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Exercise Objectives
• To determine the causes of students’ motivation in a previous work
Chapter 12 – Motivating Employees: Achieving Superior Performance in the Workplace
12.1 What’s the motivation for studying motivation?
Motivation may be defined as the psychological processes that arouse and direct
12.2 What kinds of needs motivate employees?
12.3 Is a good reward good enough? How do other factors affect motivation?
12.4 What’s the best way to design jobs – adapt people to work or work to
people?
Job design is (1) the division of an organization’s work among its employees and
(2) the application of motivational theories to jobs to increase satisfaction and
CHALLENGE: MAJOR QUESTIONS
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12.5 What are the types of incentives I might use to influence employee
behavior?
Reinforcement is anything that causes a given behavior to be repeated or
inhibited, whether praising a child for cleaning his or her room or scolding a child
12.6 How can I use compensation and other rewards to motivate people?
Compensation, the main motivator of performance, includes pay for performance,
bonuses, profit sharing, gainsharing, stock options, and pay for knowledge. Most
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1. To what extent is Caterpillar’s compensation plan consistent with
recommendations derived from need theories? Discuss.
Students can discuss expectancy theory and how greater control of outcomes
2. To what extent is Caterpillar’s pay plan consistent with equity theory? Explain.
Employees may feel as if their outputs are more directly linked with their inputs,
3. To what extent is Caterpillar’s pay plan consistent with expectancy theory?
Explain.
Employees would surely value higher pay outcomes, but the issue is again with
4. What are the key lessons learned from this case? Discuss.
The case exhibits the difficulty with utilizing profit-sharing programs. There may
be an intention to link performance with outcomes in order to increase motivation,
MANAGEMENT IN ACTION: Caterpillar Puts Employee Pay at Risk, but Is It
Done Fairly?
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Should College Athletes Be Paid to Perform?
As of today, college athletes are not allowed to be paid for playing a sport according to
rules established by the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA). The NCAA
believes that athletes should not receive any direct compensation because they receive
benefits such as athletic scholarships, medical care, academic support services, and
first-class training.
The NCAA has also refused to pay college athletes for the use of their likeness in
licensing agreements. This led to a lawsuit in 2009 by Ed O’Bannon, a former
University of California at Los Angeles basketball player. His image was used in video
Is it fair to not pay college athletes direct compensation for playing a sport?
1. Yes. I agree with the NCAA. Athletes receive plenty of benefits such as
scholarships, medical coverage, and world class training.
Is it fair for student athletes to receive both scholarships and direct
2. No. The athletes risk personal injury and they spend lots of time practicing
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3. No, but doing so would create havoc with college sports. It would mean that
players in every sport would need to be paid. This would likely lead to the
4. Invent another option.
Students can use a motivational theory to come up with another option for the
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.
Group Exercise #1: Using Extrinsic and Intrinsic Rewards to Motivate
Student Achievement?
Objectives
• To identify extrinsic and intrinsic rewards that motivate student achievement.
Introduction
The purpose of this exercise is to explore the use of rewards in motivating student
achievement. There are two types of rewards – extrinsic and intrinsic – that can be
Instructions
1. After providing a brief review of extrinsic and intrinsic rewards, break students into
groups of 5 to 8 people. Tell the groups that they have five minutes to silently
2. Ask the groups to create a master list of all unique ideas generated through
3. Ask the students to generate specific recommendations for how any college
4. Reconvene the class and summarize the groups’ conclusions. Begin by asking each
group to report on their top five extrinsic and intrinsic rewards. Record this
GROUP EXERCISES
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Questions for Discussion
1. What did you learn about the use of rewards from this exercise?
Chapter 12 – Motivating Employees: Achieving Superior Performance in the Workplace
Group Exercise #2: What Motivates You?
Objectives
• To determine the causes of students’ motivation in a previous work environment.
Introduction
The overall purpose of this exercise is for students to consider a time in which they
exhibited both high and low performance and to analyze those situations from a
Instructions
1. Begin the exercise by distributing a copy of the matrix shown at the end of this
exercise to each student. Ask your students to complete this matrix by first thinking
2. Break students into groups of 3 and ask them to share their completed matrices.
Ask the students to keep notes on the common factors that contributed to both high
and low motivation.
Questions for Discussion
1. What common factors contributed to high and low motivation for your group?
2. What factors uniquely affected some group members and not others?
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Motivation Matrix
A time when I was
highly motivated
Factors contributing
to my high
motivation
A time when I had
very little motivation
Factors contributing
to my low motivation
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Best Buy’s Clockless Office
Teaching Objective: Introduce the concept of employee motivation and discuss the
importance of motivation in employee satisfaction and retention. Illustrate an innovative
program developed at Best Buy that improves employee productivity and retention.
Summary: ROWE, or results-only work environment, was developed in the human
Questions:
1. Why is it important for companies like Best Buy to design programs that motivate
employees? How does ROWE accomplish this?
Answer: It is important for companies to motivate people to join the
2. Based on the content perspectives of employee motivation, what needs are met
by the ROWE program?
Answer: The program meets a variety of employee needs, including the need
3. What is the difference between flextime and ROWE? Which method do you think
is superior in terms of motivation?
Answer: Flextime allows workers to establish flexible hours in agreement with
Additional videos directly related to the textbook can be found in the Connect
Instructor’s Manual.
VIDEO CASE
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Students may complete the “Virtual Workplace: Out of the Office Reply” Manager’s Hot
Seat exercises in Connect for this chapter.
I. Introduction
Telecommuting is a flexible working option that many companies have
II. Learning Objectives
1. To assess students’ understanding of the challenges of telecommuting.
2. To analyze and evaluate managerial actions related to telecommuting.
III. Scenario Description:
Overview: Three months ago, Ralph Ramos assigned a number of employees
to work as telecommuters to alleviate the lack of space in their office building.
Profile:
• Ralph Ramos is the Senior Manager of Claims, managing a 75 employee
department, at Saber Union Insurance, an international insurance
company.
References: The references included in the DVD are:
• Advantages and Challenges for Employees (PPT 12–3)
MANAGER’S HOT SEAT
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Back History: Angela was one of five employees that moved to home offices
three months ago. She had volunteered right off the bat because she could
Ralph is happy with the way things are working out. The office is no longer over–
crowded or disturbingly noisy. The telecommuters are doing their work and
reporting regularly. He is having more trouble staying on top of their reports and
their projects but that’s probably because he’s so busy.
Scene Set-up: Ralph and Angela are meeting to discuss their recent
Scene Location: Ralph’s Office
The Meeting – Summary: Ralph brings up the missed deadline and Angela says
she was not informed that the deadline had been moved. Ralph explains how
the information was conveyed. She says she feels that she is out of sight, out of
Two weeks later – Angela misses an appointment with Ralph and deliberately
fails to provide work on time. Ralph wants to understand what has happened to
change the good working relationship they had. Angela threatens to resign, but
Afterthoughts – Summary: Ralph states his strategy was to listen to Angela.
He notes that he often has issues with people working from home because it’s
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Dossier: The specific artifacts included in the DVD are:
1. Emails between Ramos and Zanoni
IV. Discussion Questions:
The References and related Discussion Questions may be found in PowerPoint slides
12-1 to 12-9.
Learning Objective #1: To assess students’ understanding of the challenges of
telecommuting.
1. What advantages and disadvantages to telecommuting is Angela experiencing?
See PPT 12-3.
Angela enjoys not having to commute and likes to be closer and more available for
1. How should Ralph respond [when Angela says “since I’ve been
working from home, I’m out of sight”]?
A. Compassionately
B. Clarify issues
C. Debate point
2. What advantages and disadvantages to managing a telecommuter is Ralph
experiencing? See PPT 12-5.
His intention was to improve moral and job satisfaction of Angela by cutting down
2. What is Ralph’s strategy?
A. Emphasize strengths
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B. Hide biases
C. Change topic
3. How was this [initial] meeting?
A. Successful
B. A failure
C. A good start
Learning Objective #2: To analyze and evaluate managerial actions related to
telecommuting.
1. What should Angela have done to prepare herself for telework? Refer to PPT
12–7.
Angela needed to really assess whether her work style was suited for
4. Angela is dejected. Ralph should focus on:
A. Her value
B. Her poor performance
C. His mistakes
2. What should Ralph have done to prevent this problem from occurring? Refer to
PPT 12-9.
Completing the Checklist provided in the slide would be effective.
5. What should Ralph do [when Angela says she want to resign]?
A. Accept resignation
B. Try new approach
C. End meeting
Chapter 12 – Motivating Employees: Achieving Superior Performance in the Workplace
6. What’s Ralph’s next step?
A. Find replacement
B. Communication often
C. Reassign work load