Interviewee: Mrs. Helen Chester (Human Resource Manager, Hampshire Dispensary)
Interview Questions
i. Who is responsible for motivation within your company? Do all the employees have the same chances of getting promoted? Or, are there some who are more preferred to others?
ii. Does your company have an employee motivational plan? If yes, what are some of the factors you consider while motivating your employees?
iv. Are there some challenges you face within your motivational plans? How do you address these challenges?
vi. What are some of the methods you use to motivate your employees?
vii. Are your motivational methods extrinsic or intrinsic? Why do you say so?
viii. There are different motivational theories that different organizations apply. Do you apply any theory in your motivational plans?
x. If someone is not satisfied with the manner the organization is motivating the employees, what are some of the steps they have to follow?
Introduction
I interviewed Helen Chester, who is the Human Resource Manager at Hampshire Dispensary. Hampshire Dispensary is situated in a busy town of Hampshire with one hundred and fifty employees. Her main role in the organization is to ensure that the employees are highly motivated through providing able leadership skills. The dispensary also allows for charity work where someone can be booked even when they do not have a valid health insurance cover. In a day, the dispensary can book an average of two hundred and fifty patients. Mrs. Helen says that “our employees work in a very stressful environment, therefore, we must ensure that we motivate them highly to promote performance.”
Motivational practices
According to Helen, motivating employees is one of the hardest things in an organization. However, motivation is inevitable. No organization can survive in a highly competitive market. “Having highly motivated employees is one of our core values, therefore, we do not discriminate any employee during motivation process,” said Helen during the interview. She added that “to ensure that our employees are motivated highly, we drew a motivational plan that stipulates the process of promotion within the organization.”
During the interview, I learned that different organizations have different motivation practices. Helen agrees that the motivation practices applied in different organizations differ according to the operations within the organization. She says that Hampshire Dispensary, for instance, deals with employees who work in an environment full of sick people who need emergency attentions. “Some of the employees here, not only need motivation in terms of rewards or promotion, but also in terms of psychological well-being due to the nature of their work,” said Helen during the interview. From that sentence, I learned that the nature of work is a factor that affects the motivational practice of an organization heavily.
“Our organization motivates the employees in different ways. First, we train those who require relevant knowledge in different fields. Apart from training, we reward the most hardworking as a team and as an individual. Among other promotional methods, we appraise our employees and raise their salaries” concludes Helen when I asked her about the promotional methods they apply. From that statement, I had no reason to ask whether they use either intrinsic or extrinsic methods because, from the statement, they were applying the both methods.
Evaluation of effective based on evidence
According to Helen, leadership is an important aspect of motivation. Motivation goes hand in hand with leadership. An organization with good leadership practices will definitely have the best motivational plans and in most cases, such an organization will have the least problems with their employees as far as motivation is concerned. Motivational practices within an organization will only be achieved effectively when the employees are led effectively. For instance, at Hampshire, employees are placed in teams. Each team has a leader to whom members of the team report cases of abuse to their rights. This makes employees feel highly motivated.
However, even if Hampshire’s human resource management is promoting its employees highly, there are still some places where they need to pull their socks. I will recommend that they consider the need for communication. Most of the organizations do not give their employees the right to communicate with others through the social media. Employees always get stressed when they cannot communicate with their loved ones while at work. Considering the fact that we are in the information era, employees should be given a chance to communicate with their families while at work.
Apart from giving the employees a chance to communicate with their family members as a way to promote them, the organization needs to understand the psychological needs of the employees. At Hampshire, most of the employees work in hardships. Sometimes, an employee can work overtime in case of emergency. There is a need to understand that the nature of the dispensary requires that an employee has some time to rest and have some time away from the patients. Therefore, the days for leaves and vacations should be increased to at least thirty days a year. However, these changes may be costly to the Hampshire Dispensary as employees might take a lot of their time on phones. According to Maslow’s’ hierarchy of theory, employees will get satisfied when their needs are satisfied in stages, from the basics to the most complex. This is what Hampshire Dispensary has done exactly. Therefore, I can conclude that the motivational nature of Hampshire is high and the dispensary is in the right direction to meet the 21st-century demands of employees’ motivational practices.
