Thursday, June 18, 2009

Herzberg Motivation-Hygiene Theory

Today I read a bit about the the Herzberg Motivation-Hygiene Theory, which in a nutshell, expresses that there are two levels of needs for employees. If we want people to stick around, we have to prevent job dissatisfaction by meeting:
  • their basic needs (keep the work environment sane, fair, with competitive benefits)
  • their motivational needs (job satisfaction comes from challenge, recognition, autonomy, interesting work, and room for growth)
I used to say that a good manager does two things: gives employees autonomy (read: room to make mistakes), and challenges employees to grow. I'm finding out there are some prerequisites to this, and am trying to learn how to verbalize them.

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