Motivational Methods

Motivational Methods
HCS 325
Professor John Thompson
February 14, 2011

Managers in the health care setting are routinely met with change.   How they, and their employees, adapt to change is one way to measure the organization’s success.   While change breeds feelings of negativity, change can also improve decision making and performance (lovetoknow, 2006-2011).   To prepare for change, a manager must implement new strategies for coping with stress and to keep employees motivated in the process.   According to Lombardi (2007), “motivation is used in management theory to describe forces within individuals that account for the level, direction, and persistence of effort they expend at work.”   Three motivational methods that a manager can put into place are goal setting, incentives or consequences, and personal empowerment.
According to Lombardi (2007), “goals can be highly motivating-if they are properly set and well managed.”   Goals set the foundation for success.   With proper goal setting, managers and employees can identify priorities within themselves and the company, and can reprioritize if needed.   According to Bruce Wares (1998), goals must be “conceivable, believable, and achievable.”   For goal setting to equal success, a person must be able to visualize their goals, have the goals match their value system, be realistic, and physically and mentally achievable.   For an organization experiencing change, a manager could help with setting goals on an individual basis, or amongst groups.   To set goals, an individual or group must identify an area that needs, or could use, improvement.   Next, the group or individual must write the desired action on paper.   By committing to paper, a group or individual is more likely to complete the goal.   Finally, as the goal is nearing completion, the group or individual should begin formulating a new goal to be completed (Wares, 1998).        
If a manager approves of the goals that their employees have set, they can then...