The challenge called the 'human being'

While my past articles have focused on the reorganisation strategy in order to boost efficiency in the manufacturing businesses, this article will concentrate on motivation. To achieve the desired results, both strategies are needed as they complement each other. While it is true that processes must be clear, straightforward and the tools need to be appropriate and adequate, the best and smoothest layout with the most sophisticated technical tools will not yield expected results if the workers using them are not motivated and engaged.

The motivation strategy has two main components:

Investing in labour skills, knowledge and competence through planned training and education; and improving work attitude, motivation and psychological ownership through a participative management approach.

Investing in labour skills, knowledge and competence through planned training and education is self-explanatory. The one tool most used for this objective is the Skill Matrix. Examples and explanations on how to set-up and apply Skill Matrices can be found on the Internet. Hence, I won’t explain this in detail especially since most Human Resource managers are probably familiar with it.

Improving work attitude, motivation and psychological ownership through a participative management approach is a bit less straightforward and leaves plenty of room for individual adaptation. 

Allow me to start with two perception-pitfalls I have seen in practice. The first pitfall is when the management perceives workers and employees as an expense rather than an investment. Interestingly, machines that do exactly the same thing 10 years from now are considered to be an investment, while workers and employees who accumulate experience and knowledge over the 10 years and will know and be able to do more in the next 10 years are considered an expense. 

The problem is that a manager or business owner trapped in this pitfall, will find it difficult to invest time, effort and cash in either or both of the above mentioned key components of the motivation strategy, which is similar to closing the door to improvement. The second pitfall is when you hear yourself or others making statements similar to “my people are so lazy, disengaged, uninterested, they don’t care” etc. For a manager with this perception of his workers, no matter whether it reflects reality or not, it will be difficult to believe in the possibility of change and therefore the door to improvement will remain closed. 

A devil’s advocate would eventually ask, “why did you hire these people in a first place?” and the answer could be that at start-up they seemed to be knowledgeable, capable, responsible and interested. So what happened? 

Research in Europe found that people, when starting a new job in a new company were naturally motivated. Therefore the challenge for the new employer is not really how to motivate the people, but rather how not to de-motivate them or how to keep that natural motivation alive. Therefore, if you are tired of pondering ways to further motivate your staff, you may want to try this another way – identify the motivation-killers and kill them, unless of course, they come in the shape of leaders, supervisors, managers or other people. In that case removing or re-training them might be the safer option. 

Here some examples of motivation-killers that may have sneaked into an organisation over time.

Non-existent, unfair or unfairly applied rules and regulations: If you want to find out where in your company these motivation killers reside, then run a simple anonymous survey among your staff, asking them to list the three rules or regulations they see as most de-motivating and unfair or unfairly applied. Also ask what areas they would like guidelines to be set up in order to bring about fairness and equality. Don’t be surprised if you get surprising results. An actual example of potential unfairness is right at your doorstep. When the daily minimum wage rises from Bt215 to Bt300 in Bangkok, it would be tempting for a company to just increase the wages of those who earn less than Bt300 without touching the wages of senior workers who are already being paid Bt300 or more. So, if a worker today makes Bt320 daily due to his experience, then this benefit of his knowledge and loyalty would vanish the day an inexperienced worker is brought in at Bt300 a day. Whether the management agrees or disagrees, the experienced worker will still consider this unfair, become de-motivated and eventually leave the company, because they can earn a daily wage of Bt300 anywhere now. This may not be very popular among managers, but the rule of fairness dictates that every worker’s daily wage should be increased by Bt85. 

Lack of transparency: The less transparent rules, decisions, awards and remuneration remains, the more gossip and rumours there will be. These are hardly ever positive and more often not even true, but they can be very persistent and de-motivating. If you want to know whether your company has, or would have, a problem with transparency do the following: imagine printing the names and salaries of all employees in your company, ranging from the CEO to the maid, and displaying it on the company’s announcement board. Would you be able to justify each employee’s earnings with facts and figures based on their education, years of experience, special abilities, contributions etc? If yes, then you have a good and fair system in place. Imagine if you were to call a company-wide meeting at the beginning of the year and disclosing the company’s annual financial results to your workforce. While this might not be a very familiar approach, it would actually boost psychological ownership and eliminate the need for speculation and rumours. I would encourage you to do this.

Lack of leadership and strategy: Strategy and leadership have to come from the top. To lead means to stand in the front and pull, not sit at the back and push. It is only by pulling that you decide the direction. Pushing from behind will only get the people to scatter all over the place, get lost and become inactive. Also beware of continuously changing directions and procedures because these bring about boredom and finally indifference.

Don’t expect to get more than you give: I have seen many things get broken in factories and have sometimes wondered how that is possible. It often appears that with just a bit of care from the workers, it would not have happened. At the same time, I have seen more than one factory where workers keep their cars, motorcycles and bicycles parked out there in the burning sun or under pouring rain all day long. These things are often the workers’ most valuable assets, but the management does not seem to care. How can you expect workers whose assets are not taken care of to take care of your machines and equipment? 

The above mentioned are just a few possible de-motivators. The more de-motivators you can identify and eliminate the better. Of course, there are also motivators out there, with the most important possibly being praise and responsibility. Give as much as you can of both these things, but make sure they’re not fake. 

Contrary to machines that can work 24/7, people have their own lives outside working hours and it is with this important fact that I will end this article. A 2007 study by Thomas Wright and Russell Cropanzano on personnel reveals that job satisfaction is not purely job related, but part of what they call Psychological Well Being, which also includes happiness in the worker’s private life. 

Therefore, when trying to choose productive workers, the HR department should actually figure out whether the applicant has a high level of Psychological Well Being, because job performance is at its highest when employees report high scores on both well being and job satisfaction. So, choose happy people and keep them happy.