Managerial psychology

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Managerial psychology is a sub-discipline of industrial and organizational psychology that focuses on the effectiveness of individuals and groups in the workplace, using behavioral science.

Contents

The purpose of managerial psychology is to aid managers in gaining a better managerial and personal understanding of the psychological patterns common among these individuals and groups.

Managerial psychologists

In early years, managerial psychologists mainly studied fatigue, boredom, and other working conditions that could impede efficient work performance.

More recently, their contributions have expanded to include learning, perception, personality, emotions, training, leadership, effectiveness, needs and motivational forces, job satisfaction, decision-making processes, performance appraisals, attitude measurement, employee-selection techniques, work design, and job stress. [1]

Managerial psychologists can also:

Personality, motivation and job satisfaction

Herzberg et al.’s seminal two-factor theory of motivation theorized that satisfaction and dissatisfaction were not two opposite extremes of the same sequence, but two separate entities caused by quite different facets of work – these were labelled as “hygiene factors” and “motivators”. [3]

Hygiene factors

Hygiene factors are characterized as extrinsic components of job design that contribute to employee dissatisfaction if they are not met. Hygiene factors include:

Motivators

Motivators are intrinsic to the job itself and include aspects such as

Intrinsic factors have long been acknowledged as important determinants of motivation. There is a longstanding debate as to whether hygiene factors really contribute to job satisfaction. [4] [5] Most job satisfaction and motivation research literature is concerned with organisational or situational predictors (such as pay and supervision) while neglecting individual differences. [6] [7] It has also been discovered that individuals’ significantly differ in the way they perceive their jobs, even if the job description and the tasks they had to perform remained constant, thus suggesting that some individual differences must have an effect on work attitudes. [8] Others also argued that individual disposition may have a profound influence over how the working world is perceived (i.e. what is important to the individual), and this is likely to affect the type of jobs that are sought. [9]

The Ten Item Personality Inventory

The Ten Item Personality inventory was introduced in Gosling et al., (2003). The ten items of this measure are scored using a seven-point scale, with two statements (one reversed) used to measure each personality variable. The authors report extensive data showing good reliability and validity of this instrument. [10]

The Work Values Questionnaire (WVQ)

The WVQ was introduced in Furnham et al., (2005). It consists of 37 items and requires individuals to report the extent to which intrinsic (e.g. responsibility and personal growth) and extrinsic (e.g. pay and benefits) components are important to them on a six-point scale. [11] The WVQ is a revised version of Mantech's (1983) questionnaire. Previous studies have indicated that between two and four factors tend to be extracted, and that these often correspond to Herzberg et al.’s hygiene and motivator factors. [3]

The Job Satisfaction Scale

The Job Satisfaction scale introduced by Warr et al., (1979). It consists of 15 items, seven of which measure intrinsic satisfaction, whilst the remaining eight measure extrinsic job satisfaction. Responses are given on a seven-point scale and can be summed to create and overall satisfaction score as well as an intrinsic and extrinsic value. [12]

Experiment on personality, motivation and job satisfaction

A 2009 issue of Journal of Managerial Psychology presents an experiment with 202 full-time employees (81 males, mean age=38.3 and 121 females, mean age= 28.4) working in very different jobs in the retail, manufacturing and healthcare to investigate the extent to which personality and demographic factors explain variance in motivation and job satisfaction as defined by Herzberg et al.’s two-factor theory. [3]

Every person was given three questionnaires ( the ten item personality inventory, work values questionnaire (WVQ), and job satisfaction scale) and had to complete them via a website.

Negative relationships were observed between the security and conditions factor and job status, as well as years in full-time employment. These results suggest that individuals with low job status (e.g. graduate positions and non-managerial roles) are more concerned with working conditions and clarity in their work than those of a higher status and individuals who have been working for longer periods.

These results further validate the contention that work attitudes are not the product of situational factors alone, and that both literature and organisations should further investigate the variables that contribute to these values with the intention of increasing job satisfaction and performance, through effective selection methods and pervasive job interventions.

Tools used by managerial psychologists

Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs

Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs Pyramid.png
Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs

Abraham Maslow developed the Hierarchy of Needs model in the 1940-50s. Maslow's ideas surrounding the Hierarchy of Needs concern the responsibility of employers to provide a workplace environment that encourages and enables employees to fulfill their own unique potential (self-actualization).

While Maslow referred to various additional aspects of motivation, he expressed the Hierarchy of Needs in these five clear stages:

Douglas McGregor's XY Theory

Douglas McGregor proposed his X-Y theory in his 1960 book 'The Human Side Of Enterprise'. Theory X and Theory Y are still referred to commonly in the field of management and motivation. McGregor's ideas suggest that there are two fundamental approaches to managing people. Many managers tend towards theory x, and generally get poor results. Enlightened managers use theory y, which produces better performance and results, and allows people to grow and develop.

Theory x ('authoritarian management' style)

  • The average person dislikes work and will avoid it he/she can.
  • Therefore, most people must be forced with the threat of punishment to work towards organisational objectives.
  • The average person prefers to be directed; to avoid responsibility; is relatively unambitious, and wants security above all else.

Theory y ('participative management' style)

  • Effort in work is as natural as work and play.
  • People will apply self-control and self-direction in the pursuit of organisational objectives, without external control or the threat of punishment.
  • Commitment to objectives is a function of rewards associated with their achievement.
  • People usually accept and often seek responsibility.
  • The capacity to use a high degree of imagination, ingenuity and creativity in solving organisational problems is widely, not narrowly, distributed in the population.
  • In industry the intellectual potential of the average person is only partly utilised.

McClelland's Human Motivation Theory

See also Need theory

David McClelland in his 1961 book, "The Achieving Society " identified three motivators that he believed we all have:

People will have different characteristics depending on their dominant motivator. According to McClelland, these motivators are learned (which is why this theory is sometimes called the Learned Needs Theory).

McClelland says that, regardless of our gender, culture, or age, we all have three motivating drivers, and one of these will be our dominant motivating driver. This dominant motivator is largely dependent on our culture and life experiences.

Achievement

People motivated by achievement need challenging, but not impossible, projects. They thrive on overcoming difficult problems or situations, so make sure you keep them engaged this way. People motivated by achievement work very effectively either alone or with other high achievers.

When providing feedback, give achievers a fair and balanced appraisal. They want to know what they're doing right – and wrong – so that they can improve.

Affiliation

People motivated by affiliation work best in a group environment, so try to integrate them with a team (versus working alone) whenever possible. They also don't like uncertainty and risk. Therefore, when assigning projects or tasks, save the risky ones for other people.

When providing feedback to these people, be personal. It's still important to give balanced feedback, but if you start your appraisal by emphasizing their good working relationship and your trust in them, they'll likely be more open to what you say. Remember that these people often don't want to stand out, so it might be best to praise them in private rather than in front of others.

Power

Those with a high need for power work best when they're in charge. Because they enjoy competition, they do well with goal-oriented projects or tasks. They may also be very effective in negotiations or in situations in which another party must be convinced of an idea or goal.

When providing feedback, be direct with these team members. And keep them motivated by helping them further their career goals

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Maslow's hierarchy of needs</span> Theory of developmental psychology

Maslow's hierarchy of needs is an idea in psychology proposed by American psychologist Abraham Maslow in his 1943 paper "A Theory of Human Motivation" in the journal Psychological Review. Maslow subsequently extended the idea to include his observations of humans' innate curiosity. His theories parallel many other theories of human developmental psychology, some of which focus on describing the stages of growth in humans. The theory is a classification system intended to reflect the universal needs of society as its base, then proceeding to more acquired emotions. The hierarchy of needs is split between deficiency needs and growth needs, with two key themes involved within the theory being individualism and the prioritization of needs. While the theory is usually shown as a pyramid in illustrations, Maslow himself never created a pyramid to represent the hierarchy of needs. The hierarchy of needs is a psychological idea and also an assessment tool, particularly in education, healthcare and social work. The hierarchy remains a popular framework in sociology research, including management training and higher education.

Frederick Irving Herzberg was an American psychologist who became one of the most influential names in business management. He is most famous for introducing job enrichment and the Motivator-Hygiene theory. His 1968 publication "One More Time, How Do You Motivate Employees?" had sold 1.2 million reprints by 1987 and was the most requested article from the Harvard Business Review.

Need for achievement (N-Ach) is an individual's desire for significant accomplishment, mastering of skills, control, or high standards. The term was first used by Henry Murray and associated with a range of actions. These include: "intense, prolonged and repeated efforts to accomplish something difficult. To work with singleness of purpose towards a high and distant goal. To have the determination to win". The concept of N-Ach was subsequently popularized by the psychologist David McClelland.

Motivation is the reason for which humans and other animals initiate, continue, or terminate a behavior at a given time. Motivational states are commonly understood as forces acting within the agent that create a disposition to engage in goal-directed behavior. It is often held that different mental states compete with each other and that only the strongest state determines behavior. This means that we can be motivated to do something without actually doing it. The paradigmatic mental state providing motivation is desire. But various other states, such as beliefs about what one ought to do or intentions, may also provide motivation. Motivation is derived from the word 'motive', which denotes a person's needs, desires, wants, or urges. It is the process of motivating individuals to take action in order to achieve a goal. The psychological elements fueling people's behavior in the context of job goals might include a desire for money.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Job satisfaction</span> Attitude of a person towards work

Job satisfaction, employee satisfaction or work satisfaction is a measure of workers' contentedness with their job, whether they like the job or individual aspects or facets of jobs, such as nature of work or supervision. Job satisfaction can be measured in cognitive (evaluative), affective, and behavioral components. Researchers have also noted that job satisfaction measures vary in the extent to which they measure feelings about the job. or cognitions about the job.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Incentive</span> Something that motivates individuals to perform

In general, incentives are anything that persuade a person to alter their behaviour. It is emphasised that incentives matter by the basic law of economists and the laws of behaviour, which state that higher incentives amount to greater levels of effort and therefore, higher levels of performance.

Expectancy theory proposes that an individual will behave or act in a certain way because they are motivated to select a specific behavior over others due to what they expect the result of that selected behavior will be. In essence, the motivation of the behavior selection is determined by the desirability of the outcome. However, at the core of the theory is the cognitive process of how an individual processes the different motivational elements. This is done before making the ultimate choice. The outcome is not the sole determining factor in making the decision of how to behave.

The two-factor theory states that there are certain factors in the workplace that cause job satisfaction while a separate set of factors cause dissatisfaction, all of which act independently of each other. It was developed by psychologist Frederick Herzberg.

Job enrichment is a method of motivating employees where a job is designed to have interesting and challenging tasks which can require more skill and can increase pay.

Content theory is a subset of motivational theories that try to define what motivates people. Content theories of motivation often describe a system of needs that motivate peoples' actions. While process theories of motivation attempt to explain how and why our motivations affect our behaviors, content theories of motivation attempt to define what those motives or needs are. Content theory includes the work of David McClelland, Abraham Maslow and other psychologists.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Self-determination theory</span> Macro theory of human motivation and personality

Self-determination theory (SDT) is a macro theory of human motivation and personality that concerns people's innate growth tendencies and innate psychological needs. It pertains to the motivation behind people's choices in the absence of external influences and distractions. SDT focuses on the degree to which human behavior is self-motivated and self-determined.

Quality of working life (QWL) describes a person's broader employment-related experience. Various authors and researchers have proposed models of quality of working life – also referred to as quality of worklife – which include a wide range of factors, sometimes classified as "motivator factors" which if present can make the job experience a positive one, and "hygiene factors" which if lacking are more associated with dissatisfaction. A number of rating scales have been developed aiming to measure overall quality of working life or certain aspects thereof. Some publications have drawn attention to the importance of QWL for both employees and employers, and also for national economic performance.

Need theory, also known as Three needs theory, proposed by psychologist David McClelland, is a motivational model that attempts to explain how the needs for achievement, affiliation, and power affect the actions of people from a managerial context. This model was developed in the 1960s, two decades after Maslow's hierarchy of needs was first proposed in the early 1940s. McClelland stated that we all have these three types of motivation regardless of age, sex, race, or culture. The type of motivation by which each individual is driven derives from their life experiences and the opinions of their culture. This need theory is often taught in classes concerning management or organizational behaviour.

Despite a large body of positive psychological research into the relationship between happiness and productivity, happiness at work has traditionally been seen as a potential by-product of positive outcomes at work, rather than a pathway to business success. Happiness in the workplace is usually dependent on the work environment. During the past two decades, maintaining a level of happiness at work has become more significant and relevant due to the intensification of work caused by economic uncertainty and increase in competition. Nowadays, happiness is viewed by a growing number of scholars and senior executives as one of the major sources of positive outcomes in the workplace. In fact, companies with higher than average employee happiness exhibit better financial performance and customer satisfaction. It is thus beneficial for companies to create and maintain positive work environments and leadership that will contribute to the happiness of their employees.

Work motivation "is a set of energetic forces that originate both within as well as beyond an individual's being, to initiate work-related behavior, and to determine its form, direction, intensity, and duration." Understanding what motivates an organization's employees is central to the study of I–O psychology. Motivation is a person's internal disposition to be concerned with and approach positive incentives and avoid negative incentives. To further this, an incentive is the anticipated reward or aversive event available in the environment. While motivation can often be used as a tool to help predict behavior, it varies greatly among individuals and must often be combined with ability and environmental factors to actually influence behavior and performance. Results from a 2012 study, which examined age-related differences in work motivation, suggest a "shift in people's motives" rather than a general decline in motivation with age. That is, it seemed that older employees were less motivated by extrinsically related features of a job, but more by intrinsically rewarding job features. Work motivation is strongly influenced by certain cultural characteristics. Between countries with comparable levels of economic development, collectivist countries tend to have higher levels of work motivation than do countries that tend toward individualism. Similarly measured, higher levels of work motivation can be found in countries that exhibit a long versus a short-term orientation. Also, while national income is not itself a strong predictor of work motivation, indicators that describe a nation's economic strength and stability, such as life expectancy, are. Work motivation decreases as a nation's long-term economic strength increases. Currently work motivation research has explored motivation that may not be consciously driven. This method goal setting is referred to as goal priming. Effects of primed subconscious goals in addition to goals that are consciously set related to job performance have been studied by Stajkovic, Latham, Sergent, and Peterson, who conducted research on a CEO of a for-profit business organization using goal priming to motivate job performance. Goal priming refers to the achievement of a goal by external cues given. These cues can affect information processing and behaviour the pursuit of this goal. In this study, the goal was primed by the CEO using achievement related words strategy placed in emails to employees. This seemingly small gesture alone not only cost the CEO very little money, but it increased objectively measured performance efficiency by 35% and effectiveness by 15% over the course of a 5-day work week. There has been controversy about the true efficacy of this work as to date, only four goal priming experiments have been conducted. However, the results of these studies found support for the hypothesis that primed goals do enhance performance in a for-profit business organization setting.

Employee motivation is an intrinsic and internal drive to put forth the necessary effort and action towards work-related activities. It has been broadly defined as the "psychological forces that determine the direction of a person's behavior in an organisation, a person's level of effort and a person's level of persistence". Also, "Motivation can be thought of as the willingness to expend energy to achieve a goal or a reward. Motivation at work has been defined as 'the sum of the processes that influence the arousal, direction, and maintenance of behaviors relevant to work settings'." Motivated employees are essential to the success of an organization as motivated employees are generally more productive at the work place.

Reward management is concerned with the formulation and implementation of strategies and policies that aim to reward people fairly, equitably and consistently in accordance with their value to the organization.

Job characteristics theory is a theory of work design. It provides “a set of implementing principles for enriching jobs in organizational settings”. The original version of job characteristics theory proposed a model of five “core” job characteristics that affect five work-related outcomes through three psychological states.

Employee recognition is the timely, informal or formal acknowledgement of a person's behavior, effort, or business result that supports the organization's goals and values, and exceeds their superior's normal expectations. Recognition has been held to be a constructive response and a judgment made about a person's contribution, reflecting not just work performance but also personal dedication and engagement on a regular or ad hoc basis, and expressed formally or informally, individually or collectively, privately or publicly, and monetarily or non-monetarily.

Employee motivation, also known as work motivation, is a feature of employees that refers to how motivated they are to work. It has a significant impact on employee productivity and efficiency." While motivation is defined as why individuals do or participate in certain behaviors.

References

  1. 1 2 "Robbins, Judge & Campbell, Organizational Behaviour | Pearson". www.pearson.com. Retrieved 2021-07-18.
  2. ↑ "Journal of Managerial Psychology | Emerald Publishing". www.emeraldgrouppublishing.com. Retrieved 2021-07-18.
  3. 1 2 3 Herzberg, F.; Mausner, B.; Snyderman, B. B. (1959). "The motivation to work, 2nd ed". S2CID   150294041 . Retrieved 2021-07-18.
  4. ↑ Furnham, A.; Forde, L.; Ferrari, K. (1999). "Personality and work motivation". Personality and Individual Differences. 26 (6): 1035–1043. doi:10.1016/S0191-8869(98)00202-5. S2CID   144888829.
  5. ↑ Warr, Peter B (1987). Work, unemployment, and mental health. Oxford; New York: Clarendon Press ; Oxford University Press. ISBN   978-0-19-852159-4. OCLC   15316210.
  6. ↑ Staw, B.; Ross, J. (1985). "Stability in the Midst of Change: A Dispositional Approach to Job Attitudes". Journal of Applied Psychology. 70 (3): 469–480. doi:10.1037/0021-9010.70.3.469. S2CID   145153760.
  7. ↑ "Locke, E. A. "The Nature and Causes of Job Satisfaction" in Dunnette, M. D. Handbook of Industrial and Organizational Psychology (1st Ed.), Chicago, IL: Rand McNally. 1976. 1297-1349. 1976". www.sciepub.com. Retrieved 2021-07-18.
  8. ↑ O'Reilly, Charles A.; Parlette, G. Nicholas; Bloom, Joan R. (1980-03-01). "Perceptual Measures of Task Characteristics: The Biasing Effects of Differing Frames of Reference and Job Attitudes". Academy of Management Journal. 23 (1): 118–131. doi:10.5465/255499. ISSN   0001-4273.
  9. ↑ Staw, Barry M.; Bell, Nancy E.; Clausen, John A. (1986). "The Dispositional Approach To Job Attitudes: A Lifetime Longitudinal Test". Administrative Science Quarterly. 31 (1): 56–77. doi:10.2307/2392766. ISSN   0001-8392. JSTOR   2392766.
  10. ↑ Gosling, S.; Rentfrow, P.; Swann, W. (2003). "A very brief measure of the Big-Five personality domains". Journal of Research in Personality. 37 (6): 504–528. doi:10.1016/S0092-6566(03)00046-1. S2CID   7147133.
  11. ↑ Furnham, Adrian; Petrides, K. V.; Tsaousis, Ioannis; Pappas, Konstantinos; Garrod, Debi (2005). "A cross-cultural investigation into the relationships between personality traits and work values". The Journal of Psychology. 139 (1): 5–32. doi:10.3200/JRLP.139.1.5-32. ISSN   0022-3980. PMID   15751827. S2CID   36627151.
  12. ↑ Warr, Peter; Cook, John; Wall, Benjamin Toby (1979-06-01). "Scales for the measurement of some work attitudes and aspects of psychological well-being". Journal of Occupational Psychology. 52 (2): 129–148. doi:10.1111/j.2044-8325.1979.tb00448.x. ISSN   2044-8325.
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