Notesale: Turn your study into money

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Explain one theory of motivation and evaluate its practical usefulness for a team
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It has also been suggested, by Steers and Porter, that motivation
is essentially made up of three components; direction, energy and persistence (Steers and
Porter, 1979)
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The theory that I have chosen to evaluate is the Goal-setting theory
(Locke and Latham, 1990)
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The goal-setting theory looks at how setting aims can motivate, both, individuals and teams
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Clarity recognises that a goal must be specific for the employee to be motivated,
the reason for this is that if a goal is too generic, such as ‘do your best’, the individual will not
know how to go about achieving it
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The commitment to
a goal is closely intertwined with the challenge of a goal since people need commitment to
achieve a difficult goal which requires persistence
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Lastly,
feedback is also necessary for goal-setting for people to determine whether they are on track
to achieving their goal or whether their energy needs to be re-directed (Locke & Latham,
2002)
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Practical usefulness summarises whether the theory is in fact usefully applicable to real life
situations, whether it be goal-setting for teams or for individuals
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While the manager will focus on the productivity of
employees, team are likely to look at their own satisfaction and whether the goal has been
achieved in the first place
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It is due to goals being subject to perspectives to such a
wide extent that these conflicts occur
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This would suggest that perhaps goal-setting isn’t a practically useful
method of motivation
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The primary problem of goal-setting is conflict
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The reason for this is that managers will often have different goals to employees
which naturally leads to conflicting objectives
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This implies that not only can
manager’s set individual’s conscious goals but, based on Shatz’s analysis, it is possible that
their subconscious goals are also influenced by the conscious goals (Shantz, 2011)
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From personal experience of part-time employment, I have observed the significance of goalsetting as a motivational theory
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Irrespective of the number of hours worked by each cohort, it is evident that productivity
during the week, when each member of staff is allocated a clear task, is noticeably higher
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In conclusion, goal-setting is an effective method of motivation which is proved by its level of
relevance today
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Moreover, it must be acknowledged that goal-setting, for teams especially, is risky as people
are motivated by different outcomes (Vroom, 1964) so setting effective goals is a matter of trial
and error

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