Motivating Employees in the Workplace

I am the Events Manager for a company called Virtual Innovative Opportunities (VIO). This is a Second Life based company with a founder and parent company called First Link that is based in Florida. The VIO Business Group and it is referred to in Second Life is a series of connected virtual islands that play host to offices for a handful of real life and Second Life businesses. Our owner and developer has prebuilt empty office spaces around this "Sim" that has a large open-air auditorium in the center that is the meeting venue for many group related meetings held there each week. Our business is rather success given the current lacking state of the Second Life platform due to the economy taking a toll on it. Our 'islands' are almost completely rented out and our group has over 300 active members to date.

This operation is currently run by a four person team consisting of the owner, two managers, and one staff member. The staff manager is paid a flat weekly salary. He is satisfied with the amount he is getting paid for the work he is doing. However, he is always asking what else he can do to help the business out because he desires the need for achievement and affiliation to the group. His primary role involves research and writing, which other then when the presentation is read at the seminars, he sees little accomplishment for his work. At the same token, none of the 300 group members knows that he is the one writing these presentations and ultimately does not associate him with the management of the VIO sim.

The Estate manager is a commission paid employee of the group whereas, she gets paid 50% of the profits from the rentals of office space after the cost of the sim is covered. Most of the time this sim has little turnover. As a result she gets paid a lot of money without really having to do too much work for her income. She often talks about how she feels she makes too much money for her work and that she desires to fill her need for achievement. She is always on the ground working with the tenants on the daily maintenance of the facilities so she is well affiliated with the group members as a manager of VIO. The owner of the sim is also well affiliated with the group members of the sim as he basically started this business himself and brought all these people here. His need for power is fulfilled by the fact that all final decisions regarding this business have to go through him. However, in recent months he has experienced the desire to fulfill his desire for achievement, for he wants to see these two 'islands' build into a whole 'continent' of VIO business related functions. Then there is myself. I am a behind the scenes person for the most part whereas my tasks involve making sure that the groups events go on as planned and that we reach out to other businesses and recruit them back into the VIO sim. The process to see my detailed efforts turn into progress takes time and that leads to my need for achievement. The fact that I am often heard of but never seen results in my need for affiliation to be able to socialize with our members from time to time. My need for power is ultimately met because I have a few people that I personally oversee as my team to make sure that the events are going as planned.

All of these employees fall under the McClelland Need Theory. This is David McClelland's theory that people have three basic needs in life: Need for Achievement- the desire to accomplish something difficult, the Need for Affiliation- the desire to spend time in social relationships and activities, and the Need for Power- the desire to influence, coach, teach, or encourage others to achieve. While each of us has some different needs, the one motivational problem we all share is the need for achievement. This is the problem that will be focused on in this paper.

"The need for achievement is defined by the following desires:

To accomplish something difficult. TO master, manipulate, or organize physical objects, human beings, or ideas. To do this as rapidly and as independently as possible. To overcome obstacles and attain a high standard. To excel one's self. To rival and surpass others. To increase self-regard by the successful exercise of talent. Achievement-motivated people share three common characteristics: a presence for working on tasks of difficulty; a preference for situations in which performance is due to their efforts rather than other factors, such as luck; and they desire feedback on their successes and failures than do lower achievers."

Given more co-workers need for achievement I have devised the following solution to satisfy this common problem. The success of this business relies on the ability to not only rent out the offices on our first two islands, but to constantly add new rental clients to our group and to be able to add new islands to the continent that will be sold out and profitable as well. On a individual basis, this would mean that we need to create short term and long term goals with financial rewards for performance based on each person's role within the company. For our staff writer we need to offer him the ability to make bonuses based on writing articles for us about each of our group's 300 members at his own pace that will result in publicity for the clients, affiliation for the staff member, achievement by watching the publication that his is writing to grow on a regular basis and financially rewarding with pay per piece bonuses. For our estate manger, we need to make a goal for her to go out and pre-sell our next sim (the retail outlet) before we use our own money to buy this island. This would show her a great sense of achievement as she will watch the business grow and expand through her efforts, adding more income share to her pocket, and ultimately making her feel that she is earning her pay. The owner's goal needs to be to create a handbook and training seminar for incoming staff members and clients that will orientate them to the VIO realm. For myself, I need to focus on promoting the newest promotion (VIO Radio Network) across the entire Second Life grid and start building my revenue base from there to fulfill all of my needs in this case.

By evaluating each of the employee's roles, feelings, and productivity we can come up with a plan that will re-motivate everyone to focus their efforts on the group's mission to create this successful business in Second Life. Personal need fulfillment will lead to the overall success of this business.