Question

Compare and contrast two employee motivation theories using examples.

Answer 1

Employee motivation is certain factors that persuade or motivates them to achieve organizational goals or objective along with their objectives. It includes intrinsic motivation that means the use of internal factors within an organization to motivate them and extrinsic motivation that uses external factors to motivate employee behavior. 2 theories of motivation are:
A. Maslow's need hierarchy theory:
This theory was developed by Abraham Maslow. He created a hierarchy for human needs. Here he used to study how humans garb their basic needs through intrinsic motivation. He formed a hierarchy through with the human needs to move on this includes; physiological wants, sense of safety, belonging, esteem needs, and further self-actualization state. This is developed with the aim that lower needs are to be satisfied before achieving higher goals.
Eg: The desire of an individual to be recognized and appreciated.

B. Job characteristics model – Hackman and Oldham

It is one of the employee motivation theories in which it states that the job or task itself a means to the motivation of employees. If the employees work continuously and without rest, they become fatigued and demotivated. So all the tasks should be challenging and unique. This theory states five core job characteristics: skill variety, autonomy, task significance, feedback, and task identity. It creates high motivation and it is equal to three psychological states: a) the work gives some meaning to the employee or they can relate. b) We get responsibility and freedom in performing each job and it is considered as an opportunity. c) We get knowledge from outcomes whether it is successful or not. If it is successful, we can continue that pattern and if it is a failure, then we can learn from mistakes.
Eg: Having a challenging job motivates the person to perform well. Here, the individual is motivated through the task that is being provided to them.
Comparison:

Both are workplace motivation theory
Both the theory discusses how to motivate employees from a boring environment.
Great importance is given to the psychological states of the employees in both theories.
Contrast:

The job characteristics model is more focusing on work-life while Maslow's theory is concentrating on both work and personal life.
Maslow's theory could be considered as a macro study while Job characteristics model is a micro-study.