of outcomes or their
managers
4. Informational Justice: perceptions of extent to which managers
explain their decisions and procedures they used to arrive at these
decisions
Consequences of Organizational Justice

Employees will not be motivated to exert a lot of effort if they think
their performance will not be accurately and fairly assessed and they
will not receive the outcomes they think they deserve

Motivation suffers when perceptions of procedural justice are low

When individuals obtain high levels of outcomes, they may view
them as fair regardless of whether or not the procedures in place to
distribute them are really fair. However, they view low outcomes
levels as equitable only when the procedures used to distribute them
really are fair

Positively associated with job satisfaction, organizational
commitment, job performance, and organizational citizenship
behavior

Negatively associated with absenteeism and turnover intentions

When perceptions of organizational justice are low, they might be
increased potential for the occurrence of counter productive work
behaviors

Counterproductive work behavior: behaviors by an employee that
violate organizational values and norms and that can potentially
harm individual and the organization
KELLEY’S ATTRIBUTION THEORY
Attribution Process: reasoning backward from the observation of an event
or behavior to a judgment about its cause – attempts to provide an
explanation for an event that has already occurred
Based on 2 important contributions:
1. Principle of Covariance: behavior will be attributed to a cause with
which it co-varies over time
2. Consistency, Consensus, Distinctiveness: sources of information
that can be used in analyzing covariance and thus arriving at a causal
judgment
o Observations of behavior or response across time provide
information about consistency
o Observations of different people allow judgments to be made
about consensus
o Observations of entities or stimuli provide information about
the distinctiveness or a response
Cognitive process can be represented by a 2 x 2 x 2 analysis of variance
framework – if cognitive task is simplified by assuming that each type of
information can take either a high or low value, this representation leads
to 8 unique combinations of information
Information Combination
High Consistency
Low Consensus
Low Distinctiveness
High Consistency
High Consensus
High Distinctiveness
Low Consistency
Low Consensus
High Distinctiveness
Predicted Attribution
Personal Cause
Environmental Cause
Circumstantial Cause
Biases in the Attribution Process
1. Fundamental Attribution Error: tendency to attribute your own
behavior to your environment and attribute other’s behavior to
dispositional characteristics – the person - “actor/observer bias”
2. Ego-Defensive Bias: tendency of people to readily accept credit for
their successes (person attribution) and blame their failures on
someone or something else (environment attribution) – “selfserving bias”
3. Ego-Centric Bias: tendency for people to believe that the attitudes
that they hold are appropriate in the situation and thus must be
widely shared by others - “false-consensus bias”