How theories of Motivation and the Self and Organizational Culture are represented in the film The internship (2013)?
If to consider human life as his/her movement forward on the path of development, we can say that life is a constant process of overcoming the new boundaries, to achieve the best results, self-development and personal growth. In this process, one of the dominant roles is played by the question of the meaning of actions and deeds, which are made by people. What does have an impact on human activity and his/her behavior? For what does the person do something? What does motivate him/her? After all, any action (even idle) almost always has a motive.
One of the main provisions of psychology says that normal human behavior is influenced by certain factors that may be associated with an individual’s needs and / or the consequences of his/her actions. When we are dealing with human needs, we must remember that the motivations of people certainly are not what we think they should be; they are by what people are willing to do. Employee motivation is a mandatory attribute of any organization. Regardless of person’s disposal of technology and equipment, these resources cannot be used as long as the work of people previously motivated would not be added to them (Noe, Hollenbeck, Gerhart, and Wright 56).
Almost all theories of motivation were formed and developed in relation to the working teams and in the periods, when employees’ effectiveness inexplicably dropped by unclear reasons, and management (business owners) of the company with the help of external experts (psychologists and consultants) sought a way out of this “team depression”. And, as a rule, it has found.
Even the first researchers and theorists of motivation issues determined an individual approach to each employee motivation as the key one, ensuring success. Different people will always have different behavioral motives. In order to make working conditions and remuneration of employees in line with expectations, which the employer is interested to maintain and motivate, the approach to each should be personal (Noe, Hollenbeck, Gerhart, and Wright 79).
Self-motivation is personal motivation and pushing to the execution of the designated purposes, the internal launch of energy in a particular direction. All social (and natural) sciences are based on the philosophical foundation of basic, guiding their development, concepts. Organizational behavior and management are based on a number of basic ideas about human nature and the organizations, which are the most “time-tested” principles. They are made up of human nature, which includes the individual characteristics, perceptions, personal integrity, motivated behavior, sense of ownership and value of the person, as well as of the nature of the organization, including social systems, mutual interest and ethical principles (Noe, Hollenbeck, Gerhart, and Wright 124).
Self-motivation is now considered as part of social intelligence of the person. It is determined by how quickly people adapt to a rapidly changing situation, can present themselves in the society, how they are emotionally sensitive to changes in the behavior of the interlocutor, and so on. Today, social intelligence in some cases is quoted higher than the general intelligence (Bell 184).
There may be two types of motivation, namely the motivation of avoiding failure and the motivation to succeed, and it determines a lot in human behavior. If the person avoids failures, hi/her main principle of life sounds: “What if something happens?” He/she sees a danger for him/herself in all the current events and in any case does nothing. The person tuned to achieve success sees every new situation, new opportunities. He/she is braver and understands that in order to achieve anything, it is necessary to act and gain experience, even negative. The person does not perceive it as a failure, arguing that a negative result is the same result. He/she moves forward. His/her “glass” is always “half full” (Bell 193).
Among all arts cinema occupies a unique place in the world today and, consequently, in human life. Cinema is a social institution. It affects the life of society, forming the audience consciousness. In turn, society requires new achievements from Cinematography: improvement of techniques and creative ideas. Thus, there is a constant connection between the society and the world of the cinema. And this connection is able to transmit our feelings, habits, customs and traditions, even immerse a person in the world of his/her illusions. Moreover, it can be said that the film industry is able to cover almost all spheres of social consciousness. Cinema allows a person to take life form a little bit different angle than he/she perceived it before (Champoux 89).
Thus, the movie forms a person’s world, enriches or robs him/her mentally, emotionally saturates. Another highlight of the movie emerges from here, namely a psychological impact on the person. A varied range of unique feelings can arise under its influence. The full-length movie or a TV series can bring a smile or tears of joy or sadness, excitement and a sense of peace of mind. Movies can change the internal state of person, his/her character, behavior, and even habits (Bell 198).
If the intention of the filmmaker was to make people think about some of the ideas and issues, which the author of the movie put into his/her work, and made for themselves from this a conclusion – as it usually happens. The movie is a world of ideas that a person realizes in his/her mind (Champoux 92).
For men, the career and salary become the determining motives, which mean a rational component dominates. After forty years, many people begin to think about retirement. It becomes the main, if not, then one of the key motivations. Workers after forty value the enterprise’s stability much more. In this case, social guarantees are put at the forefront when choosing a job (Rhodes and Westwood 28).
However, the main characters from The Internship movie faced with the necessity to coincide with the current working requirements, which raised characters’ motivation. The entire movie is not only the promotion of positive life for the aged spectators but also a deep insight into the life of the younger generation, among whom competition is so fierce, but young people are forced to spend more time at the computer and idealize their skills even more. The topic is interesting and presented by the creators in a very easy manner.
The Internship (2013) is a comedy created by US cinematographers. The main characters of the movie are two guys named Billy and Nick. They dedicated their lives to the sales, and they worked pretty well. Suddenly, they learnt about a new computer world, which subsequently destroyed their established careers. Now, their goal is to prove to society that they are not so old-fashioned, and can achieve success in this direction. As a result, Nick and Billy sent a request for an internship in the largest company on the Internet – Google. Their team is composed of students, who graduated from college with honors. However, to step over the threshold of this beautiful and full of surprises the world is just the beginning, and in order to go further, they need a good, not a little, work hard. Nick and Billy have a lot of work – to beat the competition, and managers – to prove that the upgrade process is the key to the new technology. In order to succeed in achieving this goal, the main characters have a lot to learn.
The experience of the main characters in the movie indicates that with the proper motivation and belief in them, people are capable of much. In order to manage own motivation, it is necessary to have (Rhodes and Westwood 33):
Conscious choice. In cases when it is required to make a decision or to overcome the contradiction, it is necessary to analyze the situation (for example, drawing sheet into two columns on pros and cons, count those, and others), and consciously choose the most acceptable option (Rhodes and Westwood 34).
Billy and Nick were fired due to company’s bankruptcy, and this fact forces them to search for a new job. It happened that their skills got old, because the whole world became computerized. Contrary to all expectations, the job appears in the new generation of the most popular companies. This is Google. Later, the guys manage to get there on probation (Ranker, 2013).
Positive thinking, namely the ability to see what is happening around yourself in a positive way. A negative result is the same result. It’s not what happens to us but what is our attitude to what is happening to us (Rhodes and Westwood 34).
Despite happened situation, main characters are not lost and decide to try their efforts at new position. They stayed positive and later, the guys manage to get into Google on probation (Ranker, 2013).
Figure 1. The Dialogue between Bill and Nick before Google Internship (Ranker, 2013)
Both characters fall into a world, where the ball is ruled by twenty-year-geeks, passionate computers. Billy and Nick do not know what a Quidditch is and who the X-Men are, have no idea of programming languages, and do not know how to use a smartphone (Ranker, 2013).
Clear goal. At each new stage, a goal should be set a little higher than available today, the real and specific measurable (Rhodes and Westwood 35).
Despite the lack of relevant experience Billy and Nick were taken by the results of non-standard responses to the pass of the test. To get a job in the end, the guys have to win a grant, competing with other interns (Ranker, 2013).
Friendly support. If the person needs help, he/she should seek it to his/her followers. If the person needs praise, openly asking about it. If the advice is needed, it is better to ask the authoritative people (Rhodes and Westwood 36).
Both characters lost their jobs, but in the frantic attempts to find a job, Billy suddenly offered to do an internship at Google, the most technologically advanced and well-known company in the world. Friends become part of the “nerds” team, changing their lives.
Thus, our motivation is constantly changing, because the motives very closely relate to the needs (demand is a human need for something), and the main of them are the so-called Maslow’s hierarchy (Noe, Hollenbeck, Gerhart, and Wright 143):
- The need for security;
- The need for love, friendship, belonging to a group;
- The need for achievement, recognition; and
- The need for self-expression (self-actualization).
Figure 2. Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs
Choosing between the mattress sales under the characteristic inadequate boss and ghostly hope to get into Google, the two frames select an American dream – free food, booths for intense relaxation during the day, dry cleaner, green lawn, bicycles of original coloring, spaceship suspended in lobby, young and beautiful people, whose IQ is significantly higher than the national average. Also, Billy and Nick wanted to satisfy the needs for achievement and self-expression and, therefore, took a decision of the internship. However, the employment at Google values not only knowledge of the candidates in the field of technology. Participants, in particular, are forced to play Quidditch, sell advertising in the nearby pizzerias and held other strange tests. In general, Nick and Billy have to choose – either remain unemployed or jump on the playground with brooms squeezed between the legs.
The most common motivators (philosophy), affecting the three spheres of relations (related to life, to the people and to themselves) and showing, for which a person can strive for self-improvement, include (Noe, Hollenbeck, Gerhart, and Wright 149):
Motivators, affecting the attitude to life (for the sake of material prosperity – to have material goods; for the sake of alleviating – to make it easier to live; for the sake of a better life – in order to live better; and for the sake of avoiding trouble);
Motivators, affecting attitudes towards people (for the sake of good relations with the people – to be good to the people; and for altruism, opportunities to help others), and
Motivators, affecting the attitude toward themselves (for the positive attitude of people – that I was treated with respect; for the sake of perfection – to improve him/herself; and for the sake of self-realization).
The philosophy related to attitude to life is found slightly more often than the philosophy of characterizing attitude (Foreman and Thatchenkery 49). Today’s young people do not dream about freedom of choice. Young people come for an internship at Google, ready to drive themselves to the corporate framework, functional and focused entirely on the success – that is, they are the complete opposite of Nick and Billy. The latter, however, also have some advantages – for example, life experience and unconventional thinking, which turn out to be devoid of many graduates of prestigious colleges.
The perceived direction (end, focused) self-transformation of the individual, namely self-development of personality, is of particular interest. The problem of identifying the factors that influence the choice of directions of self-development and success factors of their implementation still remains among the many unexplored issues. The key moment in the process of goal-oriented self-development is self-motivation as a factor in the choice of objectives and as a basis for decision-making and as the most important “engine” of targeted systematic effort, and as a way of self-control, self-correction and self-support.
Of course, each person uses multiple mechanisms of motivation, but one or two of the mechanisms to be acceptable for the majority of intrapersonal and social situations are formed to adulthood. The dominance of these mechanisms in considerable time intervals leads to the development of self-motivation styles (Foreman and Thatchenkery 51).
The style of self-motivation is a comprehensive description of specific processes to motivate the activity by personality, including both the nomination and the motives of their struggle, and their motivational presentation to the society. The type of motivation (positive and negative), the principal orientation of self-motivation (rational and emotional), and the dominant sources of motivation (motivation, going inside, instrumental motivation, self-concept exterior, internal self-concept, motivation due to the internalization of the target) can be recognized as major style-forming features of motivation (Bell 216).
Managed self-motivation, or simply self-motivation, can be positive and negative. The positive motivation often includes such techniques as piggy of positive energy and support of their achievements: visualization of dreams, promotion and rewards. The negative motivation concerns the control of own behavior: reminders, negative reinforcement of mistakes, personal punishment, penalties, etc. Negative motivation is usually stronger than positive – more environmentally friendly and more long-playing. In practice, it is better to combine both positive and negative self-motivation, selecting the most appropriate balance between them.
The theory of equality (equity) of Adams states that people evaluate the effectiveness of motivation not by certain factors, but taking into account the assessment of remuneration that was obtained by other people who are in similar circumstances. Thus, the motivation is seen not in terms of individual needs, but on the basis of its comparison of him/herself to others. It is a question of the subjective assessments and people compare their efforts and result with the effort and the results of others. Here are three possibilities, namely underestimation, fair assessment, and reassessment (Noe, Hollenbeck, Gerhart, and Wright 178).
Billy and Nick assess their potential to it of other interns. This takes into account the conditions in which they and others operate. They feel undervalued, thus, try to change the contribution of others, and select to compare other options. Therefore, the manager must always be careful as to not feel whether his/her subordinates injustice to him/herself, to seek from the workers a clear understanding of the desired results, to encourage workers, taking into account that they are interested in not so much as even appreciate them, but the fact how to evaluate them in comparison with the others.
Thus, the stability of self-development motivation depends on the ideal of sustainability (image of the ideal personality, the ideal “I” and self-sustainability. As a result of self-esteem, the subject reveals his/her personal shortcomings that can be of different nature. On the one hand, as a lack of he/she can understand the gap from the norms of the positive qualities on the other – the level of development of positive qualities in comparison with his/her existing ideals. In this case the disadvantage is noticeable to others, and therefore a decisive role in encouraging self-development will be owned by its own initiative of the subject.
Modern approaches to identity management and, in particular, self-management involve the use of more efficient techniques and technologies not the control “on the situation”, but advanced management, propaedeutic, crisis. Knowledge of the functioning of personal motivational sphere considerably increases the potential of self-development through the timely registration of “individual” motivational factor and competent support.
Works Cited
“The Internship Movie Quotes.” Ranker. 2013. Web. 11 January 2017. http://www.ranker.com/list/the-internship-movie-quotes/movie-and-tv-quotes
Bell, Emma. Reading Management and Organisation in Film. Basingstoke: Palgrave, 2008.
Champoux, Joseph E. “Animated film as a teaching resource.” Journal of Management Education, vol. 25, no. 1, 2001, pp. 79-100.
Foreman, Joel and Thatchenkery, Tojo J. “Filmic representations for organizational analysis: the characterization of a transplant organization in the film Rising Sun.” Journal of Organizational Change Management, vol. 9 no. 3, 1996, pp. 44-61.
Noe, Raymond, Hollenbeck, John, Gerhart, Barry and Wright, Patrick. Human Resource Management. 9th ed. New York: McGraw-Hill Education, 2014.
Rhodes, Carl and Westwood, Robert. Critical Representations of Work and Organization in Popular Culture. London: Routledge, 2008.
