Directing people at work: supervision, motivation, leadership and communication, Maslow’s need hierarchy, incentives, leadership styles, and communication networks and barriers.
Key ideas
Directing is instructing, guiding, communicating and inspiring people; it starts action, happens at every level, is continuous and flows from top to bottom.
Its four elements are supervision, motivation, leadership and communication.
Maslow’s needs, lowest first: physiological, safety, affiliation, esteem, self-actualisation; a satisfied need no longer motivates.
Financial incentives: pay and allowances, productivity linked wage incentives, bonus, profit sharing, co-partnership or stock option, retirement benefits, perquisites.
Non-financial incentives: status, organisational climate, career advancement, job enrichment, recognition, job security, participation and empowerment.
Leadership styles: autocratic (the leader decides alone), democratic (decides with subordinates) and laissez faire (subordinates decide for themselves).
Formal communication follows the chain of command (single chain, wheel, circular, free flow, inverted V); informal communication is the grapevine.
Barriers are semantic, psychological, organisational and personal; clear ideas, suitable language, feedback and good listening overcome them.
Remember
Productivity linked incentive
(units made − target) × rate per extra unit; nothing if the target is not passed
Profit share per employee
share% of profit ÷ number of employees
Motive vs motivator
an inner urge vs the technique used, such as pay or recognition
shares offered to employees below the market price
Watch out
Paying the incentive on every unit instead of only the units above the target.
Listing recognition or job enrichment as a financial incentive.
Putting esteem below safety in Maslow’s order.
Worked example
Under a productivity linked wage incentive, a worker gets ₹5 for every unit above a target of 270 units a week. This week he made 305 units. How much incentive does he earn?