Abstract: This study represents an initial endeavor to explore needs satisfaction: An effective tool for workers commitment to work. Inspite of the motivational strategies available and employed in organisations, the issue of employee performance and productivity is still very much questionable. This is because what motivates one individual may not necessarily be what motivates another individual (s). Therefore, individual needs and motivational factors should be assessed critically and addressed carefully. The survey instrument used in the collection of data was questionnaire which was based on a random selection as the primary source of data. Some of the questions asked were centered on the factors that motivates an employee to perform and hence productive in the organisation. Based on the data obtained from the respondents which was analyzed using the statistical tool (pie chart) method, it was observed that a greater number of respondents supported the notion that high employee performance and productivity is a function of need satisfaction (motivation). These findings appear to be useful in furthering the understanding of the complexity associated with the strategy to the realities of result oriented organisation environment by recommending that organisations should accord priority attention to the introduction of good motivational package (such as: good remuneration, instituting other monetary awards, higher fringe benefits package and other financial rewards, timely promotion, cafeteria, flextime, employee involvement, etc.) to enhance higher productivity and commitment to work.
INTRODUCTION
The unprecedented deteriorating level of productivity in organisations in Nigeria today is a matter of serious concern to the government as well as to the employers of labour (Kayode, 2001; Akinyele, 2005; Lather and Jain, 2005). The need for productivity in all sectors of the economy has become very crucial and inevitable especially now that the country is passing through a critical period in her socio-political and economic history (Sadiq, 2003). It is against this background that the Federal Government of Nigeria has restored to the introduction of welfare packages as a source of motivational strategy for higher performance and higher productivity and improvement in government establishments (Eghe, 2001; Choudhary, 2004; Allport, 1999). One of the basic problems in any society is how to motivate people to work. In a modern society, this is not an easy task, since many people derive only slight personal satisfaction from their jobs (Agbadudu and Ogundipe, 2000). Even with the best strategy in place and an appropriate organisational architecture, an organisation will be effective only if its members are motivated to perform at a high level. One reason why leading is such an important managerial activity is that it entails ensuring that each member of an organisation is motivated to perform highly and help the organisation achieve its goals. When managers are effective, the outcome of the leading process is a highly motivated workforce.
All human behaviour arises in response to some forms of internal (physiological) or external (environmental) stimulation. These behaviours are the result of the arousal of certain motives. Thus motivation can be defined as the process of activating, maintaining and directing behaviour toward a particular goal. The process is terminated after the desired goal is obtained.
Motivation has been described by many scholars and management experts as an important tool that ensures the encouragement of employees to higher performance in any organisation. In any organisation, it is pertinent for the management to study the needs of workers and try as much as possible to meet those needs (Agbadudu and Ogundipe, 2000). Motive or motivation is now the most frequently used and accepted terms in psychology to refer to the basic causes which move or activate the organisation.
A problem is recognized when a doubt is raised, difficulty is created or dissatisfaction occurs and a solution is needed. For the purpose of this study, it was discovered that there are issues of low productivity in most organisation and which the researcher wishes to explore in depth. The statement of the research problem as regard this study posits that employees performance are drastically reducing and continuously low as a result of poor or lack of motivation which in turn affects productivity at large? The overall purpose of this study is to examine employee needs satisfaction which would enhance the total satisfaction of the customers through efficient performance of the employees with the view of making profit which is the ultimate purpose of every organisation.
In the past, managers seldom bother to understand these motives that induce men and women to work. It has been so easy to assume that money is all that matters. No wonder why managers in the past often remarked: give them another penny an hour and it will keep them happy.
The aim of an organisation is to achieve specific goals set for it. These goals can be achieved through materials and human elements present in the organisation. In the case of business organisations, their goals may be to increase productivity, maximize profit and efficiency, expand market shares and to build efficient personnel etc. these goals can be achieved if employees’ needs are satisfied.
Benkhoff (1997), Guest (1999), Arthur (1994), Guest (1999) and Guest (1997) states that some individuals refuse to give further commitment to work because their basic needs have not been satisfied by the organisation that employed them. It is obvious that while the enterprise have some specific goals, the individuals also involved also have needs and goals that are specially important to them. To realize these goals of the organisation, there is need for the employees to be committed to work. This commitment cannot be achieved unless the workers perceive that their own needs are going to be satisfied by the organisation.
Meyer and Smith (2000) observed that man is motivated to work primarily by money and that he is inherently lazy and will respond only when he is induced by economic and monetary rewards. He is of the view that human beings are rational economic beings whose only aim is to maximize their economic gain with money as one of the main pivots.
Meyer and Allen (1997) write: Taylor reviewed workers’ commitment to work in terms of satisfaction of their economic needs only. Taylor’s approach could be viewed as dehumanizing because he compared human beings to lifeless machines which can be manipulated mainly for money. It is this flawed scientific management theory that led to the development of human relations management.
Iverson and Buttigieg (1999) sees commitment to work in terms of interpersonal relationships established in the work place. He believed that workers are not merely a collection of individuals but perceived themselves as a group. Therefore, that manager who does not have the enthusiastic support of the group they supervise will be unable to motivate the individual members in any significant degree and this cannot enhance their commitment to work.
Meyer and Herscovitch (2001) and Somers and Birnbaum (1998) are of the opinion that individuals will work hard on a task, when they perceive that such efforts have a good chance of yielding the rewards they want. In recent times, many studies have been carried out to test the accuracy of this suggestion and in general, positive results have been obtained.
Shore and Wayne (1993) opined: it appears that one of the main reasons why individuals chose to work hard on certain jobs is that they believe such efforts will be rewarded. A worker in the course of performing his duties expects reward in form of regular payments of salary, promotion as at when due, cordial relations with his boss, the absence of which may have negative effects on work commitment.
Patterson et al. (1997) attempts to explains commitment of workers to the organisations’ objectives. They advocated the popular theory X and Y. McGregor’s theory X views man as lazy, indolent, lacking ambition and like to avoid responsibilities. They therefore assumed that the effective mobilization of worker should involve control, direction, conversion and force. They further stated that it is only the threat to punishment that can make workers to put forth adequate efforts towards the achievement of the organisational objectives. Theory Y is a statement of new beliefs and assumptions of management. It assumes that workers are not lazy and they exercise self control and self directions if they are committed to the job. They can be more committed through material things and status enhancement based on the assumption of theory Y. It can be argued that before workers could be satisfied, these needs that could be financial (salaries, bonus) or psychological which may be status enhancing e.g. promotion should be satisfied.
Porter et al. (1999) asserts: ‘the more satisfied the worker, the stronger the force to remind employees who experience positive satisfaction in their work and they are more productive. Shouksmith (1994) summarizes that in industrial and commercial organisations, the satisfaction tends to be rather limited to junior staff and operative levels of works, that opportunities increased as one ascends into higher steps and the self-actualization needs are theories least satisfied at all levels of an organisation.
Pfeffer (1998) advances that a worker who enjoys high pay, autonomy, prestige, opportunity of advancement, opportunity for skill utilization and skill development will have high level of commitment and productivity.
Edwards and Wright (2001) states: it is not only one motive that affects behaviours but numbers of it. He claims that human motivation develops in sequences. This theory assumes that the needs are in a sequential order and when satisfied, they decrease in strength and the higher needs dominate behaviours. This leads to the statement that a satisfied need is not a motivator. In work place, the needs that people bring to their work differ because each person has a different background and set of experiences. One employee may be seeking growth needs as social needs through a sense of belonging by identifying with an occupational group. The same worker may desire esteem needs as sense of self worth for completing an important task or being successful under competitive conditions. Therefore, satisfaction at one level moves workers to a higher level of need. Workers may desire basic needs such as adequate salaries, bonus, security of job etc. In this situation; the management should ensure provision of these needs to workers.
Becker and Gerhart (1996) and Herzberg (1987) identifies the type of factors in an organisation, which can result into dissatisfaction or satisfaction of an employee. These factors are called hygiene factors and motivating factors. He states that factors that create satisfaction are those emanating from the intrinsic content of a job e.g., recognition and responsibility. The factors, which create dissatisfaction, stem from the extrinsic job content e.g., working condition, pay and supervision. These satisfy lower needs and are known as hygiene factors an important point in the theory is that as dissatisfaction springs from lower needs not been satisfied, when these are satisfied, it only removes dissatisfaction and does not lead to motivation. If the hygiene factors did not reach a certain standard, the workers feel bad about their job. A positive motivation and a feeling of well being could be achieved not by improving these hygiene factors, but by improving the intrinsic factors such as recognition and the job itself.
The satisfiers are necessary in an organisation because they are psychologically related factors. When a worker first enters into an organisation, his primary aim may be economy but as he stays longer in the organisation, salary, bonus, supervision and company policy may not be adequate to motivate him to work. As the worker moves to the upper ladder of the organisation through promotion, his needs may tend to be psychological such as a desire for recognition, achievement and growth.
Olatunde et al. (1999) explains that the most vital lesson that can be learnt from motivation theories is the extent of the management of incomplete knowledge of individual and group behaviours. There is a problem in determining what is important to a particular person or a group. The objectives of this study are to detect whether commitment to work increases employees’ efficiency; to know whether needs satisfaction contributes to employees’ commitment to work; to consider whether the cost of satisfying workers needs is a waste to the organisation on the long-run and to ascertain whether commitment to work improves organisational profitability.
MATERIALS AND METHODS
YELE Nigeria limited is located at Ile-Epo, Agege, Lagos State. The company was established in the year 2000. The company manufactures varieties of soaps of different sizes e.g., Yele toilet soaps, Yele medicated soap, Yele key soap, Yele detergent etc. The company has a working population of one hundred (100) staff. Yele has distributors covering the South-West geo-political zone of Nigeria. It has a reasonable market share among its competitors.
This study will enable readers to ascertain to what extent Yele Nigeria limited has satisfied the needs of its workers and the effects of satisfying these needs on worker’s commitment to work. The result of this study can be applied to any organisation.
In order to get to the root of the study, questionnaires were administered, data were drawn from the questionnaires collected and the data were analyzed so that the objective of the study could be achieved.
The population of Yele Nigeria limited is 100. Questionnaires were administered to 80 workers out of the entire population. Sixty out of 80 questionnaires were correctly filled and returned. Therefore, 60 were considered as the sample size.
Each questionnaire contains 16 questions out of which those directly relevant to the objective of this article were analysed. And in order to give all population the element of equal chance of being selected, random sampling technique was employed. The statistical tool used is the pie chart.
| Fig. 1: | The responses to question (6) among variables |
| Fig. 2: | The responses to question (8) among variables |
| Fig. 3: | The responses to question (11) among variables |
Figure 1 shows that majority of the respondents agrees with the question. Therefore, it is established that when the needs of workers are satisfied, it makes them to be more committed to work.
Question (8) would you say that workers’ commitment to work increases the employee’s efficiency in your company?
From Fig. 2, it is inferred that 294° represents those that support the question. Therefore workers’ commitment to work increases employees’ efficiency.
Question (11) would you support the view that workers’ commitment to work improves organisational productivity?
From Fig. 3, it is absolutely agreed that workers’ commitment to work improves organisational productivity.
Question (13): Does the cost incurred on satisfying workers’ need a waste to an organisation in the longrun?
| Fig. 4: | The responses to question (13) among variables |
From Fig. 4 the highest number of respondents disagrees with the question. Therefore, the cost incurred on satisfying workers’ need is not a waste to the organisation in the long run.
SUMMARY OF FINDINGS
The following are inferred from the study:
| • | Workers’ commitment to work increases employees’ efficiency. |
| • | The cost incurred in satisfying workers’ needs is not a waste to the organisation in the long run. |
| • | Workers’ commitment to work improves organisational productivity. |
| • | When the needs of workers are satisfied, they would be more committed to work. |
CONCLUSIONS
Although, it is not possible to satisfy all the needs of workers in an organisation, but the degree of dissatisfaction should be brought to a minimum level. If most of the workers’ needs are not satisfied, the effect of their dissatisfaction will reflect negatively in the productivity of the organisation.
However, the inference drawn so far shows that when workers needs are adequately satisfied, they will be committed to their work and by extension, make the organisation more efficient.
RECOMMENDATIONS
The following suggestions and recommendations as they concern YELE NIGERIA LIMITED can be applied to other organisations:
| • | The increment in the rewards of workers should not be published in order not to escalate prices of goods and services in local markets. |
| • | Economic needs and satisfaction should entail placing the salary structure of workers on an equal basis with their colleagues in other viable companies and other public enterprises. This will reduce the tendency of non-committed workers to work, as a result of in satisfaction of their economic needs. |
| • | The salaries, wages, bonuses and other allowances of workers should be increased and paid promptly by the management of the company. |
| • | The promotion procedure should be performance-related. Most of the respondents are of the opinion that they are not really satisfied with the system of promotion and this can bring about negative attitudes towards work. |
| • | Workers should be allowed to work in groups rather than in isolation of others; the reason being that isolated workers always complain of boredom and become lazy, thereby less committed. |
| • | The management should find means of detecting the needs of workers in order to use such to increase workers’ commitment to work, by satisfying the needs. |