Managing Motivation in Economy Essay

The firm has had to close rather a few locations, reversing its elaboration plans for the first time since it incorporated. Being that this is uncharted territory for the social club, Jim Claussen, vice chairperson for human relations, had been struggling with how to address the issue with employees. As the companys fortunes worsened, he could see that employees were becoming more and more disaffected. Their insecurity just well-nigh their jobs was victorious a toll on attitudes. The companys retrenchment was big novels, and the employees didnt like what they were hearing.Media reports of Morgan-Moes chisel in closings use up pore on the lack of advance nonice or communication from the companys corporate offices, as well as the lack of prisonbreak payments for departing employees. In the absence seizure of official information, rumors and gossip harbour spread like wildfire among remaining employees. A few angry blogs developed by discontinue employees, like IHateMorga nMoe. blogspot. com, have made the morale and public relations exhibit even worse. Morgan-Moe is changing in other ways as well. The honest age of its workforce is increasing rapidly. A couple of factors have contri thated to this shift.First, less qualified young people argon around because many families have moved south to find jobs. Second, cut ins have been actively encouraged to get hold of older workers, such as retirees looking for some supplemental income. Managers are very receptive to these older workers because they are more mature, miss few days of work, and do not have child-care responsibilities. They are also ofttimes more qualified than younger workers because they have more experience, sometimes in the managerial or executive ranks. These older workers have been a large(p) asset to the company in troubled times, but they are in particular likely to leave if things get bad.If these older workers start to leave the company, taking their hard-earned experience with them, it seems likely that Morgan-Moe will sink deeper toward bankruptcy. The System Claussen wasnt quite sure how to respond to employees sense of hopelessness and fear until a shoplifter gave him a hold up entitled Mans Search for Meaning. The book was written by a psychologist named Victor Frankl who survived the concentration camps at Auschwitz. Frankl raise that those who had a clear sense of purpose, a reason to live, were more likely to persevere in the face of nearly unspeak able suffering.Something just about this book, and its advocacy of finding meaning and management as a way to persist over adversity, signifi stinkertly stuck with Claussen. He thought he might be able to apply its lessons to his workforce. He proposed the idea of a new direction for management to the companys executive committee, and they reluctantly agreed to prove his suggestions. Over the last 6 months, stores throughout the company have utilise a performance management system that, a s Claussen says, gets people to purchase into the idea of performing so that they can see some real results in their stores.Its all about seeing that your work serves a broader purpose. I read about how some companies have been sharing store performance information with employees to get them to understand what their jobs really mean and enter in making variety shows, and I thought that was something wed be able to do. The HR team came up with five options for the management system. Corporate al poored somebody managers to choose the option they thought would work best with their employees so that managers wouldnt feel too much like a rapid change was being forced on them.broadcast I is opting out of the new idea, continuing to stay the course and providing employees with minuscular to no information or opportunities for participation. Program II tracks employee absence and sick leave and shares that information with somebody employees, giving them feedback about things they can control. Management takes no further action. Program III tracks sales and inventory replacement rates across shifts. As in Program II, information is shared with employees, but without providing employee feedback about absence and sick leave. Program IV, the most(prenominal) comprehensive, tracks the same information as Programs II and III.Managers communicate it in weekly brainstorming sessions, during which employees try to determine what they can do give out in the future and make suggestions for improving store performance. Program V keeps the idea of brainstorming but doesnt fork over employees with information about their behavior or company profits. Since implementing the system, Claussen has spoken with several(prenominal) managers about what motivated them to choose the program they did. Artie Washington, who chose Program IV, said, I inadequacy to have my employees input on how to keep the store running smoothly.Everybody worries about his or her job security in this economy. Letting them know whats going on and giving them ways to change things keeps them involved. Betty Alvarez couldnt take issue more. She selected Program I. I would rather have my employees doing their jobs than going to meetings to talk about doing their jobs. Thats what management is for. Michael Ostremski, another proponent of Program I, added, Its okay for the employees to feel a little uncertainif they think were in the clear, theyll slack off. If they think were in trouble, theyll give up.Cal Martins also questions the emergency to provide information to the whole team, but he chose Program II. A person should know where he or she stands in the job, but they entert have to know about everyone else. It creates unnecessary tension. This is somewhat identical to Cindy Angs reason for picking Program V. When we have our brainstorming meetings, I learn what they the employees think is most pressing, not what some spreadsheet says. It gives me a better feel for whats going on in my store. Numbers count, of course, but they dont tell you everything.I was also a little worried that employees would be upset if they saw that we arent performing well. Results to bodyguard Claussen is convinced the most elaborate procedure (Program IV) is the most effective, but not everyone in the executive committee is won over by his advocacy. Although they have supported the test implementation of the system because it appears to have relatively low costs, others on the committee want to see results. CEO Jean Masterson has asked for a complete breakdown of the performance of the conglomerate stores over the past 4 years.Shes specially interested in seeing how sales figures and employee turnover rates have been affected by the new program. The company has been hoard entropy in spreadsheets on sales and turnover rates, and it prepared the chase report, which also estimates the dollar cost of staff time taken up in each method. These costs are based on the go of hours employees spend working on the program multiplied by their earnings rate. Estimates of turnover, profit, and staff time are collected per store. Profit and turnover data include means and standard deviations across locations profit is net of the monthly time cost.Turnover information refers to the percentage of employees who either quit or are terminated in a month. To see if any patterns emerged in managers selection of programs, the company calculated relationships between program selection and various attributes of the stores. Program I was selected most frequently by the oldest stores and those in the most economically distressed areas. Programs II and III were selected most frequently by stores in urban areas and in areas where the workforce was younger on average. Programs IV and V were selected most frequently in stores in rural areas, and especially where the workforce is older on average.