Achieving Goals: Understanding Motivation, Needs, and Equity in the Workplace

Defining Motivation and Goal Achievement

Motivation is what drives individuals to seek, through actions, the achievement of specific goals, whether personal or group-oriented.

Group Goals and Organizational Drivers

Groups are motivated by several distinct purposes:

• Power: Seeking positions of prestige and dominance.
• Budget: Ensuring the satisfaction of all financial and resource requirements.
• Transcendent: Driven by religious or philosophical beliefs.
• Business: Interest in improving the situation of others or the community.
• Scientific and Technical: The desire to increase various cultural and artistic knowledge.
• Freedom: The fundamental need for autonomy and independence.

Individual Needs and Personal Development

The goals and purposes of individuals vary significantly, depending on the timely situation and the personal value scale of each person. Key individual needs include:

• Social Insertion: Work is an essential part of life because it fulfills the purpose of actively inserting oneself into society and provides a decent and independent life.
• Emotional Balance: The worker's mood is more closely related to the working environment than to the physical conditions in which the work is performed.
• Personal Development: Motivation to work exists when the work is intended to achieve many environmental finalities.

Workplace Factors Affecting Motivation

Motivation is influenced by two main types of factors:

• Environmental Factors (Negative): These depend on the working climate and atmosphere in which the work is developed.
• Motivating Factors (Positive): These depend on the development of the work itself.

Goal Setting Theory for Objective Achievement

This motivation theory outlines several principles for effective goal setting:

1. Workers must set their own goals voluntarily.
2. The goals should be staged according to their importance and difficulty.
3. A worker who does not achieve the final objective will experience a high level of dissatisfaction. However, their dissatisfaction will be less if they partially exceeded several goals before failing to achieve the final goal.
4. The achievement of each objective (goal) must be tied to a clear system of rewards.

The process involves setting different motivating partial goals that bring us closer to the final objective. Workers should participate in setting both the goals and the final objective. It is crucial to establish a retribution system that rewards the effort made to achieve each part of the goals and, ultimately, the final goal.

The Principle of Equity in Compensation

Equity suggests that everyone tends to compare the efforts they make and the rewards they obtain with the efforts made and the rewards obtained by others. Perceived fairness in this comparison is crucial for maintaining motivation.