Motivation

"Motivation is the internal and external factors that stimulate desire and energy in people to be continually interested in and committed to a job, role, or subject, and to exert persistent effort in attaining a goal. Motivation is the energizer of behaviour and mother of all action. It results from the interactions among concious and unconscious factors such as the (1) intensity of desire or need, (2) incentive or reward value of the goal, and (3) expectations of the individual and of his or her significant others." 

There are several different theories about motivation in the work place such as, task competence, peer and management support, task and role clarity, and corporate awareness.

The Theories have been put to use by different business icons of our time. Such as Frederick Winslow Taylor, who thought about money giving workers motivation. On the other hand Elton Mayo thought that workers wanted to be social and have good working conditions to stay motivated. Abraham Maslow researched more into his theory of needing 5 main needs to stay motivated at work shown in this image.

Maslow's Theory

Frederick Herzberg believed similar theories to Maslow, but with only two factors to keep the staff motivated, but established that their are other factors that if are not present in the workplace could demotivate staff. such as hygiene factors.

I think the Motivation theory that most relates to me and my decision to come to university is probably Maslow's Theory.

I was motivated to start my degree by my father, who has just finished his business management masters degree with The Open University Business School. I read some of his MBA books whilst studying Business studies at sixth form and found them quite interesting. There was a lot i didnt understand since i wasn't at the same level as he was. I wanted to come here to get ahead of the rest of my old class mates who chose different life paths. I think knowing i got very similar grades to my father all through my life has motivated me to try as hard as i can for the next 2-3 years so that i can have my attempt at becoming as successful as my father in the 'real world'. 
I feel like my motivation has similarities to Maslow's theory because I have a loving family behind me willing to help me. Also I have the recognition and self esteem of knowing if i work hard enough i can hopefully achieve what ever i want. which i suppose then leads onto Self actualisation of believing in myself?

When i first started sixth form, i found it very difficult settling in. this made me very de-motivation. i think not knowing many people made it very hard for me to work hard meaning my work wasn't very good, and so making teachers give me bad grades, this caught me in a down hill period where got very de-motivated and found it tough to keep up with school work. So when i came to university i tried very hard to make new friends qiuckly in order not to go into the down hill spiral i was in at sixth form. so far i hope i have been doing well to keep motivated.

In conclusion motivation is very important in a working environment other wise you can slip very easily into a point of mental block from working hard. in order to stay happy it is important to keep up with work and friendships so that you stay motivated. as well as keeping your home environment nice and clean so that you are happy to sustain the amount of work needed to stay motivated and do well.