Motivation is the key to keeping employees interested in working hard and meeting daily demands from a company. In my point of view managers must be able to successfully motivate their employees in order to prevent high turnovers, satisfy employee needs, and keep an overall good reputation for the company. With a happy employee you will have happy customers as well.
Motivational Strategies I believe that in order to properly motivate your employees a manager must first find out how and what different strategies will work for which employees. There are many ways to motivate workers, but I think there are more effective strategies that work on some workers than others. That being said I believe that managers must get on some sort of personal level with their workers in order to efficiently motivate them to work harder and reach the company’s goals.
Money
The most controversial idea of motivational strategies is money. I personally think that if an employee is not being paid what they believe to be suitable the will be unhappy regardless of any other motivator. Unless the need or want for money is being met, the employee will most likely feel unappreciated and unhappy regardless of any other motivation strategies that an employer might use. A personal example I would like to use is when I worked as a receptionist at Supercuts, I was held responsible for doing a lot of managerial work, without being compensated for it. I soon became overloaded with work, tired, and I was still making minimum wage. No matter what kind of motivational strategies my manager would use I was still disappointed and unhappy with my pay which eventually led to quitting my job. As management consultant Rosabeth Moss Kanter (1999) puts it, "Compensation is a right; recognition is a gift” (Para. 4). This quote in my theory harmonizes with my statement that it is important to infuse other motivational strategies along with using money as a motivator.
Money alone would not be sufficient enough to keep an employee motivated, and would result in higher turnovers in my opinion.
Self-Esteem
In addition to using money as a motivator I think Self-esteem is just as important of an issue when motivating employees. According to the Encarta Dictionary the term Self-esteem is defined as “confidence in your own merit as an individual person.” In my theory self-esteem is the need for self-respect, to make ourselves feel like we are worth something, that what we are doing matters to something or someone. It is important in my opinion that an employer stresses this idea to all managers, so they can implement this into their motivational strategies. To keep employees motivated, they need to feel appreciated, managers need to compliment good work, and show their appreciation. In my opinion when my work is being credited and praised I feel important to the company, I feel like I did a great job and it satisfies my need to feel important and successful. When a worker makes a mistake it is important not to embarrass them, instead I believe it is important to show them that their mistakes are guides to do the work the right way. I believe that if a manager can properly instruct an employee and focus on their mistakes and not the employee as a “bad person” they can motivate and to teach them how to fix their mistakes and give a better performance for the next time.

Relatedness The next idea I would like to add to my list of motivational strategies is Relatedness. In my theory relatedness gives people the feeling of belonging. It is how an employee feels when they are accepted in the office and work area, it is also the feeling that they receive when they spend a lot of time with a group of people at their jobs. Managers that allow their workers to learn together through activities for instance are giving them opportunities to connect with one another and relate to each other on personal levels. I believe that this is needed to motivate employees because it is human nature to want to feel accepted and in my eyes it makes the work day a little easier being able to communicate with other workers and to satisfy the need to feel accepted.
Autonomy
Lastly, I would like to include the idea of personal autonomy. Personal autonomy is important for managers to practice with their motivational strategies. Allowing employees to make decisions for themselves will make them feel less like robots and more like valued workers in my opinion. I believe that it will give workers the motivation they need to stay satisfied and strive to reach higher ratings, profits, and goals. When you empower an employee to make decisions in their area of work, it makes the employee comfortable, and it will also benefit the customers as well. Conclusion Although there are many great strategies to motivate employees, I chose these four strategies because they are ones that I strongly agree with. Money, Self-esteem, Relatedness, and Autonomy in my opinion are important for managers to include in their motivational skills. I have shown what each of these terms mean for employees and how important it is to use in the workforce. In my theory it is not wise to use money alone and vice versa, these strategies must all be used together, due to the fact that employees all have different needs and wants.

References
Nelson, Bob. "The Ironies of Motivation." Strategy & Leadership Jan.-Feb. 1999: 26+. General OneFile. Web. 22 Aug. 2010.1, Para. 4.