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A Job Description for the Business Owner - стр. 24

Money

The last level of motivation is money, and it is actually pretty rare to find a person at this level, as this is a level of motivation in which, strictly speaking, a person does not even care what he does as long as he makes more money doing it. Although many people say they are interested only in money, this is not actually true. Just try offering an engineer who constantly complains about being underpaid a better-paying job as sales manager. Typically, he would tell you that he wants to work in his specialty. This means that his level of motivation is not money, but personal conviction. People who are on the money level of motivation usually have some serious money troubles and are ready to do anything possible to solve them.

It should be noted that the higher levels of motivation are accompanied by the lower ones. Thus a person on the level of duty is also motivated by the personal conviction, personal gain, and money levels. The fact that he has a duty level of motivation does not mean he would not be interested in money. Money is just not the first priority. When he acts, he thinks first about the company, and only then does he consider the reward he might get. This is why you should be careful not to stigmatize somebody who asks for a raise. Such a request does not necessarily mean that money is the person's main motivation. In order to determine the person’s true motivation, you should look at what drives him when he does his job, not concentrate on whether he asks for more money.

A person on the personal conviction level of motivation acts according to his or her own beliefs about what is right and wrong. Of course, he also operates on the personal gain and money motivation levels, but not on the level of duty motivation. With this type of person, as long as his or her principles and views correspond with the company’s goals, there are no problems. However, if in order to achieve the company’s goals you have to ask for something from him that does not agree with his beliefs about what is right and wrong, you will face problems in managing this kind of person. For example, say that you hired a new chief accountant who is functioning on the personal conviction level of motivation, and his conviction is that the accounting department should be perfectly in order. He has his own idea about what “perfectly in order” means. You are happy about finding such a great person because your idea about how an accounting department should function means not having any problems with the IRS. As time goes by and your company becomes more structured, you notice that the accounting department slows down the company’s work flow. For example, it takes too long to get some orders written and to account for financial transactions. You decide to change the work procedures in the accounting department and find that your chief accountant, who completely supported all of your ideas before and seemed very professional to you, all of a sudden starts working against your ideas and creating problems. The reason for this is simple. He operates on the personal conviction level of motivation and is not motivated to work in the company’s best interest, but, rather, in accordance with his own principles.

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