Approaches to Understanding Motivation

Questions: 1: Why do you think there are so many different theories or approaches to understanding motivation? 2: Shouldn't it be possible to determine which one is best and just use it? 3: Why or why not? Answers: Motivation is one of the major factors that contribute in stimulating desire as well as energy in the people to be committed in a job, role along with making a proper effort to attain the goal. Therefore, it can be stated that this is such a part of human life that can be interpreted in several ways. For this reason, there are several motivational theorists and the concept, perception and the attitude of motivation has changed with the course of time. The classicalists theorists have explained motivation differently and so as the behaviouralists (Petri and Govern 2012). Besides that, it can be seen that the Contemporaneous theorists have analyzed motivation in a different way and this is because of the fact that motivation can be explained from different perspectives (Ankli and Palliam 2012). The way Henri Fayol, Max Weber and Taylor have explained the theory of motivation, Elton Mayo, Chris Argyris and Herzberg have explained the theory from some other perspectives. Therefore, it is clearly understood that motivation is such a topic that can be accessed from several viewpoints and thus with the course of time, the concept of motivation has changed significantly in the viewpoints of the theorists. However, it can be stated that the concept of motivation varies from every people in the society and the viewpoint of a manager on motivation varies largely from the viewpoint of the workers (Kerr 2014). However, considering the nature of motivation, it can be stated that it is not possible for any of the persons to determine one particular theory of motivation among all the existing theories. All the theories have their own perspectives and best at explaining motivation from their point of view. Therefore, it is almost impossible to identify one particular theory as the best theory of motivation. The concepts and the explanations of the motivation theories have differed from one theory to another and thus the explanation differs. Therefore, no particular theory can be identified as the best theory of motivation (Schunk and Zimmerman 2012). Main aim of Taylor was to increase productivity in the organization and on the other hand, Gant introduced Gantt chart following Taylor. Maslows Hierarchy of Needs theory and McGregors Theory X and Theory Y have two different perspectives and main aim of both the theories were to focus on the need of motivation from different perspectives (Malik a nd Naeem 2013). It has been seen from the previous research work that from the beginning, motivation theories have gained enough importance and thus many theorists have worked on this. Each of the theories has tried their best to motivate people both in society, in organization at the highest level, so that they reach the best level (Nuttin 2014). Therefore, each of them have their own set of objectives and based on that, the outcomes automatically vary from one to another. Therefore, it is not proper at all to determine one theory as the best theory of motivation and other as less important (Schunk and Zimmerman 2012). References Ankli, R.E. and Palliam, R., 2012. Enabling a motivated workforce: exploring the sources of motivation.Development and Learning in Organizations: An International Journal,26(2), pp.7-10. Kerr, J.H., 2014.Motivation and emotion in sport: Reversal theory. Psychology Press Malik, M.E. and Naeem, B., 2013. Towards understanding controversy on Herzberg theory of motivation.World Applied Sciences Journal,24(8), pp.1031-1036. Nuttin, J., 2014.Future time perspective and motivation: Theory and research method. Psychology Press. Petri, H. and Govern, J., 2012.Motivation: Theory, research, and application. Cengage Learning. Schunk, D.H. and Zimmerman, B.J. eds., 2012.Motivation and self-regulated learning: Theory, research, and applications. Routledge.