tion members contribute their joint efforts to generate productivity. Motivation provides the best potential source of increased productivity and profitability. It implies that employee abilities will be used more efficiently, which in turn should lead to improved job satisfaction as well as increased productivity.Although motivational theories are often viewed as abstract and unrelated to the real world, a good theory provides a basis for understanding, explaining, and predicting what will happen in the work environment. Whether we realize it or not, leaders and managers, working with and through other people, must operate from some theory. The core theories of motivation can be classified into two categories--content and process.Content Theories (sometimes called need theories) are concerned with the question of what causes people to act. This question leads to an identification of needs, incentives, and perceptions. The most popular of the content theories are (1) psychologist Abraham Maslow's hierarchy of needs, and (2) Frederick Herzberg's motivation-maintenance theory. Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs Maslow are based his concept of a hierarchy of needs on two principles. First, human needs may be arranged in a hierarchy of importance progressing from a lower to a higher order of needs. Second a satisfied need no longer serves as a primary motivator of behavior. Herzberg's Motivation-Maintenance Theory In general, employees tend to focus on lower-level needs, particularly security, in their first jobs. After those are satisfied, however, they try to fulfill higher-level needs, such as initiative, creativity, and responsibility. It is by appealing to those needs that real achievement in efficiency, productivity, and creativity can be made, although managers do not always do this.The content theories focus on the needs that drive or spur behavior and the incentives that attract or induce behavior. The process theories focus on how...
