Team Six Sigma

CR-1
MOTIVATION: FROM CONCEPT TO APPLICATION

FLEXIBLE BENEFITS: Developing a benefits package
Flexible benefits turn benefits into motivators
A benefit plan that allows each employee to put together a benefit package individually
tailored to his or her own needs and situation is a FLECIBLE BENEFIT PACKAGE.
BENEFIT PLANS:
1. Modular plans: Modular plans are predesigned packages or modules of benefits, each
of which meets the needs of a specific group of employees.
2. Core Plus Options: Core Plus plans consist of core essential benefits and a menu like
selection of others from which employees can select.
3. Flexible Spending Accounts: Flexible Spending plans allow the employee to set aside
pretext money up to the amount offered in the plan to pay for a particular benefit.

Flexible Spending accounts can increase take home pay because employees dont pay
taxes on the money they spend from these accounts.
Flexible benefits can accommodate differences in employee needs based on age,
marital status, and number and age of dependents.
Flexible benefits replaces One-Benefit-Plan-Fits-All

INTRINSIC REWARDS: Employee Recognition Programs
Appreciation
Recognition
Benefit of Intrinsic rewards include motivation
1. Important work rewards can be both intrinsic and extrinsic
2. Intrinsic in the form of employee recognition programs and extrinsic in the form of
compensation systems.
Recognition Programs:
Spontaneous to Private thank you
Widely publicized programs

- Research suggests that financial incentives may be more motivating in the short run,
but in the long run, it is non financial incentives.
- Most powerful workplace motivator is RECOGNITION.
- Advantage of non-financial incentives It is free, praise being free.

Criticism of intrinsic rewards:
Despite the increased popularity of employee recognition programs, critics argue that they are
highly susceptible to political manipulations by management.
In cases where most jobs, criteria for good performance arent self evident, which allows
managers to manipulate the system and recognize their favourites. Abuse can undermine the
value of recognition programs and demoralise employees.

Recognise Individual Differences:
- Managers should be sensitive to individual differences
- Spend the necessary time to understand whats important to individual employee. This
allows individualizing goals, level of involvement and rewards to align with
individual needs.
- Design jobs to align individual needs and maximize their motivation potential.
Use goals and feedbacks:
- Employees should have a specific goal and they should get feedback on how well they
are faring in pursuit of these goals.
Allow employees to participate in decisions that affect them:
- Employees can contribute to setting their own work goals, choosing their own benefit
packages and solving their productivity and quality problems.
- Participation can increase employee productivity, commitment to work goal,
motivation and job satisfaction.
Link Rewards to performance:
- Rewards should be contingent to performance, and employee must perceive the link
between the two.
- Regardless of how strong the relationship is, if individuals perceive it to be weak, the
results will be low performance, a decrease in job satisfaction, and an increase in
turnover and absenteeism.
Check the system for equity:
- Employees should perceive that experience, skills, ability, effort and other obvious
inputs explain differences in performance and hence in pay, job assignments and other
obvious rewards.

IDENTIFYING CONFLICTS OF INTEREST:
Managers often find themselves needing to make multiple perspectives at the same
time and sometimes that are motivated by rewards to take actions that are unethical.
This is known as Motivated Blindness, a tendency to only see what we want to see.
Financial rewards may amplify conflicts of interest.

What helps to minimise conflicts of interests?
The most important step is to be aware of motivated blindness and be honest about
where conflicts exist. Beware of biases that might creep into your perceptions when
money is at stake.

MOTIVATED BY INDIVIDUAL GOALS OR RELATIONAL GOALS:
o Psychologists have consistently demonstrated differences in the ways personal or a
group based achievements are valued.
o In cultures that emphasize collective orientation, people strive to achieve goals that
benefit the whole group and find processes that isolate individual performance and
achievement.
o People from these cultures admire team players and those who help and support one
another.
o Cultures that emphasize individual orientation are marked by striving to achieve
personal goals and a lack of attention to what benefits the group as a whole. People
from these cultures are more likely to admire Star performers and those who
accomplish their ends independently.