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S U P E R V I S O R : F R A N C E S J Ø R G E N S E N
MOT IVAT ION O F B LUE - AND WH ITE - COLLAR
EMPLOYEE S
LINE KIRKEGAARD (286429) AND KRISTINA LARSEN (286295) U17BSCIM
Aarhus School of Business and Social Sciences
Spring 11
Abstract
Increasing competition in today’s globalized world makes it important for companies to focus
on employee motivation. The aim of this paper is, therefore, to investigate how factors of
work affect blue-‐ and white-‐collar employees’ motivation, as theorists infer that motivational
needs of employees vary with the nature of their work and skill levels.
In order to investigate how these factors of work affect the two employee groups, four
motivational theories are used as a theoretical framework. It consists of McClelland’s
achievement needs theory, Herzberg’s two-‐factor theory, Latham and Locke’s goal theory, and
Hackman and Oldham’s job characteristics model. All of these four theories contribute with
different, yet complementary, aspects of how to motivate employees. The empirical results
are gathered by the use of a questionnaire. The questionnaire is given to employees in two
different companies, Orskov Yard and Systematic. Orskov Yard employs both blue-‐ and white-‐
collar workers and Systematic only employs white-‐collar workers. In order to analyze the
responses of the questionnaire, the statistical tool, SPSS, is used.
Based on the analysis, we discovered that blue-‐collar workers find McClelland’s need for
affiliation to be most important factor of their work, whereas the white-‐collar workers prefer
the need for achievement. Goal theory was not rated considerably high by any of the two
groups; this might be because goals are already implicitly a part of their work. In addition, it
was found that the blue-‐collar employees generally value all the characteristics of Hackman
and Oldham’s model higher than the white-‐collar employees, except questions relating to task
identity and task significance. Finally, regarding Herzberg’s two-‐factor theory, it was found
that the blue-‐collar workers generally prefer the hygiene factors of salary and company
policy, whereas the white-‐collar workers value the motivators of sense of achievement, work
itself, and recognition.
In summary, it can be concluded that companies need to be aware of the different attitudes of
white-‐ and blue-‐collar employees’ perceptions of motivational factors of work.
Table of Contents
1 Introduction .........................................................................................................................................1 1.1 Definitions ................................................................................................................................................... 2 1.1.1 Motivation................................................................................................................................................................. 2 1.1.2 Blue-‐ and White-‐Collar Employees................................................................................................................ 3
1.2 Theoretical Framework .......................................................................................................................... 4 1.3 Delimitation ................................................................................................................................................ 7 1.4 Structure ...................................................................................................................................................... 7
2 Motivation.............................................................................................................................................9 2.1 McClelland’s Achievement Needs Theory ......................................................................................... 9 2.1.1 Relation to Analysis ............................................................................................................................................10 2.1.2 Criticism ..................................................................................................................................................................11
2.2 Herzberg’s Two-Factor Theory...........................................................................................................11 2.2.1 Relation to Analysis ............................................................................................................................................13 2.2.2 Criticism ..................................................................................................................................................................13
2.3 Goal Theory ...............................................................................................................................................14 2.3.1 Relation to Analysis ............................................................................................................................................17 2.3.2 Criticism ..................................................................................................................................................................17
2.4 Job Characteristics Model.....................................................................................................................18 2.4.1 Relation to Analysis ............................................................................................................................................22 2.4.2 Criticism ..................................................................................................................................................................22
3 Methodology...................................................................................................................................... 23 3.1 Quantitative vs. Qualitative Research ..............................................................................................23 3.2 Development of Questionnaire...........................................................................................................25 3.3 Pilot Study..................................................................................................................................................26 3.4 Empirical Background...........................................................................................................................27 3.5 Data Collection .........................................................................................................................................29 3.6 Data Analysis ............................................................................................................................................29
4 Empirical Results............................................................................................................................. 30 4.1 Presentation of Respondent Sample.................................................................................................31 4.2 Summary of Results................................................................................................................................32 4.2.1 The Blue-‐Collar Sample.....................................................................................................................................32 4.2.2 The White-‐Collar Sample .................................................................................................................................35
4.3 Analysis.......................................................................................................................................................36 4.4 Critical Reflections..................................................................................................................................40 4.4.1 Internal Validity ...................................................................................................................................................40 4.4.2 External Validity ..................................................................................................................................................41 4.4.3 Reliability ................................................................................................................................................................41 4.4.4 Sum up of Critical Reflections ........................................................................................................................41
5 Discussion and Reflection............................................................................................................. 42 5.1 Discussion of Analysis............................................................................................................................42 5.2 Inconsistencies in Respondent Answers .........................................................................................52 5.3 Impact of Age on Motivation................................................................................................................53 5.4 Differences within the White-Collar Group....................................................................................57 5.5 Implications for Companies and Managers ....................................................................................62 5.6 Future Perspectives................................................................................................................................63
6 Conclusion.......................................................................................................................................... 65
7 Bibliography...................................................................................................................................... 68
8 Appendices ........................................................................................................................................ 73 8.1 Appendix 8.1: Questionnaire in English ..........................................................................................73 8.2 Appendix 8.2: Questionnaire in Danish ..........................................................................................77 8.3 Appendix 8.3: Statistical Framework for Analysis of Blue- and White-Collar Workers..80 8.4 Appendix 8.4: Statistical Framework for Analysis of Generations.........................................84 8.5 Appendix 8.5: Statistical Framework for Analysis within the White-Collar Group ..........91
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1 Introduction
The Danish welfare society will face a number of new challenges in the future that largely are
caused by increasing globalization and demographic change. The growing globalization
causes the international economy to become increasingly integrated, which means that
everybody has access to the same technologies, and therefore compete against each other
despite national boundaries. The demographic challenge is found through a shrinking work
force caused by more older people leaving the labor market, while there are fewer younger
people to take over (Andersen 2010). Furthermore, the core workforce, people between 35
and 54, will also decrease. Since the core workforce, is normally the group that works more
hours, the problem of a change in demography is reinforced by a decrease in people working
the most hours (Andersen 2010)
Due to changes in demography and increasing globalization, greater demands for productivity
and quality are placed on the companies. This is especially true for Danish companies as
wages are higher in Denmark than in many other parts of the world (Hansen 2010).
Therefore, it is very important for Danish workers to be increasingly productive and deliver
work of a high quality. The question then is how a company can ensure better performance by
their employees?
One possible answer to the question above could be to make sure the employees are
motivated to perform their best at their job. According to Pinder (2008), work motivation is
the most important topic in organizational science as no other issue in the discipline has more
significance for the general economic well being. Moreover, because many of the key
determinants of productivity are hard to point out, we can expect work motivation to be at
least as important in organizational science and management in the future as it has been in
the past (Pinder 2008). Since motivation is important for ensuring economic well-‐being
companies need to motivate their employees, however the question is whether all employees
are motivated by the same factors?
Many theorists argue that the motivational needs of employees vary with the nature of their
work and their skill levels (Locke 1973, Friedlander 1965, Hunt 1986, Kovach 1995). Two
groups that have different nature of work and thereby job types are blue-‐ and white-‐collar
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employees. Both job types are present in Danish companies and therefore, it is important for
companies to acknowledge that these two job types might be motivated by different factors of
work. In order to motivate employees companies can rely on a wide selection of motivational
theories that all provide a framework for how to motivate employees. However, as just
mentioned not all employees have the same motivational needs, which leads to the following
problem formulation:
How does factors of work affect blue- and white-collar employees’ motivation?
Our main motivation for writing this paper can be illustrated by what Henry Ford said almost
a century ago: “You can destroy my factories and offices, but give me my people and I will
build the business right up again” (Whiteley 2000). The quote clearly indicates the
importance of employees and how they can affect the company’s competitive situation.
Furthermore, motivated employees make it easier for the companies to reach the best
possible result as compared to having demotivated employees (Hein 2009). Thus, if
employees are motivated, it helps the company perform better and strive for high quality.
However, we recognize that all people are different which might also have something to do
with the nature of the work they perform. Therefore, we find it very interesting to investigate
how to motivate both blue-‐ and white-‐collar employees and what factors of work they find
motivating.
1.1 Definitions Before moving on, we find it necessary to define some of the concepts used in the problem
formulation. The problem formulation consists of two concepts, which need to be clarified,
motivation and blue-‐ and white-‐collar employees.
1.1.1 Motivation
The word “motivation” has its roots from the Latin words motio, moveo, movere, movus, and
motivus, which in English can be translated into motion, to move, set into movement, or a
motive power (Pinder 2008). The concept of motivation refers to internal factors that drive an
action, and to external factors that can act as inducements to action. Motivation can influence
three aspects of action, which are direction (choice), intensity (effort), and duration
(persistence) (Locke, Latham 2004). This paper focuses on employee motivation and the
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forces that lead to a better performance and well being in the job. Therefore, we will use
Dwight D. Eisenhower’s definition of motivation: “Motivation is the art of getting people to do
what you want them to do because they want to do it” (Brooks 2009).
People in a workplace, no matter what position, decide not only the amount of new abilities
and skills they are willing to acquire, but also how and to what extent they utilize their skills
and abilities. Therefore, it is hard to find out what different people perceive as motivational
factors and also, how can we be sure that people react to the motivational factors, the way we
expect? This is the problem that makes Pinder (2008) stress that motivation is a hypothetical
construction, due to the fact that motivation is an invisible process, which is pretty hard-‐ if not
impossible-‐ to measure and evaluate. Nevertheless, motivation is based on an assumption of a
variety of psychological principles, which can lead to a movement in the sense of performing
organizational activities.
Motivation can be divided into internal and external factors. The internal motivational factors
are created from within the human itself and can be affected by the wish to perform or self-‐
development. Internally controlled behavior occurs because the execution of that behavior is
satisfying in itself (Hein 2009). Many also refer to internal motivation as intrinsic motivation.
The external motivational factors are created from the outside and are outside the control of
the individual. The individual can react to external motivational factors, but does not control
whether they are available or not. These could include working conditions and company
policy. Externally controlled motivation occurs because it leads to a reward that can alleviate
a need or prevent discomfort (Hein 2009). External motivation is also referred to as extrinsic
motivation.
1.1.2 Blue- and White-Collar Employees
According to Oxford American Dictionaries and MacMillan English Dictionary a blue-‐collar
worker is a person who is a member of the working class and performs manual labor typically
at an hourly wage. The name ”blue-‐collar” originally derives from the overalls worn by shop-‐
floor workers in some US factories (Bessant, Lamming 1988). A blue-‐collar worker can be
skilled or unskilled and can perform e.g. mechanical work, work in manufacturing, or in
construction.
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White-‐collar workers are people working in an office or in a professional environment and
traditionally, they were wearing “white collars” in contrast to the “blue-‐collar” workers
(McKean 2005, Rundell, Fox 2007). In the 1960s, white-‐collar personnel for the first time
outnumbered blue-‐collar workers (Rosenberg 1993).
A special part of the white-‐collar employees’ work force is the knowledge workers, they are
also known as “gold collar” workers and are predicted to be the “crème de la crème” of white
collar workers (Brown 1999). Knowledge workers are specialists and can be identified by
their skills and abilities, namely that they are highly educated, computer literate, creative, and
have transferable skills that allow them to move anywhere where their service is needed
(Brown 1999). Examples of knowledge workers include lawyers, programmers, information
systems designers, doctors, and scientists (Brown 1999).
1.2 Theoretical Framework Motivational theories have their root in behaviorism that was founded in 1913 by
psychologist John B. Watson (Hein 2009). Behaviorists believed that behavior was to be
explained by objective and direct observable data instead of theories; they therefore made a
range of experiments to explain responses to stimuli. Behaviorists saw motivation as the
learning of a certain behavior, typically through reward and punishment (Hein 2009). Even
though the strength of behaviorism rested in a clear and well-‐defined set of concepts,
methods and scientific principles, some behaviorists became skeptical. Cognitivism replaced
behaviorism as the most popular paradigm for understanding the mental function.
Cognitivists tried to find the outer circumstances that affect the individuals behavioral and
reaction patterns (Hein 2009). Out of these different approaches to human behavior came
many motivational theories all having different assumptions of human nature.
In the 1930s, psychologist Henry Murray was the first behavioral theorist who proposed a list
of needs that were to foster a goal-‐directed behavior (Buelens, Sinding & Waldstrøm 2011).
Murray’s work inspired a variety of needs theories, today also called content theories. Content
theories try to explain the inner needs that actually motivate or energize people in their jobs.
Consequently, content theories want to identify people’s needs and the goals they want to
achieve in order to satisfy these needs. Because they stem from behaviorist tradition they
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consider human behavior to be reflexive and instinctive, thus act as response to certain
environmental positive or negative stimuli.
The content theories include theories made by Maslow, Alderfer, McClelland, and Herzberg.
The theories of Maslow, Alderfer, and McClelland have some resemblance in that they
describe people’s needs whereas Herzberg’s theory distinguishes between internal and
external motivational factors.
The other category of motivational theories is called process theories. Whereas content
theories focus on what motivate people, process theories seek to explain the actual process of
motivation. The process theories derive from the cognitive tradition where it is assumed that
people are aware of their goals and their behavior and they act rationally and with purpose
(Brooks 2009). People who have developed theories in this category are Adams, who is
renowned for his equity theory, Vroom and Porter and Lawler for their expectancy theories,
and finally Latham and Locke for their goal theory.
Hackman and Oldham has also contributed to motivation theory with their job characteristics
model. Hackman and Oldham’s focus is not on the specific factors that lead to motivation, but
how to design a job that maximizes motivation among employees. According to Hackman and
Oldham there are certain factors a job must contain for it to be motivating.
Several of the motivational theories build upon and supplement each other. Therefore, we
have chosen to use four different motivational theories to analyze the problem in this paper.
The first two are content theories that will try to give an answer to what factors motivate
people’s actions. The first theory we will use is McClelland’s achievement needs theory. This
theory has been chosen due to the fact that McClelland argues that each individual has a
unique combination of needs, which will direct his behavior towards power, affiliation or
achievement. This is important in our paper as we are analyzing motivational factors for two
different groups, blue-‐ and white-‐collar workers, who might have different preferences
towards one of the needs. McClelland has been chosen over Maslow and Alderfer because
McClelland acknowledges that people have different needs that can be satisfied at the same
time and that these needs can be combined in various ways depending on the situation. Thus,
McClelland places his needs on a continuum rather than in a hierarchy.
6
The second content theory in this paper is Herzberg’s two-‐factor theory. This theory is chosen
because it specifically focuses on the factors that are necessary for a person to be motivated,
in addition to the fact that it is highly recognized (Latham 2006). Furthermore, Herzberg’s
theory distinguishes between intrinsic and extrinsic factors, which might be evaluated
differently depending on the type of work performed.
The third theory in this paper is Latham and Locke’s goal theory. This is a process theory,
which will help us understand how and why a behavior will lead to a certain choice or action.
Goal theory in general is very relevant as it is already used largely in companies for instance
by setting goals relating to a level of job performance, a work norm, a deadline, a budget, or a
quota (Locke et al. 1981). Therefore, goal theory has been chosen to learn whether having a
goal in their job motivates blue-‐and white-‐collar workers, and whether there are any
differences between the two groups. Further, goal theory is known as the most dominant and
useful theory of work motivation. Since, the idea behind goal theory is that people are more
motivated if they have a specific goal to work towards, the theory generally seems compelling
and reasonable to use in our analysis (Pinder 2008).
Finally, we will use Hackman and Oldham’s job characteristics model. This model will
complement the other theories well, because it gives insight into how to design a motivating
job. Hackman and Oldham are inspired by McClelland and Herzberg’s theories; therefore, the
theory complements the other theories well in giving a full picture of motivating employees.
One of the criticisms of the job characteristics model is that it does not take social needs into
account (Morgeson, Humphrey 2006). However, by using McClelland’s achievement needs
theory the social needs of the employees will be addressed. In relation to blue and white-‐
collar employees, Hackman and Oldham do not distinguish between different types of jobs;
however, they include moderators to their model, which might influence, which job
characteristics that motivates. Another important aspect of the job characteristics model is
that it focuses on internal motivators, which can be argued to have a long-‐term effect for
employee motivation, compared to external motivators (Buelens, Sinding & Waldstrøm 2011).
Also, it might be interesting to investigate whether these characteristics are found of greater
importance to one of the two groups we are studying.
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1.3 Delimitation Motivation is not only reserved for the work place. Motivation is also a central element
outside the working life. People can be motivated by engaging in planning a party or
exercising a hobby because it gives a sense of well being and having a good time with friends
and family. We will, in this paper, however, only focus on employee motivation, which is the
kind of motivation that occurs at the work place, and has an influence on the effort provided
by the employee, and thereby the effectiveness of the company. A person can easily be
motivated at the work place without it necessarily having positive consequences for the
company. This could for instance be if a person decides to make a long distance call to a
relative while at work, and thereby using the company’s resources to satisfy a personal need,
to talk to the relative. This behavior is not what the company wishes to achieve by promoting
employee motivation -‐ this is, on the other hand, something the company wishes to avoid. The
difference between motivation and employee motivation is, thus that the motivation is not
only limited to the behavior in relation to the company, employee motivation wishes to
promote the behavior that corresponds with the company’s expectations and goals
(Christensen 2007). This paper is about employee motivation, but for the sake of legibility, we
will hereafter refer to the term simply as motivation.
Furthermore, we will not evaluate leadership, as we will focus on the factors of work that
motivate employees, and not how specific leadership styles affect motivation. This has been
chosen because we wish to find out which internal factors and processes that lead to
motivation within the employee, in addition to designing a job that maximizes motivation.
Motivation and job satisfaction are two concepts that are sometimes hard to separate because
motivation often will lead to job satisfaction. However, in this paper we will only focus on how
employees are motivated, and not whether they are satisfied with their job which means that
we will not ask questions concerning whether they are currently satisfied.
1.4 Structure The paper consists of seven sections. The first section is what we have just been through and
contains the introduction to the paper.
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The second section deals with the topic of motivation and addresses the theoretical
framework of this paper. The four different theories, McClelland’s achievement needs theory,
Herzberg’s two-‐factor theory, Latham and Locke’s goal theory and Hackman and Oldham’s job
characteristics model, will all be explained as well as related to this research. Finally, a
critique will be given on each theory.
The third section deals with the methodological framework and begins with some general
reflections upon the methodological reasoning used in this paper. After that a discussion of
quantitative and qualitative research design will be made, followed by the development of the
questionnaire. We will also address weaknesses found in the questionnaire from making our
pilot study and after that present our empirical background. Finally, we will address the data
collection process and the data analysis.
The fourth section consists of our analysis and will begin by a presentation of the respondent
population. Moving on, a summary of the results will be given for the blue-‐ and white-‐collar
group respectively after which we will address possible differences in what factors of work
that motivates the two groups. Lastly, we will focus on some critical reflections relating both
the methodology and the research. The critical reflections will comprise of the extent of
internal validity, external validity, and reliability. The critical reflections are important as they
address the general strength of the research.
The fifth section deals with our discussion and reflection. Firstly, we intend to address what
was found to be important for the blue-‐ and white-‐collar employees and also whether there
were any differences between the two groups. Furthermore, we will address inconsistencies
in the respondents’ answers concerning some of the factors of work. We will also include a
minor discussion concerning how age and education influences which factors of work one
finds motivating. Furthermore, we will address what implications our findings have for
companies and managers and finally, we will try to come up with future perspectives relating
this research area.
The sixth section will comprise of the conclusion and here we will summarize our main
findings.
The seventh and final section consists of appendices.
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2 Motivation
This chapter includes the motivational theories chosen as our theoretical framework. The
theories chosen are McClelland’s achievement needs theory, Herzberg’s two-‐factor theory,
Latham and Locke’s goal theory, and Hackman and Oldham’s job characteristics model, as
argued for in section 1.2. In this section, we will begin by explaining each theory in detail,
followed by a paragraph clarifying the relation of the theory to the analysis and finally,
criticism will be given on the different theories.
2.1 McClelland’s Achievement Needs Theory McClelland’s achievement needs theory claims that people have different needs, and because
of these needs different things motivate us. The theory is built on the three needs of:
achievement, affiliation, and power. McClelland claims that people develop an emphasis
toward one of the three needs (Brooks 2009). The desire and strength for the different needs
is created and affected by upbringing, cultural background, and changes in life conditions
(McClelland 1967). The primary method used by McClelland to measure the strength of the
three different needs in individuals, is called Thematic Apperception Test (TAT), and was
originally developed by Henry Murray. In completing the TAT, people are first given a test and
told that the test measures their intelligence and leadership potential. They are told this in
order to awake their sense of achievement. Thereafter they are asked to write stories about
ambiguous pictures. Finally, it is counted how many times it is possible to trace each of the
three needs in the stories (Hein 2009).
People who have a high need for power have a desire to influence, coach, teach or encourage
others to achieve. They are motivated by competition and attracted by status and prestige,
therefore they look for positions with power and authority (McClelland 1967). McClelland
distinguishes between two types of people with a high power motivation score. People, who
are balanced by high inhibition, tend to tell stories about power that is altruistic, which is the
socialized face of power. These people are in control, and are more institution minded,
meaning that they are able to stimulate a greater sense of responsibility in their division and
create a greater team spirit. On the other hand, there are people with high power motivation,
who have a high concern for personal power and show signs of exercising their power
impulsively and are often rude to others. Moreover, they collect symbols of personal prestige
10
such as fancy cars or big offices (Burnham, McClelland 2003). McClelland and his colleagues
found that a leader who exercises socialized power is more effective in managing than leaders
high in personal power. The most optimal pattern of need for a leader in a large organization
a strongly socialized power, a moderate achievement motivation, and a low need for
affiliation (Burnham, McClelland 2003).
People with a high need for affiliation search for social interaction with friends and
colleagues, and are interested in establishing, maintaining, or reestablishing a positive, warm
and close relation to others (Hein 2009). They need harmonistic relationships and try to avoid
conflict. According to McClelland, they are therefore not the most effective employers or
leaders as they seek approval and have a hard time making difficult decisions (Burnham,
McClelland 2003).
People with a high need for achievement focus on how they can improve themselves so that
they are more efficient and they are very result oriented. The high achievers prefer
moderately difficult tasks due to the reduced frequency of failure and increased satisfaction
associated with successfully completing challenging tasks (Buelens, Sinding & Waldstrøm
2011). Another characteristic of achievement-‐motivated people is that they desire more
feedback. The feedback desired needs to be job related rather than social or attitudinal, thus
the feedback needs to be relevant for the job and performance so that they know how they are
doing in relation to achieving the goal. Social or attitudinal feedback, on the other hand, like
acceptance, approval, and appreciation does not work as a motivator; therefore, high
achievers can neither be motivated by material or economic rewards nor by status or security
(Hein 2009).
2.1.1 Relation to Analysis
The strength of McClelland’s achievement needs theory is that he makes good observations of
how a need is developed and how it can be affected. Another important contribution from
McClelland is that he characterizes different types of employees who each have widely
different sources of motivation. This postulation by McClelland is important to our paper, as
we look at two different types of jobs with many different types of people. Even though no
other theories have claimed that people are motivated by the same factors, McClelland
segments different motivation profiles and points out the importance of these. Another
11
interesting point raised by McClelland that is useful for our paper is that his theory suggests
that motivation is changeable, even in adulthood, which can be done by training (Hein 2009).
Therefore, if a company needs some of their employees to increase motivation to achieve, this
can be done by training initiatives, modifying and enhancing self-‐images, and encouraging
individuals to seek new job challenges and responsibilities (Bowditch, Buono 2005).
2.1.2 Criticism
McClelland’s need for achievement has a North American bias because it assumes two cultural
value dimensions. The first is the willingness to accept moderate risks, which excludes
countries with strong uncertainty avoidance. The second dimension is the concern with
performance, which almost only applies for countries with strong quality-‐of-‐life
characteristics (Buelens, Sinding & Waldstrøm 2011). Both dimensions are valid in Anglo-‐
American countries, which makes the theory more applicable in these countries. Another
criticism pertaining to McClelland’s research is that it is important to recognize that most of
his evidence relates to boys and men; thus, like most behavioral science in the early years, the
theory fails to address gender differences (Pinder 2008).
2.2 Herzberg’s Two-Factor Theory Frederick Herzberg’s two-‐factor theory of motivators and hygiene factors is one of the most
well known and maybe also most discussed theories of employee motivation. Herzberg
developed the two-‐factor theory in 1959 together with Bernard Mausner and Barbara Bloch
Snyderman (Herzberg, Snyderman & Mausner 2004). Originally, the theory was not
developed as a motivation theory but as a theory which focuses on the working conditions
necessary for people to be satisfied and motivated (Brooks 2009), and therefore it is also
known as a job enrichment theory (Herzberg, Snyderman & Mausner 2004).
The reasoning behind this theory is that Herzberg wants employees to be motivated, as
motivated employees do the job willingly and therefore saves money and time compared to
employees who are not motivated, who needs to be told what to do constantly (Herzberg
2003).
Herzberg was greatly inspired by Maslow and the distinction between the higher order needs
and the deficiency needs, which is similar to respectively the motivators and the hygiene
12
factors. The basic idea behind this theory is that job satisfaction and job dissatisfaction do not
stand on opposite ends of a continuum. So, presence of the motivators leads to job
satisfaction, whereas the absence of the same motivators just leads to no job satisfaction and
not job dissatisfaction. The same principle accounts for hygiene factors where the presence of
hygiene factors leads to no job satisfaction, and the absence of the hygiene factors leads to job
dissatisfaction (Herzberg 2003).
The reasoning behind the theory is that these two different types of factors, motivators and
hygiene factors, corresponds to two different human needs. The hygiene factors concentrate
on fulfilling the basic human needs, such as avoiding pain and eating, corresponding to
Maslow’s lower needs, whereas the motivators focus more on the higher level needs such as
psychological growth and the need for achievement (Herzberg 2003). Similarly, the
motivators are located at the same level as McClelland’s need for power and need for
achievement, whereas the hygiene factors are located at the same level as McClelland’s need
for affiliation (Buelens, Sinding & Waldstrøm 2011).
The theory was developed and tested by use of the critical incident method, which is a
qualitative study where focus is on incidents in which the respondent felt particularly
strongly about the job either in a negative or positive sense. So, after having asked questions
about the incident, the respondent was asked to describe which factors contributed to that
either very high job satisfaction or very high job dissatisfaction. Finally, the respondent was
asked how the high or low job satisfaction affected his or her work performance. These
interviews was developed on the basis of the F-‐A-‐E model (Factors-‐Attitudes-‐Effects), which
indicates that a certain factor leads to a psychological reaction (an attitude), and that attitude
then has an effect on the employee’s work output. So, by making these interviews, Herzberg
found 14 different factors each affecting the attitude towards work in a positive or negative
way and these 14 different factors are all part of Herzberg’s two-‐factor theory (Hein 2009,
Herzberg, Snyderman & Mausner 2004). The study was first conducted from interviews of
engineers and accountants (Herzberg 2003), so this actually has its origin from white-‐collar
workers. However, later studies confirmed the theory among blue-‐collar workers as well
(Hein 2009).
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According to the two-‐factor theory, the 14 factors work in different ways; some of the factors
were more frequently related to job satisfaction and some were more frequently related to
job dissatisfaction. The factors relating to job satisfaction Herzberg named motivators and
these factors all concern intrinsic aspects of work. The motivators are achievement,
responsibility, recognition, the work itself, personal growth or advancement. The factors
causing dissatisfaction were named hygiene factors and these factors all involve extrinsic
aspects of the work. The hygiene factors are company policy and administration, relationship
with superior, relationship with peers, working conditions, salary, status, work-‐life balance
and job security (Herzberg 2003). Herzberg argued that the hygiene factors of good working
conditions and friendly interactions, for example, might only serve to move people in the
short run because people increasingly want more. However, the motivators have a longer-‐
lasting effect on the employees, which results in motivation rather than simple movement
(Pinder 2008)
2.2.1 Relation to Analysis
Herzberg’s two-‐factor theory is an analysis, which distinguishes between intrinsic factors and
extrinsic factors, and therefore it is very relevant for this analysis to evaluate whether the
blue-‐ and the white-‐collar workers find the intrinsic and extrinsic factors important.
Moreover, some of the critique relating to this theory is that it only applies to professionals
and higher level employees as people in unskilled jobs or with repetitive work often are not
interested in job growth-‐related opportunities (Buelens, Sinding & Waldstrøm 2011).
Therefore, it will be interesting to find out whether the theory only applies to white-‐collar
employees, meaning whether it is only the white-‐collar employees who find motivator events
motivating. Another important aspect in relation to this analysis is the fact that Herzberg’s
theory complements McClelland’s needs achievement theory very well because McClelland
argues that people have different preferences whereas Herzberg gives some specific factors
that motivates. The combination of the two theories can therefore provide and interesting
perspective on how Herzberg’s factors motivate people differently based on their needs.
2.2.2 Criticism
The theory of Herzberg has received a lot of criticism and a great deal of it relates to the
methodology used to develop the theory. The drawbacks of the critical incident method are
first of all that there can be a problem with biases in the interview. This is due to the fact that
14
it would typically be easier to mention a specific incident for instance about increased
responsibility in a positive situation than increased responsibility relating to a negative
situation. Also, good and bad feelings arise when people refer to the incidents, and these
feelings also affect the interviewers analysis after the interview which therefore questions the
validity of the theory (Buelens, Sinding & Waldstrøm 2011). Another drawback is the
possibility of the respondents of linking job-‐satisfying incidents with their own performance
and job dissatisfying incidents with factors extrinsic to them (Hein 2009).
Another important critique relates to the sample size of the original research, as it was a
relatively small sample size of 210 professional people. So, whether the theory can be used on
other groups has been questioned (Brooks 2009).
One could also question the fact that what motivates cannot de-‐motivate (Hein 2009). Some of
Herzberg’s basic satisfiers actually appeared to have some frequency in the stories of
dissatisfaction, including recognition (18%), work itself (14%) and advancement (11%)
(Herzberg, Snyderman & Mausner 2004). Nevertheless, these three satisfiers do not show a
clear picture in their effect on job attitudes as the factors that cause job dissatisfaction.
Therefore, based on Herzberg’s results, a better statement of hypothesis would be that the
satisfier factors are much more likely to increase job satisfaction than they would be to
decrease job satisfaction, but that the factors related to job dissatisfaction very rarely work to
increase job satisfaction (Pinder 2008).
A further criticism of the theory relates to the fact that this theory suggests that human needs
are universal, and that the motivators would increase motivation of employees disregarding
individual preferences (Hackman, Oldham 1976). This is a very interesting consideration, as
this theory therefore does not explain why certain people react more positively to job
enrichment than others.
2.3 Goal Theory Goal theory is one of the well-‐known process theories and according to Pinder it is “the most
dominant, valid, and useful modern theory of work motivation” (Pinder 2008, p.405) In its
raw form, goal theory is quite simple as the essence is that people perform better if they have
a goal to reach. Many different theorists have used goal theory, but the goal theory, which will
15
be the focus in this paper, is Latham and Locke’s goal setting theory from 1979 (Latham,
Locke 1979). This is considered the most dominant model in the goal setting literature
(Pinder 2008).
In order to understand goal theory, one needs to understand what a goal is. According to
Latham and Locke “A goal is a level of performance proficiency that we wish to attain, usually
within a specified time period.” (Latham, Locke 2006, p.332). So, a goal can be seen as a target
one wishes to accomplish, and can be used in many different regards, both in relation to one’s
professional work life but also one’s personal life where an example could be that somebody
has a goal to loose 20 pounds of weight.
This paper will look upon goal theory as seen from a work perspective, and explain how to
use goal setting in a professional work environment to make employees feel motivated and
thereby perform better.
Latham and Locke’s goal setting theory was developed in 1979 where they tested goal setting
in various environments (Latham, Locke 1979). They found that goals increased the
performance of the employees. Overall, one can divide the goal setting process into three
distinct phases: setting the goal, obtaining goal commitment, and providing support elements
(Latham, Locke 1979).
Setting the goal contains the following two characteristics: it should be both challenging yet
obtainable and specific rather than vague. Challenging and obtainable goals lead to better
performance than easy goals as the employee is then forced to make a better effort in
reaching the goal (Latham, Locke 1979). Specific goals also lead to better performance than
“do your best” goals as do your best goals are not specific and therefore allow people to make
use of their own benefit of doubt in estimating their own talent and performance (Latham,
Locke 2006).
Obtaining goal commitment is about making sure that the employee accepts and remains
committed to the goals. One way to secure that commitment is by giving a simple instruction
to the goal and also by supporting the employee. Further, the employee should not feel
threatened to reach to goal; it should be regarded as a positive thing (Latham, Locke 1979).
According to Latham and Locke, there are in general only two reasons why employees resist
16
assigned goals. First of all, the employees might feel that the goal is unrealistic maybe because
the employees feel they do not have the competences and knowledge to reach the goal, or
secondly, if the employees cannot see any personal gain in achieving the goal. So, in order to
overcome these two obstacles to obtain goal commitment, one can provide more training to
the employee so he/she feels they can solve the task and reach the goal. Another method
would be to allow the employee to take part in the goal setting and finally, the employee could
also be offered a monetary bonus or rewards such as recognition and time off work for
reaching the goal (Hein 2009, Latham, Locke 1979).
The last part of the goal setting method is supportive elements. By supportive elements is
meant that the employee have the necessary resources such as money, equipment, time and
help to reach the goal. Further, the employee should also have freedom over the above
resources to decide when and how to use them so the employee does not feel that company
policies are blocking the employee’s road to reaching the goal (Latham, Locke 1979). Also, the
employee needs feedback, and help to develop a plan of action on how to reach the goal (Hein
2009).
The benefits of high specific goals are first of all that individuals get a feeling of achievement
and accomplishment when reaching the goal and this feeling of success is important for
everyone as they get a higher self-‐confidence. This could also lead to the individual’s coming
to like the task even more as they have just experienced success. Another important
characteristic of goal setting is that it directs attention and makes people search for strategies
to reach that particular goal. Also, it can provide a simple task a purpose of meaning (Latham,
Locke 2006).
Another important aspect of goal setting is the one of feedback. Feedback is necessary when
using goal setting as a motivator, because people needs feedback in order to know the
progress in reaching their goal. If they do not know how they are doing, it is impossible for
them to adjust their effort in order to reach the goal. So, the combination of feedback and goal
setting is more effective than just using goal setting alone (Locke, Latham 2002).
17
There are parallels between McClelland’s need for achievement and goal theory. Goal theory
also states that goals need to be challenging, but realistic, and that people with high need for
achievement needs task feedback (Hein 2009).
2.3.1 Relation to Analysis
Goal theory is useful in this paper as there are indications that goal theory applies especially
for white-‐collar employees, as setting a goal requires a need for achievement and scope for
autonomy, which can be argued more often is present in white-‐collar jobs and especially
among knowledge workers (Newell 2002). Therefore, it will be quite interesting to investigate
whether this is actually the case. Furthermore, goal theory will also be used to address
whether employees in general actually considers goal setting as an important motivator, as
many companies already make use of goal setting one way or the order, which might result in
employees not considering goal setting important in relation to their individual work.
2.3.2 Criticism
Even though there is lot of empirical evidence supporting goal theory (Locke et al. 1981), the
theory still has some pitfalls. First of all, the employee can experience dissatisfaction and
demotivation if the goal is not reached (Hein 2009). Also, if the employees do not have the
necessary knowledge and skills to perform the task and reach the goal, a difficult goal might
lead to even poorer performance than if no goal was set (Latham, Locke 2006).
Maybe the biggest problem with goal setting is the fact that the employee gets a narrow
outlook on the job, as they will only focus on reaching the specific goal so that everything else
is ignored. This corresponds well to the old saying: ‘what gets measured, gets done’. An
example could be a production line having to produce X number of units per day, but then
forgets to focus on the quality of what is produced and also some short cuts could be taken in
order to reach the goal (Hein 2009). This could result in larger costs and delays in the
production schedule.
Also, having a goal could prove to have a negative effect on creativity, as employees then only
focus on reaching the goal and forget to think outside the box as they choose the one ‘safe’
method, which will make them reach the goal. So, this will result in less learning, as the
18
employees do not learn from failures and experiments because they do not make any as they
only focus on reaching the goal (Hein 2009).
It should also be taken into consideration that people are different. What if not all people find
that goals work for them, and that goals do not control their behavior? Thus, this model does
not encounter that people are different (Hein 2009). McClelland argues that people are
different; that people are controlled by the same needs but that those needs have different
weight in each individual. So according to McClelland, goal setting might work for individuals
with a high need for achievement, whereas people with high need for affiliation might be
uncomfortable competing to reach a goal (Burnham, McClelland 2003). Goal setting might
also limit cooperation, as people who are highly committed to reaching their goal, might be
less likely to help others (Wright et al. 1993).
2.4 Job Characteristics Model Hackman and Oldham are considered among the most significant contributors to job design
theory (Brooks 2009, Morgeson, Humphrey 2006). Before Hackman and Oldham made their
contribution to job design theory, the early concern to increase motivation was on job
rotation, job enrichment and job enlargement. Job enlargement seeks to increase motivation
by including more variety and complexity in the tasks performed (Brooks 2009). Job
enrichment, on the other hand, is about designing jobs, which will increase the individual’s
responsibility and involvement and thereby increase the intrinsic motivation. Herzberg’s two-‐
factor theory is an example of a job enrichment theory (Herzberg, Snyderman & Mausner
2004).
Hackman and Oldham’s job characteristics approach was actually developed with inspiration
from other theories such as Herzberg’s two-‐factor theory and McClelland’s achievement needs
theory (Brooks 2009). It should be mentioned though, that Hackman and Oldham themselves
claim that their theory has not been inspired by Herzberg but by expectancy theory developed
by Lawler (Hein 2009).
The job characteristics model was developed in 1980, and was created as a reaction against
the scientific management view in which task specialization was considered the best job
design in order to earn the largest profit (Buelens, Sinding & Waldstrøm 2011). The basic
19
assumption behind the model is that a well-‐designed job raises intrinsic employee motivation
and thereby also create increasing growth and effectiveness in the organization (Hackman,
Oldham 1980).
The study was conducted using data from 658 employees who work in 62 different jobs and
in 7 different organizations in the USA (Hackman, Oldham 1976). The primary data collection
instrument was the Job Diagnostic Survey (JDS), which was developed by Hackman and
Oldham in 1975. The JDS is basically a survey developed to test whether the job
characteristics model holds and also to determine whether existing jobs are motivating or if
they need to be redesigned in order to become motivating (Hackman, Oldham 1975).
In order for a job to be motivating it should contain certain core job characteristics and these
characteristics will then lead to three psychological states, which in turn lead to internal
motivation. The three psychological states, that should be experienced to generate the
internal motivation, are experienced meaningfulness of the work, experienced responsibility
for outcomes of the work and finally, knowledge of the actual results of the work activities
(Hackman, Oldham 1980).
The experienced meaningfulness of the work is based on whether the individual finds the job
valuable, worthwhile and meaningful (Hackman, Oldham 1976). According to Hackman and
Oldham’s model, experienced meaningfulness can be achieved by the use of three different job
characteristics namely skill variety, task identity, and task significance. Skill variety should be
understood as the extent to which the job demands several different skills and abilities used
by the individual carrying out the work. This characteristic is based on the assumption that a
job is perceived as more meaningful when one is challenged by the use of different skills when
doing the job. Task identity is considered high when an individual works on the job from the
beginning to the end, and therefore get to see the finished result. This should lead to
identification with the specific job. So, task identity is basically the extent to which the job
requires an individual to complete the whole or completely identifiable piece of work. Task
significance should be understood as the extent to which the work has an effect for other
people inside or outside the organization. This is based on the assumption, that you will find
your work more meaningful if what you do have relevance for other people. Hackman and
Oldham gives the example that people tightening nuts on aircraft engines are more likely to
20
experience meaningfulness of their work than people who tighten nuts on decorative mirrors
because lives is at stake for those people working with the airplanes (Hackman, Oldham
1980). Another example of a highly task significant work could be doctors and nurses who
saves lives and helps people every day. It should be noted that a job does not have to score
high on each of the three above-‐mentioned job characteristics, as a job can be perceived as
meaningful even though a low score is obtained on one or two of the job characteristics (Hein
2009).
The experienced responsibility of work outcomes can be achieved through autonomy.
Autonomy should be understood as the extent to which the job provides the individual with
freedom and independence to carry out the work, and whether the individual have disposal
over his or her own time to schedule and determine the procedures to complete the job. So,
the assumption is that if autonomy is high, the employee will experience a high responsibility
of outcomes because the employee feels that he or she was the main person responsible for
the work carried out (Hackman, Oldham 1980).
Knowledge of the actual results of the work activities can be obtained through the use of
feedback. Feedback can be classified as two distinct types, namely feedback from the job itself
and feedback from other people. An example of feedback coming from the work itself could be
computer engineer solving a specific problem in a program he developed, causing the
program to function, or a doctor operating a patient and afterwards looking at the results of
the operations and sees that the patient gets better. Hackman and Oldham does acknowledge
that both types of feedback can play a role in experiencing knowledge of results, however,
they stress the fact that feedback from the job itself is seen as more important than feedback
form others. This is due to the fact that feedback from the job itself usually comes right a after
a specific task is completed, and also that feedback coming from the individual’s own
observations heightens the credibility of the feedback (Pinder 2008, Hackman, Oldham 1980).
The five different job characteristics; skill variety, task identity, task significance, autonomy
and feedback can all be used to calculate the ‘Motivating Potential Score’ (MPS) which is a
summary index to evaluate whether a job provides the individual with internal work
motivation. So, a low score means that the individual will not experience a high internal work
21
motivation, whereas a high score indicates that the individual should stimulate a high internal
work motivation (Hackman, Oldham 1980). The MPS is calculated as follows:
The job should be rated on a scale from 1 to 7, where 1 is considered low and 7 is considered
high, on each of the five core job characteristics. The highest possible score is 343, and the
lowest is 1. When a job has a score above 200, it is considered highly motivating, and jobs
scoring below 120 are considered low in motivating potential (Buelens, Sinding & Waldstrøm
2011). Based on the above equation, one can conclude that the two most important single
factors for a motivating job is autonomy and feedback, whereas the factors leading to
experienced meaningfulness (skill variety, task identity, and task significance) are not
individually as important for the overall internal motivation (Hackman, Oldham 1980).
Hackman and Oldham incorporated some moderators in their model acknowledging that
people are different and that they have different wants and needs. Some people might not
want a job with a high MPS score, and therefore Hackman and Oldham identified three
characteristics of people, called ‘moderators’ in their model, which should be considered
when designing jobs. These are knowledge and skill, growth need strength, and context
satisfactions. The basic idea is that individuals will respond positively to jobs with a high MPS
if they have the knowledge and skills necessary to actually do the job, high growth needs, and
an overall satisfaction with the work content (Buelens, Sinding & Waldstrøm 2011).
The outcomes from a well-‐designed job are high internal work motivation, high growth
satisfaction, high general job satisfaction, and high work effectiveness. So, according to
Hackman and Oldham one can both enrich the individual by satisfying him or her internally,
but also ensure a higher effectiveness, which is beneficial for the company (Hackman, Oldham
1980).
The theory does have some similarity to Herzberg’s F-‐A-‐E model as this model also deals with
factors in the sense of job characteristics, attitudes in the sense of the psychological states and
finally effects in terms of outcomes.
22
2.4.1 Relation to Analysis
The strength of Hackman and Oldham’s job characteristic model is that it gives specific
examples of how to increase motivation, and therefore this theoretical framework will be
used to examine whether white-‐collar employees and blue-‐collar employees are motivated by
the same job characteristics and whether their jobs should be composed of the same
elements. Furthermore, Hackman and Oldham’s job characteristics model only focuses on
internal motivation, which has the advantage that the employee acts on his or her own
incentives rather than on someone else’s initiatives, which provides more value for the
company as employees, who do their job willingly, saves money and time for the company
(Herzberg 2003).
2.4.2 Criticism
As with every other motivational theory, the job characteristics model has also received
several critique points. Even though Hackman and Oldham have supported their findings
relating to the motivation potential of the work and the critical psychological states, there
have been no empirical evidence for the moderators (Hein 2009).
Another important critique, which is also mentioned by Hackman and Oldham themselves, is
that the five job characteristics are not always easy to separate from each other. An example
could be that skill variety typically is closely linked to autonomy as one could argue that the
higher need for different skills, the higher possibility you have for planning you own work day
hence autonomy (Hackman, Oldham 1980).
In addition, it can be difficult to determine what is actually job feedback and what is not.
Further, some would argue that feedback from supervisors and co-‐workers should be
considered equally important as feedback from the job itself (Morgeson, Humphrey 2006).
A question has also been raised whether job design in fact increases output, as the redesign of
jobs also sometimes reduces the output (Buelens, Sinding & Waldstrøm 2011). Further, the
theory does not take the social needs of individuals into account, and therefore, it could be
discussed whether interaction with other people should be included a “job characteristic”
(Morgeson, Humphrey 2006).
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3 Methodology
This chapter includes all methodological considerations and will therefore comprise of
aspects relating the chosen methodological framework, the relationship between quantitative
and qualitative research, the development of our questionnaire, a pilot study, the empirical
background for this study, the data collection process and finally, how the data is analyzed.
Generally there are two different methods of reasoning namely the inductive and deductive
approach. The difference between deduction and induction is that when using deduction,
departure is taken in existing theory, then research questions and hypotheses are derived
from theory, which afterwards can be empirically tested (Flick 2009). Induction, on the other
hand, takes its departure in assumptions or concepts that suggest directions in which to look
and reliance on a general sense of what is relevant. The social contexts are then studied and
used as empirical evidence to generate theories or hypotheses (Flick 2009).
The chosen theoretical approach to this problem is based both on deduction and induction.
The deductive approach is used when we take departure in theory to form some general ideas
on the subject in addition to constructing our questionnaire. The inductive approach is used
when we create new knowledge based on our empirical study.
3.1 Quantitative vs. Qualitative Research Both quantitative and qualitative research methods can be used to study many different
research problems. As the name implies, focus in a quantitative study is on quantitative
information meaning numbers and figures, whereas focus in the qualitative study is on
qualitative information such as words, sentences and narratives. Examples of a quantitative
study could be a questionnaire or a structured interview whereas an unstructured interview
or a narrative are considered a qualitative study, as there is an opportunity to focus on the
words of the respondent and not only a series of numbers on a piece of paper. Another
important difference between qualitative and quantitative research is their main goals. The
main goal of qualitative research is to expose opinions and feelings in a specific context,
whereas the main aim of a quantitative research is to establish some general rules and
correlations between dependent and independent variables. Also, it is important to note that
in a quantitative study, the researcher is seen as independent from the respondents and the
24
situation, whereas the researcher is actually taking part in the research in a qualitative study
(Heldbjerg 2006).
One of the advantages of making quantitative research is that it is not as time-‐consuming as
qualitative research. Therefore, it is possible to reach a larger sample when using quantitative
research. It also allows for a comparison of respondents, as they all will be answering the
same questions. However, quantitative research is not as flexible as qualitative research, as it
is a one-‐way communication form whereas qualitative research acts more as a dialog between
interviewer and respondent. In addition, qualitative research gives the researcher the
possibility of going into depth with a certain topic and the respondent will have the possibility
to ask questions if the questions posed are not clear (Arbnor, Bjerke 2009).
In this thesis, a quantitative research will be used. This is chosen due to the research problem,
which is to analyze how factors of work affect blue-‐ and white-‐collar employees’ motivation
and quantitative research allows for comparisons between the two respondent groups. So,
our main aim with this study is to establish some general knowledge within the motivation
field and not expose opinions and feelings as the purpose is in the qualitative study.
As it is now decided to use a quantitative approach, the question then is what type of
instrument to use. First of all, one could use a structured interview to perform the analysis.
The advantage of using this type of instrument is, among others, that the respondent can ask
questions during the interview if the questions are not formulated clearly. Also, an interview
could give a good and constructive cooperation between the interviewer and the respondent,
and thereby assure that the respondent answer in an honest matter. The disadvantage of a
personal structured interview is that the interviewer should be well trained and that it is
more time-‐consuming compared to a questionnaire. A questionnaire would allow
respondents to answer the questions in their own pace, whereas an interview might put
pressure on the respondent to answer the questions quickly. Further, a questionnaire
requires the minimum amount of staff and the questionnaire is often perceived as more
anonymous than an interview (Blumberg, Cooper & Schindler 2008).
Based on the above consideration, we have decided to use a questionnaire, as this allows us to
reach a bigger sample by being less time-‐consuming both seen from our perspective but most
25
importantly seen from the companies’ perspective. Also, we find it important that a
questionnaire is seen as more anonymous. First of all, when answering anonymously a higher
response rate can be expected, as people do not have to be held responsible for their answers.
Also, some of the questions and statements relating motivation might be perceived as very
personal, which means that an interview might make the respondent uncomfortable.
3.2 Development of Questionnaire The chosen theoretical framework inspires the different items in the questionnaire and the
structure of the questionnaire will follow the basic advises given by Blumberg et al. (2008).
We intend to begin our questionnaire with some administrative questions and these
questions constitute of question 1 to 3. The entire questionnaire can be found in appendix 8.1
in English and 8.2 in Danish. These questions serve to warm up the respondent with some
easy questions; furthermore, the responses to the questions might be useful when
interpreting the data, if gender, age, or education has an influence on the responses. Question
1 classifies gender and a simple category scale is used, which gives us nominal data. Question
2 and 3 refer to age and education and a multiple choice single response scale is used, which
again gives us nominal data (Blumberg, Cooper & Schindler 2008). The educational levels are
based on the Danish education system and consist of: primary school (folkeskole), secondary
school (gymnasial uddannelse), professional training (erhvervsmæssig uddannelse), KVU
(kort videregående uddannelse) -‐ a Danish abbreviation for an education with a typical
duration of two years, MVU (mellemlang videregående uddannelse)-‐ a Danish abbreviation
for various bachelor’s degrees, and lastly LVU (lang videregående uddanelse)-‐ a Danish
abbreviation for a university degree at master-‐ or PhD level. Finally, a box was included for
the respondents without any completed education.
Hereafter, a classification question will follow, where the participants will be grouped into
white-‐ and blue-‐collar workers respectively (Blumberg, Cooper & Schindler 2008). We have
included three different response categories. The first relates to blue-‐collar workers, which
are referred to as hourly paid employees in our empirical study as there is no equivalent term
for blue-‐collar workers in Danish. However, as the blue-‐collar workers in our sample all are
hourly paid, we can classify them by using this term. The second response category relates to
the white-‐collar workers and is called “funktionær” in Danish (Kjærulff Nielsen 2010). The
26
last response category is labeled “other”, where the respondent can specify how he/she is
employed. Based on the respondent’s specification, we can determine if the person belongs to
the blue-‐ or white-‐collar group, if the response specification is unclear or ambiguous it is
excluded from the sample.
Finally, we will use target questions to address the theoretical framework. The target
questions will be structured questions, also known as closed questions. We chose the closed
questions because experience has shown that closed questions make the participants feel less
threatened, and also closed questions typically require less motivation to answer than open
questions (Blumberg, Cooper & Schindler 2008). Questions 5 to 21 are developed as a likert
scale summated rating, where respondents are asked to rate the importance of a number of
statements (Blumberg, Cooper & Schindler 2008). Questions 5 to 11 related to McClelland’s
achievement needs theory, questions 12 and 13 related to Latham and Locke’s goal theory,
and questions 14 to 21 relate to Hackman and Oldham’s job characteristics model. Question
22 is a multiple choice single response question, where respondents have to choose between
three statements relating to McClelland’s achievement needs theory (Blumberg, Cooper &
Schindler 2008). In this question, respondents are forced to compare the statements and only
choose one. Question 23 relates to Herzberg’s two-‐factor theory where respondents are asked
to choose the three factors, which give them most motivation to make an extra effort in their
job. This is a multiple choice multiple response question, which gives us nominal data. Even
though Blumberg et al. (2008) advise not to use more than ten answer alternatives, we have
included fourteen, as we want to include all factors in Herzberg’s model.
3.3 Pilot Study In order to improve the quality and efficiency of our study, we have chosen to carry out a pilot
study. A pilot study is a small-‐sample quantitative study conducted to prelude a larger study.
The aim of the pilot study is to guide the future larger study and to prevent problems that
might obstruct the larger study (Connelly 2008). In our research, the pilot study can reveal
deficiencies in the design of the questionnaire, in the wording of the questions, or in the
directions of how to answer the questionnaire. Furthermore, the pilot study will help us
estimate how much time is needed to fill out the questionnaire. In the pilot study, the
questionnaire was given to five people, who all had different full-‐time jobs.
27
When the five respondents had filled out the questionnaire, they gave feedback on aspects
they found problematic. Three out of the five respondents thought the division of educational
levels in question 3 were unclear. Therefore, we added some examples of the different
educational levels to the question (see appendix 8.1 and 8.2). In questions 5 to 21, each
question started with “it is important for me…”, some respondents found the questions too
long and the “it is important for me” redundant, thus it was taken out. Also, questions 5 to 21
had to be rated on a five-‐point scale from “highly disagree” to “highly agree”. None of the
respondents has ticked the “highly disagree” box and some indicated that it is hard to
disagree, rather it would then be easier to choose “neutral” if the respondent did not agree. On
that background, we changed the scale so that it went from one to five, where one is not
important and five is very important. In this way, we found that it will be easier for
respondents to find the claims unimportant rather than disagreeing.
In the last question, number 23, the respondents had to prioritize fourteen claims. Four of the
five respondents found this task very hard, and some even gave up. Blumberg et al. (2008)
supports this behavior, as they state that if respondent motivation should remain strong, no
more than seven items should be ranked. We, therefore, changed the question so that
respondents now have to choose the three expressions they find most important.
Finally, some respondents found the layout confusing, this was then changed so that the order
of the questions became more suitable, in addition, some questions were more clearly defined
with boxes and borders.
The responses from the pilot study made us realize that it might be hard for us to find the
respondents’ preference towards one of McClelland’s three needs, as the questions related to
McClelland has to be rated on a scale. Therefore, we added a question (question 22) asking
what the respondent find most important, out of three claims, to make them choose between
McClelland’s three needs and not just rate the importance of a claim.
3.4 Empirical Background In order for us to investigate how factors of work affect blue-‐ and white-‐collar employees’
motivation, we have found two companies that were willing to help us. Our empirical
background comprises of Orskov Yard, a shipyard in Frederikshavn in the Northern part of
28
Jutland, and Systematic, an international IT company. The reason for choosing Orskov Yard is
because they employ both blue-‐ and white-‐collar employees and they were open for handing
out our questionnaire to their employees, as opposed to other companies we contacted.
Systematic was chosen because they employ knowledge workers, which brought more
diversity to our relatively small white-‐collar sample.
Orskov Yard converts and repairs all types of ships and employs 213 people as of 30
September 2010, including both white and blue collar employees (Orskov Yard A/S 2011a,
Orskov Yard A/S 2011b). Orskov Yard was founded in 2003 when the original shipyard,
Ørskov Christensens Stålskibsværft, had to close due to problems with missing payments.
Ørskov Christensens Stålskibsværft was both involved in repairs and the constructions of new
ships, however, only the repair department was transferred to the new ship yard, Orskov
Yard (Østergaard 2003). The closing of the old company cost 700 employees their job
(Madsen 2003). Orskov Yard now has a special way of keeping the employees motivated, as
they make high use of profit sharing. This resulted in record high bonuses for the hourly paid
blue-‐collar workers, who were paid a minimum of DKK 75,000 in profit sharing in 2008
(Albæk 2008).
Systematic is an IT company that supplies IT solutions to companies and governments mostly
within defense, health care, integration services, and intelligence and national security. The
company is present in USA, Finland, UK and Denmark with headquarters in Aarhus, Denmark.
The company employs approximately 450 people where 61% of their software developers
have a PhD or master’s degree (Systematic 2011). Systematic is a financially solid company
with the highest credit rating and no bank debts. It has not been unaffected by the financial
crisis; however, according to it’s own web site, Systematic is more influential and dynamic
now than before the crisis hit. Systematic has values that emphasize: the best way for people
and organizations to grow is by empowerment; their employees have freedom with
responsibility and an obligation to take responsibility; they expect and appreciate initiative
and ambition; and lastly “better train people and risk they leave-‐ than do nothing and they
stay” (Systematic 2011). Furthermore, Systematic is certified at CMMI (Capability Maturity
Model Integration) level 5, which means that all processes are continually improved and
optimized. As previously stated, knowledge workers are highly educated, computer literate,
and creative, therefore Systematic’s employees are characterized as knowledge workers, and
29
are thus a part of the white-‐collar group. The sample that received our questionnaire in
Systematic, all works within health care and the development of electronic patient records for
hospitals.
3.5 Data Collection In order for us to gain the most possible responses, we have chosen both to make use of a
printed copy of our questionnaire and an online version. The sample from Orskov Yard
received the questionnaire in a printed-‐paper form and the person responsible for collecting
the questionnaire was the production manager. A printed-‐paper form was chosen for Orskov
Yard because it allowed easier access to the sample, as they were allowed to fill out the
questionnaire during working hours and almost all of the blue-‐collar employees have no
access to computers during the workday. Furthermore, the questionnaires were sent to the
production manager who then could control who received the questionnaire and make sure it
was filled out. The sample collected from Systematic was done online by using StudSurvey, a
facility provided by Aarhus School of Business. The online questionnaire form was chosen as
all of the employees from Systematic already work from a computer, so this would be the
easiest and most convenient way for them to answer the questions. We established contact to
one employee from Systematic, who received a link to the questionnaire in an e-‐mail, which
he then send to the other employees in the health care department. The advantage of the
online questionnaire is that respondents are not able to finish the questionnaire unless they
have provided the correct amount of information. In addition, filling out the questionnaire
online is more anonymous, than handing in a paper form as no one can link the responses to
the person. An example of incorrectly filled out questionnaires, which would not be possible
online, was two printed-‐paper questionnaires where the respondents ticked off thirteen of
fourteen factors instead of only the three factors asked for in question 23.
3.6 Data Analysis In order to analyze whether there is difference in what motivates the blue-‐collar and the
white-‐collar group, the statistical framework of hypothesis testing is applied. The concept of
hypothesis testing is familiar to most people, an example could be when a person is accused of
a crime and he or she then goes to trial; two hypotheses are tested, a null hypothesis (H0)
stating that the defendant is innocent, and an alternative hypothesis (H1) stating the
30
defendant is guilty. Evidence is presented, and the jury must then make a decision based on
the evidence and decide to reject or maintain the null hypothesis (Keller 2004).
The same general framework is applied for this analysis, and our null hypotheses generally
states that there is not a difference in the perceptions of blue-‐ and white-‐collar workers,
whereas the alternative hypothesis states that there is a difference in what motivates blue-‐
and white-‐collar employees. In order to find if there is any statistical difference between blue-‐
and white-‐collar employees, we have performed statistical tests in SPSS, which is a computer
program used for statistical analysis. Therefore, all the data obtained from the questionnaires
have been recoded into numbers and put into SPSS allowing us to perform statistical tests on
the data. As the data generated from questions 5-‐21 is interval data, a t-‐test will be used to
identify possible differences between the white-‐collar and blue-‐collar group. In question 22
and 23, we cannot perform a t-‐test as in question 5-‐21 because the data generated from these
questions is nominally scaled and not interval data as needed to perform a t-‐test. Therefore,
we will in question 22 and 23 use the chi-‐squared test for homogeneity in order to test
whether the proportions who chose a specific factor is the same for both the blue-‐ and white-‐
collar sample (see appendix 8.3).
Normally, when applying hypothesis testing, it is necessary to go through seven steps
consisting of hypothesis, significance level, test statistic, calculations, critical values, p-‐value
and finally a conclusion. However, as we only intend to show the general framework applied,
we will only present the first four steps, which can be seen in appendix 8.3. The conclusion of
the statistics will be presented and discussed in the discussion section.
In order to decide upon whether the difference is statistically significant, we have chosen a
significance level of both 0.1 and 0.05. The lower the significance level, the more the data
must deviate from the null hypothesis to be significant (Keller 2004). Therefore, the 0.05 level
is more conservative than the 0.1 level. This means that it is harder to reject the null
hypothesis with a significance level of 0.05 compared to one at 0.1 level.
4 Empirical Results
In order to analyze what factors motivate blue-‐collar and white-‐collar employees, the
statistical tool, SPSS, has been applied to perform the hypotheses testing and the results of
31
this analysis will be presented in this chapter. Firstly, the chapter consists of a presentation of
the respondent population. Followed this presentation, a summary of the results of
respectively, the blue-‐collar and the white-‐collar group, will be given. The summary will
address the responses of the blue-‐ and white-‐collar groups’ answers expressed in
percentages. Thirdly, an SPSS analysis will be made which will focus on statistical evidence
and whether there is a difference in what motivates the blue-‐ and white-‐collar group. Finally,
some critical reflections relating the methodological framework will be addressed.
4.1 Presentation of Respondent Sample The respondent sample consists of 16 blue-‐collar workers from the shipyard, Orskov and 33
white-‐collar workers from Orskov and the IT company, Systematic. The fact that the white-‐
collar sample is collected at two different companies can affect the results in that the
organizational culture at a company can affect how the respondents assess motivational
factors. However, having a sample from two different companies can also make the results
more reliable and transferable to other companies because the bias of a company hiring a
similar type of people, who then assess the motivational factors pretty equally, has been
removed. Another bias in the respondent population is that it primarily consists of men. This
could be related to the fact that the two companies, providing the empirical background for
the study, perform work within ship repairing and IT and therefore employ fewer women
than men. Thus, there are only 5 women in our sample. It can be argued that if there had been
more women in the sample, the results would have been different.
The blue-‐collar workers in the sample are all men equally spread between the age groups, as
seen in the chart below. About two thirds of the blue-‐collar workers have an education with
professional training, while a quarter only have primary schooling. The white-‐collar sample
consists of 33 people, where 28 are male and 5 are female. About half of the white-‐collar
sample is between 31 and 40 years old and have a university degree at master-‐ or PhD level.
Almost the whole sample from Systematic fall into the second and third age groups from 20-‐
40 years old, while the sample from Orskov is evenly spread from 31 to above 60. The full
distribution of age and educational levels of both blue-‐ and white-‐collar workers can be seen
below.
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4.2 Summary of Results
4.2.1 The Blue-Collar Sample
When assessing the results of questions 5 to 21, where the respondents were asked to rank
how important some expressions were to them, they found it most important “to have a good
relationship with my colleagues at the workplace”, which corresponds to McClelland’s need
for affiliation. The second and third most important factors for the blue-‐collar workers are “to
be able to see measurable results in what I do”, and “to be able to see the overall purpose in
what I do”. These questions should correspond with McClelland’s need for achievement and
Hackman and Oldham’s task identity factor.
33
The questions that were rated to have the least importance were “to be able to affect others to
perform better” and “to be able to advice others within my work area”, which both
corresponds to McClelland’s need for power. What can generally be said about questions 5 to
21 is that they are rated high, and the standard deviations for most questions are high, which
indicates different attitudes among the blue-‐collar workers.
In question 22 the respondents had to choose between three expressions, each representing
one of McClelland’s three needs. In this question 57.1% of the blue-‐collar workers found the
social connection between colleagues and superiors to be most important, while none choose
“to influence other people and events”. These answers correspond to the earlier answered
questions and to the assumption that blue-‐collar workers have a higher need for affiliation,
while they in this sample have no need for power.
34
In the last question, respondents were to choose the three most important expressions of
Herzberg’s fourteen factors. The answers made it very clear that the most important factor for
the blue-‐collar workers was salary, a total of 71.4% found this factor to be among their three
most important factors. According to Herzberg, salary should only serve a dissatisfier if
workers do not feel they get the salary they deserve based on what others get performing the
same type of work, it should not be able to motivate workers as the respondent’s claim in this
sample. The three next most important factors all received 35.7% of the respondents’ marks.
They were relationship with peers, company policy, and responsibility. The first factor is
similar to McClelland’s need for affiliation, which was chosen to be most important in the
previous question, however it is a hygiene factor, therefore it should not serve as a motivator
according to Herzberg. The second factor, company policy, is also a hygiene factor, while the
only factor that, according to Herzberg, was supposed to serve as a motivator, is
responsibility. The question that served as Herzberg’s responsibility factor was phrased as
the possibility to determine how tasks at work should be performed. The factors that were
least important to the blue-‐collar workers and were not rated by any workers were job
security, status, sense of achievement, and advancement.
35
4.2.2 The White-Collar Sample
The most important statement, from questions 5 to 21 for the white-‐collar workers, was that
the work performed “has significance for my company and our customers”, which
corresponds with Hackman and Oldham’s task significance factor. The two second most
important factors, which were rated equally high, were “to be able to see measurable results
in what I do” and “to have the possibility to see the overall purpose in what I do”. These two
statements should correspond to McClelland’s need for achievement and Hackman and
Oldham’s task identity factor.
The questions that had least importance to the white-‐collar sample were “to have a specific
plan of action for what to achieve in my work”, which corresponds to Latham and Locke’s goal
theory; to get clear information about the effectiveness of my own work, which corresponds
to Hackman and Oldham’s feedback factor; and lastly that they do something socially together
in the workplace, which indicates the need for affiliation in McClelland’s theory.
Question 22, where respondents had to choose between McClelland’s three factors (see table
4.2), it was very clear, with 88%, that the white-‐collar sample preferred “to have a challenging
job and a personal responsibility for the work”, which corresponds to the need for
36
achievement. No respondents chose “to be able to influence other people and events”,
corresponding with McClelland’s need for power.
In question 23, the white-‐collar sample clearly indicated the most important of Herzberg’s
factors to be work itself, in that about two thirds ticked off that “the work itself should be
exciting and interesting”. According to Herzberg, this factor is an intrinsic factor and should
also serve as a motivator according to his theory. The second and third most important
factors were both chosen 36% of the time and were to have “a good relationship with peers”
and “recognition for the work performed”. The first of the two factors is, according to
Herzberg, a hygiene-‐ and extrinsic factor and it should therefore not be possible to be
motivated to perform an extra effort based on this factor. The second factor, recognition, is an
intrinsic and thus motivational factor, according to Herzberg, and it should therefore be able
to serve as a motivator. The three factors that were least likely to motivate the white-‐collar
sample to perform an extra effort were the possibility for advancement, company policy, and
status. The first factor, advancement, is according to Herzberg a motivational factor whereas
the two last factors, company policy and status, are hygiene factors and should therefore not,
as the sample also indicated, be able to serve as a motivator.
4.3 Analysis This section will analyze the statistical outputs of SPSS. Each question will be evaluated
individually to interpret whether there is a difference in which factors of work that affects
blue and white-‐collar employees’ motivation.
Questions 5 to 21 deal with questions regarding McClelland’s needs achievement theory,
Latham and Locke’s goal theory, and Hackman and Oldham’s job characteristics model.
37
Questions 5 and 6 both deal with McClelland’s need for achievement and based on our
statistical analysis there is no evidence to prove that there is a difference between the groups.
This is caused by the fact that both groups find question 5, “to be able to see measurable
results in what they do”, to be one of the most important factors. In question 6, “to feel that
my manager acknowledges my work”, the mean rating of the blue-‐collar group is higher than
that of the white-‐collar. However, there is no statistical evidence to prove the difference. Thus,
the difference might as well be due to a general higher rating of the questions in the blue-‐
collar group.
Questions 7 and 8 related to McClelland’s need for power. No statistical difference was found
between the two groups. None of the two groups rated the questions particularly high.
Questions 9, 10, and 11 all regards McClelland’s need for affiliation. Based on the p-‐value,
there is strong evidence to infer that there is a difference between the groups in question 9,
“to have a good relationship with my superior”. Based on the mean ratings, the blue-‐collar
group values this factor more than the white-‐collar group. Question 10, “that we do something
socially together at the workplace”, and question 11, “to have a good relationship with my
38
colleagues at the workplace”, did not infer any statistical difference. Question 10 was, by both
groups, rated among one of the lowest work factors, while question 11 was the work factor
rated highest for the blue-‐collar group, however without any statistical difference between
the groups.
Questions 12 and 13 served to represent aspects of Latham and Locke’s goal theory. Both
questions were rated with the same mean among the blue-‐collar group, while the white-‐collar
workers rated question 12, “to work towards clearly defined goals in my work”, higher than
question 13, “to have a specific plan of action for what to achieve in my work”. Between the
groups, there is statistical evidence to support a difference between the groups in question 13,
where the mean rating of the blue-‐collar workers was higher than that of the white-‐collar
workers. Thus, blue-‐collar workers value to have a specific plan of action for what to achieve
in their work higher than white-‐collar workers.
Questions 14 to 21 represent factors of Hackman and Oldham’s job characteristics model. The
only question that infers statistical difference between the groups is question 21, “that I get
specific information about the effectiveness of my own work”. This factor is valued higher by
the blue-‐collar groups and corresponds to Hackman and Oldham’s feedback factor. Question
20, “to get direct and clear feedback on the work I perform”, also corresponds to the feedback
factor; however, this question has only been rated slightly higher by the blue-‐collar group but
without any statistical evidence. For both the white-‐collar and blue-‐collar group question 15,
“to be able see measurable results in what I do”, is among the three most important factors
and corresponds to the task identity factor; however, it is, again, rated slightly higher by the
blue-‐collar sample. Two questions that have been rated higher by the white-‐collar sample are
question 16, “to have a feeling that what I do becomes part of the final result”, and 17, “that
the work I perform has significance for my company and our customers”, which both address
Hackman and Oldham’s task significance factor. Even though the difference between the blue
and white-‐collar sample is not statistically significant in these questions, the fact that the
white-‐collar sample has rated these questions higher is worth noticing, as almost all other
questions have been rated higher by the blue-‐collar sample.
39
Based on the experience gained from conducting the pilot study, an extra question relating
McClelland’s achievement needs theory was added. Thus, question 22 asks the respondent to
choose one of McClelland’s three needs. In answering this question, there was a clear
tendency that blue-‐collar employees valued need for affiliation the highest and white-‐collar
employees valued the need for achievement highest. This difference between the two groups
was also confirmed by the statistical analysis showing the difference between the two groups
was highly significant. Nevertheless, the result that blue-‐collar employees value need for
affiliation and white-‐collar employees value need for achievement was not strongly supported
in results from questions 5 to 11, as it was only in question 9 relating the need for affiliation a
statistical difference was found. This inconsistency in answers will be addressed in the
discussion section.
Question 23 relates to Herzberg’s two-‐factor theory and the aim was to find the three factors
which blue-‐ and white-‐collar employees value in order to make an extra effort at work. The
question comprised of Herzberg’s fourteen different factors, and based on the analysis there
was a significant difference in the opinions of the blue-‐ and white-‐collar employees relating
five of the fourteen factors. The five factors are salary, company policy, sense of achievement,
recognition and work itself. The hygiene factors, salary and company policy, was found to be
40
much more important for the blue-‐collar group than the white-‐collar group and the
motivators, sense of achievement, recognition, and work itself, was found to be much more
important for the white-‐collar group. No statistical difference between the two groups was
found relating job security, relationship with peers, status, relationship with superior,
working conditions, work-‐life balance, personal growth, responsibility and advancement. The
fact that there is no statistical difference between the two groups relating relationship with
superior is a bit contradictory to what was found in question 9, as it was concluded that the
blue-‐collar employees actually valued this factor more than the white-‐collar employees. These
contradictory answers will be discussed later in the thesis.
4.4 Critical Reflections In order to get some critical reflections upon the chosen methodology, we will address the
concepts of internal validity, external validity, and reliability, as these are relevant when
performing a quantitative study (Heldbjerg 2006).
4.4.1 Internal Validity
Internal validity concerns the relationship between the chosen theory and the study. It deals
with the fact that the study should be formulated in a way where it actually corresponds to
the theory (Arbnor, Bjerke 2009). In our questionnaire all the factors of the theories have
been represented by few questions compared to how many aspects the theorists encompass
in the factors. Due to the length of the questionnaire it is not possible to include all aspects of
a factor, however we feel that the factors have been represented in a sufficient manner. One
could, nevertheless, question whether Latham and Locke’s goal theory is sufficiently
represented as we have only included two questions representing the theory. In hindsight,
internal validity might have been higher if more elaborate questions were asked. An example
would be that goals not only need to be clearly defined, as mentioned in question 12 (see
appendix 8.1 and 8.2), but also challenging. Regarding Hackman and Oldham’s feedback factor
in our questionnaire, the questions phrased for this factor might no be provided with enough
explanation as to who gives the feedback. In our questions regarding feedback there is only
focus on feedback from the job itself, which is Hackman and Oldham’s main objective with this
factor, but no questions related to general feedback from co-‐workers and managers, which
Hackman and Oldham also recognize as important. This lack might affect how high the
41
question is rated by both the blue-‐ and white-‐collar respondents. It could also be discussed
whether the moderators of Hackman and Oldham’s job characteristics model should also have
been included in the questionnaire. This would have given the possibility to estimate whether
the employees actually where interested in the various characteristics. However, as the
moderators were not empirically confirmed and based on the fact that we are not interested
in what motivates each single individual but rather the entire blue-‐ and white-‐collar groups,
we chose not to include the moderators. Finally, one could also discuss the fact that every
person has selective perception, which means that people only read or hear what they want
and interpret that in different ways. Thus, no matter what our intentions were with each
question and how it was phrased, people can always understand it differently.
4.4.2 External Validity
External validity relates to whether the results made can be generalized beyond the actual
study area (Arbnor, Bjerke 2009). This means that if the sample is representative for the
entire population, we would be able to generalize the results and there would then be
external validity. Generally, our sample of 49 respondents is a small sample if we wish to
generalize to all blue-‐ and white-‐collar employees in Denmark. A way to improve external
validity, we could have included more respondents by cooperating with more companies; this
would insure that the specific company culture would not affect the results.
4.4.3 Reliability
Reliability addresses the certainty of the measuring instruments. Thus, validity is about what
we are measuring, whereas reliability is about what we are measuring with (Heldbjerg 2006).
So, if a study is seen as reliable, the results of the study could be repeated over and over again,
producing the same results. Because we, as researchers, have not in any way been
responsible for collecting or even presenting the questionnaire for the respondents, the
reliability is high in this study.
4.4.4 Sum up of Critical Reflections
Summing up on the critical reflections, one could question the internal validity as in particular
Latham and Locke’s goal theory could have been addressed even more directly in the
questionnaire along with Hackman and Oldham’s feedback factor. This off course will reflect
the results of the analysis and also make it harder to come up with general conclusions
42
relating the usefulness of this theory in relation to blue-‐ and white-‐collar employees.
Furthermore, the generalizability of this sample to the entire population might be
questionable based on the small number of respondents in our sample. Concerning reliability,
the measurement instruments are considered satisfactory.
5 Discussion and Reflection
This section will discuss the findings from the analysis. We will try to explain some of the
findings and differences discovered in the analysis and also try to link these with relevant
sources. We will also comment on the fact that we found some inconsistencies in the answers
of the respondents, and try to explain why these differences might occur. After having
discussed and reflected upon our analysis from section 4, we will try to move on with an
analysis of age to see whether age has impact on how employees are motivated. We will also
try to address whether differences in preferred motivational factors can be found within the
white-‐collar group meaning that we will try to discover if there is any differences between the
general white-‐collar workers and the knowledge workers from our sample. Thereafter we will
move into a discussion of which implications are important for managers and companies
when they want to motivate blue-‐ and white-‐collar workers. Finally, we will focus on future
perspectives on this topic of research.
5.1 Discussion of Analysis In this section the significant differences found in the analysis will be discussed and these
differences will then be linked to what factors of work that serves as motivators for blue-‐ and
white-‐collar employees. The discussion will to a certain degree include our own thoughts,
however, it will also be discussed whether the findings are similar to any previous studies
performed within the area.
The first difference found between the two groups relates to question 9 “to have a good
relationship with my manager”. As the p-‐value is 0.015 (see table 4.4) there is strong evidence
to infer that the alternative hypothesis is true meaning that there is a difference in the mean
ratings between the blue-‐ and white-‐collar groups. Based on the calculated means (see table
4.1 and 4.3) it can be concluded that the blue-‐collar workers valued the relationship with
their manager higher than the white-‐collar employees. This question relates McClelland’s
43
need for affiliation, though there is no statistical difference between the two groups relating
the other questions concerning McClelland’s needs in this part of the questionnaire (questions
5-‐8 and 10-‐11). However, based on the analysis of question 22 and the corresponding p-‐value,
it was concluded that there is overwhelming evidence to infer that the alternative hypothesis
is true, and that the difference between the blue-‐ and white-‐collar groups is highly significant.
The fact the blue-‐collar workers has a higher need for affiliation than the white-‐collar workers
can also be supported by a study made in 1965 by Friedlander. Friedlander made his analysis
based in Maslow’s hierarchy of needs and discovered that the predominant value within the
blue-‐collar group sample was environmental characteristics, which would fulfill the basic
security needs and desires for interpersonal interaction with one’s co-‐workers, work group,
and supervisor. Therefore, the blue-‐collar group had a more general focus on the lower order
needs (Friedlander 1965), corresponding to McClelland’s need for affiliation. The white-‐collar
workers, on the other hand, was found to value Maslow’s higher order needs such as sense of
achievement, challenge, freedom, and the use of one’s best abilities (Friedlander 1965), which
would correspond to McClelland’s need for achievement.
Even though, the blue-‐collar sample valued the social connection with their colleagues higher
than other aspects of their job in question 22 relating McClelland’s needs, they still rated
question 10, “that we do something social together at the workplace” among the three lowest
factors in questions 5 to 21. Also the white-‐collar workers rated question 10 among their
three lowest factors, even though “to have a good relationship with colleagues” was important
to 37% of the sample when choosing between Herzberg’s factors. The reason question 10 has
been rated so low could be due to Danish cultural reasons as the official Danish website for
international recruitment states that most Danes wish to keep work life and their social life
separated. Most Danes have friends whom they have known a long time and most places it is
not the norm to associate with colleagues outside working hours (Work in Denmark 2011).
The social connection with colleagues and the fact that one can laugh and joke with them is
very important, however, it is still a community around the workplace and not much more
(Larsen, Munkgård Pedersen & Aagaard 2005, Paarup, Liboriussen 2002). When white-‐collar
workers have to choose between the challenging job and the social connection with
colleagues, they choose the challenging job, however, when choosing among Herzberg’s
factors, and when it was possible to choose more factors that would motivate to perform an
44
extra effort, the white-‐collar workers found the relationship with peers just as important as
the blue-‐collar sample. According to the classical division of extrinsic and intrinsic motivation
the social aspect is an extrinsic factor. This is due to the fact that it is other people who affect
us, and thus affect the way we think and our behavior. However, Larsen (2005) might have a
point when he raises the question of whether this frame of mind is not rather narrow as there
is an “intrinsic” cause why other people affect us. Being a social creature is a highly common
“intrinsic” characteristic in humans or as one leading scholar in the area of affiliation
motivation wrote: “The motivation for social contact can be considered a central influence on
human behavior” (Hill 1987, p.1008). Thus, we have a need to seek towards the
understanding, purpose, and comfort a community gives us. Larsen (2005) therefore asks
whether the classical intrinsic/extrinsic division makes any sense in the discussion of the
social aspect. One could then think about all the criticism of Herzberg’s methodology for his
two-‐factor theory and wonder whether is makes sense to include relationship with peers as a
hygiene factor that can act as a dissatisfier but not as a satisfier, nevertheless it seems that
both for the blue-‐and white-‐collar sample the relationship with their colleagues can act as a
motivator to perform an extra effort.
Moving on in the analysis, a difference was also found relating question 13 “to have a specific
plan of action for what to achieve in my work” as the blue-‐collar workers rated this question
to be of bigger importance than the white-‐collar workers. Questions 12 and 13 are based on
Latham and Locke’s goal theory and question 12 “to work towards clearly defined goals in my
work” was rated of almost equal importance for the two groups (see table 4.1 and 4.3).
Therefore, it is only in one of the two questions relating goal theory that the blue-‐collar
workers found goal theory to be more important than white-‐collar workers. However, this
difference is quite interesting, as we actually expected that it would be the white-‐collar
workers who would have preference for goal theory. Though, this was not the case with our
sample.
The fact that white-‐collar workers rated this question very low, might be due to the specific
formulation of the sentence as having a specific plan of action might not be desirable for some
white-‐collar workers, as their jobs seem to be defined less clearly than the type of job
performed by blue-‐collar workers. Furthermore, a big part of our white-‐collar workers can
also be classified as knowledge workers, which also affects the ratings of the respondents as
45
some theorists actually characterize knowledge workers by the large amount of autonomy in
their work (Christensen 2007, Newell 2002). Therefore, a specific plan of action might sound
unattractive for them as this could sound like they would loose influence on their own work.
Referring to section 4.4.1 about internal validity, we discussed the fact that there could have
been included extra questions relating goal theory, and by doing that we might have received
different responses concerning this theory.
In a study done in Israel, goal setting was actually proved to work among white-‐collar
workers as it was found that ”the motivational factor of involvement in goal setting
significantly affected both performance quantity and quality, and work attitudes” (Erez, Arad
1986). However, it should be noted that the national culture of Israel is different from that of
Denmark. Geert Hofstede’s cultural dimensions could, among others, be used to elaborate on
differences between the Danish and the Israeli culture. According to Hofstede, Israel has a
more masculine culture than Denmark indicating that they are more competitive and not
focusing so much on the soft values as in Denmark. Further, the Israeli culture has higher
uncertainty avoidance than the Danish culture, which means that they generally would try to
minimize situations with uncertainty, whereas Danes in general would be more willing to
accept uncertainty (Hofstede 2009). Relating these national differences to goal theory, it
might explain why goal theory proved successful in Israel as they focus more on competition
and has a tendency to try to decrease uncertainty, and having a goal to reach could trigger the
competition value and also deal with the uncertainty by having a specific plan of action. Lastly,
it should be notified that putting national culture into boxes of course is making
generalizations.
Addressing the concepts of McClelland’s achievement needs theory; one might also link
achievement-‐oriented people with goal setting as achievement oriented people are very result
oriented. Further, high achievers also desire feedback, which goal setting would also offer
them as they will get feedback on whether a goal is reached or not. Even though we found our
white-‐collar workers to be achievement oriented, this did not result in them preferring goal
theory.
46
Generally, both the blue-‐ and white-‐collar group did not value goal setting very high
compared to other factors of work (see tables 4.1 and 4.3). However, one might argue that
most companies today make use of the general concepts of goal theory in one way or the
other. Examples of this could for instance be a work norm, a deadline, a certain level of job
performance, a budget or a quota (Locke et al. 1981). As many companies also use some sort
of goal setting in describing values and strategies, this might explain why the individual
employee does not seem to value goal setting so much, as it is already incorporated in the
company cultures.
Concerning Hackman and Oldham’s job characteristic model, the only difference found
between the blue-‐ and white-‐collar employees was relating question 21. This result was only
significant with a significance level of 0.10 however, there is strong evidence to infer that the
alternative hypothesis is true meaning that there was a difference between the groups (Keller
2004). Question 21, “to get specific information about the effectiveness of my own work”
relates to Hackman and Oldham’s concept of feedback. Based on the mean ratings, this factor
seems more important for the blue-‐collar employees than the white-‐collar employees (see
table 4.1 and 4.3). One aspect of why blue-‐collar workers rated this as of greater importance
than white-‐collar employees could be found in the nature of their jobs as white-‐collar jobs and
in particular knowledge workers job maybe not so suitable for a measure of effectiveness.
Further, the whole concept of effectiveness might make the employees feel measured and
controlled upon, which could result in some employees having negative associations
concerning the word effectiveness.
Relating question 20, “to get direct and clear feedback on the work I perform”, which also
concerns the feedback aspect of Hackman and Oldham’s job characteristic model, the two
mean ratings of the two groups was more similar, and generally this factor was valued higher
by both groups (see table 41. and 4.3). This indicates that getting a direct and clear feedback
was valued as more important than information on the effectiveness of one’s work.
Our questions aimed at addressing the feedback factor did not clarify whether the feedback
was provided by the job itself or by others, as the questions do not mention from who or how
the particular feedback is coming. Therefore, it is unfortunately not possible for us to analyze
which type of feedback the employees would want, whether it is from the work itself or
47
others. This information could have been quite interesting, as McClelland suggests people
with a high need for achievement have a strong desire for task-‐related feedback meaning
feedback from the job itself (Hein 2009). Since we found that the white-‐collar workers are
achievement motivated, it would have been interesting to discover whether they actually
desire feedback from the job itself as McClelland claims.
In the questions from 5 to 21, where respondents had to rate the importance of the
statements, the highest rating among white-‐collar employees was given to Hackman and
Oldham’s task significance factor. According to Hackman and Oldham, task significance should
be understood as the extent to which the work has an effect for other people inside or outside
the organization. The reason the respondents rated this question so high might be due to the
majority of our respondents are from Systematic where they are working within health care
and the development of electronic patient records for hospitals. Thus, the employees at
Systematic might find their work more meaningful because they develop a system that might
make it possible for health personnel to spend more time curing the sick than on
administrative tasks.
Looking at questions 18 and 19 relating autonomy, no difference between the two groups was
found, however, the blue-‐collar workers generally rated autonomy higher than the white-‐
collar workers. One possible reason for the lower rating by the white-‐collar workers could be
the fact that a large part of these workers, in our sample, also are characterized as knowledge
workers, and knowledge workers are, among other things, often characterized by their large
amount of autonomy in their work (Newell 2002). So, the fact that they might take the
autonomy factor for granted could explain why autonomy is not as important for white-‐collar
employees as blue-‐collar employees. Thus, the blue-‐collar workers might value autonomy
more, due to the fact that it is not as implicit in their job descriptions.
When only looking at Hackman and Oldham’s job characteristics, the question is whether all,
as well as the same, factors should be included in a motivating job for both blue-‐collar and
white-‐collar employees. Generally, most factors have been rated about equally between the
two employee groups. Therefore, it can be argued, as Hackman and Oldham also claims, that
both job types should include all factors. However, they need to be addressed in different
ways as e.g. autonomy largely is included in many white-‐collar jobs, whereas management
48
might need to hand over some of the planning or specifications to the blue-‐collar employees.
A factor that, unlike all other factors, have been rated higher by the white-‐collar sample is
question 16 “to have a feeling that what I do becomes part of the final result”, which
corresponds to the task identity factor. This might indicate that it is slightly more important
for white-‐collar employees to constantly feel that what they are working on becomes a part of
a final element. Thus, white-‐collar people might need more information about the overall
product or goal of the work whereas the blue-‐collar employees rather want to know the
effectiveness of the work on their current assignment, as seen in question 21 regarding task
feedback.
In relation to Hackman and Oldham’s job characteristic model, it is also important to consider
individual differences among people as evidence supports the fact that some people are more
attracted and motivated by enriched jobs than others (Pinder 2008). This is also what
Hackman and Oldham acknowledged by including the moderator of growth need strength to
the model. So, when addressing the preferences towards these job characteristics, it should be
remembered that each individual would have different perceptions towards these
characteristics.
As mentioned previously in this section, there is overwhelming evidence to infer a significant
difference among the blue-‐ and white-‐collar sample in question 22 regarding McClelland’s
needs. In this question a little more than half of the blue-‐collar sample chose the statement
implying a need for affiliation, while this statement was only chosen by 12% of the white-‐
collar sample. According to the research done by Paarup (2002) unskilled workers are
generally satisfied with having a job with a relatively good income and good relations to the
other workers and with management, while people with longer educations have requirements
about the job fulfilling personal ambitions. Even though all the blue-‐collar workers in our
sample are not unskilled, the research by Paarup corresponds to the findings from our
empirical research. A majority of the people in our white-‐collar sample has longer educations
than the blue-‐collar sample. Thus, the reason almost 90% of the white-‐collar employees have
chosen the statement implying a need for achievement might be due to the fact that they have
personal ambitions they want to carry out. Other studies have also found blue-‐collar workers
to put a high emphasis on their co-‐workers and the interpersonal relationship at the
workplace (Locke 1973). The fact that our blue-‐collar sample has a higher need for affiliation
49
might be that the respondents in this sample repair ships and therefore highly rely on each
other for the ship to be done. Furthermore, if the teamwork at the yard does not work it might
lead to safety hazards. These two aspects in the blue-‐collar work might increase the
importance of good relationships to coworkers and superiors. What needs to be mentioned
for McClelland’s needs achievement theory is that even though it seems that the white-‐collar
group has a higher need for achievement and the blue-‐collar group for affiliation, it does not
mean that these two employee groups only possess these needs. In other situations than their
work they might have a higher need for one of the other factors, it is simply not as prevalent
in their job.
It is also quite interesting that none of the respondents in our sample choose McClelland’s
need for power. One possible explanation to this could be that there, as far as we know, are no
managers in our sample, and McClelland states that it is typically managers who have a high
need for power. Furthermore, one might also consider the Danish concept of the Jante Law,
where the main thought is “don't think you are better than us” (Den Store Danske 2011). This
could maybe unconsciously affect the Danish employees not to choose the questions relating
to McClelland’s need for power.
Moving on with the discussion concerning question 23 and Herzberg’s two-‐factor theory we
found that there is a statistical significant difference in five of the fourteen factors. The first
factor we will discuss is the factor of salary. About 50% more blue-‐collar than white-‐collar
workers chose the salary factor. It is common in many studies that the most important factor
for blue-‐collar workers is salary (Locke 1973, Kovach 1995, Paarup, Liboriussen 2002).
According to Herzberg, salary is a hygiene factor and should therefore not serve as a
motivator as it is seen from our study. However, as Paarup (2002) discovered in his research,
some workers simply go to work in order to provide for their family, thus salary serve as a
motivator for this group. Therefore, when problems arise in work situations and overtime is
needed, the best incentive to get the skilled and unskilled workers in production industries to
work is by giving them a high overtime salary (Paarup, Liboriussen 2002).
In relation to the importance of salary for the blue-‐collar workers, it is also important to keep
in mind that Orskov, where all our blue-‐collar employees work, has paid out large amounts in
50
profit sharing to all their employees (Albæk 2008). The importance of this large bonus might
be what the employees have in mind when choosing the salary factor.
The next significant difference between the two groups concerns company policy. Also this
factor is by Herzberg seen as a hygiene factor, however, in our research this factor could serve
to motivate the blue-‐collar sample. The reason company policy is more important for the
blue-‐collar sample might be that this group does not have as high autonomy as the white-‐
collar sample and therefore rely on the policies established by their company to a greater
extend than do white-‐collar workers. Also, the importance of company policies among the
blue-‐collar sample could be linked to the importance of safety regulations on a shipyard.
The third significant difference is in the “sense of achievement” factor that by Herzberg is said
to be a “motivator”. This factor was not chosen by any blue-‐collar workers but by one out of
three white-‐collar employees. This factor can be linked to McClelland’s need for achievement,
which was also chosen by significantly more white-‐collar employees. The question regarding
this factor was phrased: “That there is opportunity to use my skills and abilities fully”. The fact
that there are more white-‐collar employees putting a high emphasis on this statement also
corresponds to the finding by Paarup (2002) that higher educated people require the job to
fulfill personal ambitions and to findings by Friedlander (1965) who found that the use of
one’s best abilities is of highly significant value to white-‐collar employees.
The “recognition” factor also shows a significant difference between the blue-‐ and white-‐
collar employees. This factor is more important to the white-‐collar sample in our study (see
table 4.2). Kovach (1995) came so a similar conclusion in his research when he compared
skilled blue-‐collar workers with skilled white-‐collar employees, as his white-‐collar
respondents placed a higher value on “full appreciation of work done”. Kovach (1995) argues
that the blue-‐collar workers might be more intrinsically content with their jobs, because in
most cases their tasks are well defined whereas the tasks of white-‐collar workers are more
open-‐ended and the worker depends on supervisory feedback for definition and assessment
of the job. In order to give employees a higher recognition they could be included in decision-‐
making activities, which might give them the feedback needed to define the job.
51
The last significant factor of difference of Herzberg’s theory in our questionnaire is “work
itself”. This factor was clearly the most important factor among the white-‐collar group (see
table 4.2). Many other studies have come to the same conclusion, namely that interesting
work is of prime importance to white-‐collar workers (Locke 1973, Friedlander 1965,
Hackman, Oldham 1980). Harris (1974) also came to the conclusion that blue-‐collar
employees were more likely to derive satisfaction and dissatisfaction from hygiene factors
whereas white-‐collar employees derived satisfaction and dissatisfaction from “motivator
events” (Harris, Locke 1974).
A factor that, to our surprise, was not important to the blue-‐collar workers was Herzberg’s
“job security” factor. This was surprising as the employees at Orskov Yard are primarily
employees that have experienced layoffs of many of their previous colleagues when Ørskov
Christensens Stålskibsværft closed. In addition, many other studies found the job security
factor to be one of the most important for blue-‐collar employees (Friedlander 1965, Kovach
1995, Hackman, Oldham 1980, Slocum Jr. 1971). Moreover, increasing globalization causes
more jobs to be outsourced to countries with lower wages (Hansen 2010), which is a factor
that one would think increases the desire for job security. The reason the respondents in our
blue-‐collar sample have not chosen the job security factor, might be because they each year
have received a bonus, which means that the company is doing well. Thus, the employees
know that when the company is thriving there is a low possibility of being fired and therefore
the “job security” factor cannot motivate them to perform an extra effort.
In the question relating to McClelland, we discovered that the respondents in our white-‐collar
sample found a challenging job and a personal responsibility for the work to be most
important at their workplace, which corresponds to the need for achievement. However, one
of the factors that were least important for the same respondents among Herzberg’s factors
was the responsibility factor. The statement “the possibility to decide how my work should be
carried out” measured the responsibility factor. Two of Systematic’s values are that the best
way for people and organizations to grow is by empowerment and that their employees have
freedom with responsibility and an obligation to take responsibility. Thus, one can argue that
the employees of Systematic take responsibility for granted as they are obligated to embrace
responsibility as it is of great importance in the company culture, which might explain why
the responsibility factor was not chosen.
52
5.2 Inconsistencies in Respondent Answers In the analysis, it was mentioned that some of the answers given by the respondents not
always seemed to be consistent all the way through the questionnaire. This was the case for
the questions relating to McClelland’s theory namely questions 5-‐11 compared to question 22
and also the relationship with superior both mentioned in question 9 concerning McClelland’s
need for affiliation and in question 23 relating Herzberg’s hygiene factors.
Relating McClelland’s achievement needs theory in question 22, it was found that blue-‐collar
employees valued the need for affiliation whereas white-‐collar employees valued the need for
achievement. However, this discovery was not clear when considering the statistics
performed on questions 5 to 11 as the only statistical difference between the two groups was
found relating question 9 as the blue-‐collar workers valued the relationship with superior
much higher than the white-‐collar workers. This raises the question why only one statistical
difference was found in questions 5 to 11, even though it was clear from question 22 that
there was a difference between the two groups?
One possible explanation to the above question could be that by constructing the
questionnaire in a way where the respondents did not have to choose between the groups,
but only rate what is important, there would be a tendency to rate everything fairly high as
the entire questionnaire is based on motivational theory and thereby factors, that all seem
desirable. This is also very much supported by the fact that the lowest mean found in
questions 5 to 21 was 3.06, which shows a clear tendency for the respondents to rate
everything relating questions 5 to 21 as important. When reflecting upon the composition of
the questionnaire and the fact that the needs should only be rated by importance in questions
5 to 11, it also makes sense that all three needs were found to be somewhat important for
everyone, as McClelland’s achievement needs theory actually states that everyone have a
basic need for all of the three factors, however with emphasis towards one of the three needs.
Therefore, it also makes sense that it is not until you make the respondents choose specifically
which one of the needs they have emphasis for, you get to see the difference between the two
groups of employees.
Relating the inconsistency in the answers of questions 9 and 23, it was found in question 9
that there was a statistical difference between the two groups as the blue-‐collar employees
53
valued relationship with superior more than white-‐collar employees. However, in question 23
concerning Herzberg’s two-‐factor theory no statistical difference was found between the two
groups relating relationship with superior as only 14.3% of the blue-‐collar group had chosen
it, whereas 15.2% of the white-‐collar group had chosen it as one of the three most important
of Herzberg’s factors. A possible explanation for the inconsistency in the answers could be
that the expressions are not entirely equivalent in the two questions as question 9 is phrased
as having relationship with my manager whereas question 23 is to have a good relationship
with my superiors. So, this might indicate that blue-‐collar workers find it important to have a
good relationship with their nearest manager, however, not with the superiors in general.
5.3 Impact of Age on Motivation When assessing differences in what factors motivate employees, there might be other
explanations than whether they are blue-‐ or white-‐collar employees. One factor that might
affect motivation is age. In the labor market there are currently workers belonging to three
different generations. Because values, beliefs and attitudes change over time these
generations might have more in common than workers in blue-‐ or white-‐collar jobs.
Generation Y are the people born from approximately 1980-‐1997, and are thus people below
30 in our sample (Hein 2009). This generation is also sometimes called the “what’s in it for
me” generation and are often described as extrinsically controlled employees who seek
material goods, prestige, esteem, and fame (Hein 2009). Some even argues that this
generation, according to Herzberg’s two-‐factor theory, feels dissatisfied by the absence of so
many factors, that almost everything functions as hygiene factors for them. However, there
are also opposing sides that claim that generation Y are not only individualists, but also
collectivists because they put the social environment high along with meaningful work.
Generation X are people born between 1961 and 1980 (Sung-‐Bum Yang, Guy 2006) . In our
sample this generation comprises of people from 31 to 50, as our age categories are divided in
years of ten intervals. Generation X is viewed to demand fast payoffs, challenging work,
constant feedback about their performance, and constant opportunities for personal and
professional development through their jobs (Tulgan 1995).
The last generation in the workforce of our sample is generation Baby Boomers (BB) who are
born between 1943 and 1960 (Sung-‐Bum Yang, Guy 2006). They will today be between 50
54
and 68 years old and will in our sample consist of the employees above 50. According to Sung-‐
Bum Yang (2006), Baby Boomers are often described as independent and anti-‐authoritarian.
They prefer to have a meaningful career to having a job just for economic gains.
In order to find out if there are any statistical differences between the generations in our
sample we have to recode our data in SPSS. We have, in our questionnaire, made six age
intervals, however to compare the generations, these age groups have to be recoded so that
people below 20 up to 30 years of age will become one variable called ”genY”, people from 31
to 50 will become one variable called “genX” and lastly people from 51 to above 60 years of
age will become a variable called “genBB” for generation baby boomers. For question 5-‐21 we
will use a one-‐way analysis of variance (ANOVA) test in SPSS to compare the three mean
ratings in each question (appendix 8.4). The p-‐values are then used to determine whether
there is a difference between the means, which is the case in questions: 5, 9, 12-‐14, 16, 18, and
21 (see appendix 8.4: table 8.2). In order to find out which means differ from each other the
Bonferroni confidence intervals are used (see appendix 8.4: table 8.3). The statistical
framework of questions 22 and 23 can be seen in appendix 8.4.
In most of the questions where a statistical difference is discovered from questions 5-‐21,
generation BB have a higher mean rating, which might indicate that the older generation
value motivational factor higher than the other two generations, or that they are simply just
higher raters than the other two groups. What is interesting among the findings is that
questions 12 and 13, regarding goal theory, were found to be statistically more important for
generation BB, which might confirm the arguments of Sung-‐Bun Yang (2006) that this
generation is independent and therefore likes to have clearly stated goals that they have to
achieve. Even though there is no statistically significant differences between the generations
in question 22 regarding McClelland’s needs, generation BB seem to value achievement much
more than generation Y, which corresponds to their higher preference for having goals (see
appendix 8.4: table 8.4). In addition, the lower need for affiliation among generation BB might
be due to that they have been employed the same place for many years; therefore, they might
take the importance of a good relationship with co-‐workers and superiors for granted.
The only statement with a statistical difference in question 23 of Herzberg’s factors is the
question regarding relationship with superior. This is a factor that is more important to
55
generation BB which can also be seen in question 9 where the importance of having a good
relationship with the manager is rated significantly higher for generation BB than by
generation Y. A possible explanation for this could be that because generation BB often are
described as anti-‐authoritarian and therefore seek to establish a relationship with their
superior rather than seeing them as an authority.
What is interesting when looking at the results for generation Y is that in question 14, “to
have clear variation in the work I do”, regarding Hackman and Oldham’s skill variety, is
significantly lower for generation Y than for both generation X and generation BB. This might
be caused by the fact that generation Y is relatively new to the labor market, thus they still
need to achieve many new skills before they feel confident having a clear variation in their
work. Another interesting aspect in the findings of question 22, regarding McClelland’s needs,
is that generation Y almost divided their marks between the statements relating affiliation
and achievement, while the other two generations four out of five times chose the statement
corresponding to McClelland’s achievement factor (see appendix 8.4: table 8.4). Even though
the difference between the generations is not statistically significant it is still worth noticing,
that more from generation Y, compared to the other generations, chose the affiliation factor.
This corresponds to some general characteristics of generation Y, namely that they are said to
highly value the social environment (Hein 2009). Another desire that generation Y is claimed
to have is meaningful work, which also can be seen from question 23 of Herzberg’s factors in
our questionnaire. Even though not statistically significant, generation Y found work itself to
be a motivation to perform an extra effort two out of three times while only a little more than
half of generation X chose the factor and one out of three from generation BB. The work itself
factor is the most chosen factor for generation Y along with salary at number two, which
corresponds to both views of generation Y stated previously by Hein (2009).
However, in the sample we have obtained, a little more than half of the employees are from
generation X. Therefore, it could be claimed that our sample is not representative of the
population. Moreover, now that we have found that there are some differences between blue-‐
and white-‐collar employees, it would be more reliable to obtain a larger sample among
employees with similar professions and then test for generational differences. Furthermore,
the people in the generation Y sample are almost all from Systematic; therefore the fact that
56
they are knowledge workers might affect the results, which will be discussed in the next
section.
Differences in what factors motivate different age groups might not only be due to which
generation an employee belongs to, but rather what phase of life the employee is going
through. The sociologist Henrik Dahl argues that the sociological definition of generations,
meaning that a large number of people have something in common solely due to their birth
certificate, is a myth. The only reason that it makes sense to talk about a generation, he
argues, is because it is interesting to see how current cultural, economical, and political
conditions affect a group of individuals who experience the same phase of life at the same
time (Dahl 1998).
Rather than focusing on generations, Kovach (1995) has made empirical research of different
age groups and his study might be a good supplement to ours. He found that the under 30
group valued good wages, job security, and promotion and growth as their first 3 priorities. In
our empirical study the under 30 groups also found salary to be of prime importance. This
could indicate that, because they are new workers, they have no yet fulfilled their basic needs.
The age group 31-‐40 placed job security high and as age increases, personal problems become
more of a factor. The personal factor is also important to generation X in our sample, as the
people between 31 and 50 have rated “work-‐life balance” higher than the other generations.
This personal emphasis might be due to the fact that employees between 31 and 50 have
small children rather than they belong to generation X. The over-‐50 workers place “good
working conditions” and “personal loyalty to employees” high on their list of preferences in
Kovach’s study, however in our study the over 50 worker place paramount importance to
being able to see measurable results in what they do and that the work has significance for
customers and the company. According to Kovach (1995) the under-‐30 workers might work
well with flexible pay incentives whereas the older age groups responds better to job
enrichment and job enlargement programs, however this is not entirely supported by our
study. But it is important to recognize that our sample might not be completely fit for testing
whether age has an influence on motivational factors. Eskildsen (2003) further found that in
the Nordic countries there is a linear relationship with age and job satisfaction, which means
that the older the employee, the higher is the satisfaction with one’s job (Eskildsen,
Kristensen & Westlund 2004). This could either indicate that as the employee gets older
57
he/she obtains a larger skill set, which according to Hackman and Oldham increases
motivation and perhaps job satisfaction. It could also indicate that as an employee gets older
he/she achieves more recognition and more responsibility, which according to Herzberg
increases motivation.
5.4 Differences within the White-Collar Group As our white-‐collar group is a mixture of general white-‐collar workers and knowledge
workers, it could also be quite interesting to investigate whether there are any differences
between these two subgroups. These two groups will therefore be analyzed based on
educational level, and thereby we will discover if the level of education affects how employees
are motivated. In order to perform the analysis, we had to construct a new data set by moving
all our white-‐collar employees into this new data set as the answers of the blue-‐collar
employees were without relevance in this analysis. For the sake of analyzing differences
within the white-‐collar group, we needed to be able to separate the general white-‐collar
workers from the knowledge workers. This separation was done by the use of the
respondents’ educational levels as the respondents’ with a bachelor’s degree, master degree
or PhD was grouped together as knowledge workers. The remaining respondents were
classified as general white-‐collar workers. The grouping was based on our definition of
knowledge workers in section 1.1.2, where knowledge workers were described as highly
educated. Based on the above classification, we came to a respondent sample comprising of
eight general white-‐collar workers and twenty-‐five knowledge workers. The vast majority of
the knowledge workers are from Systematic, which might affect the results of the analysis.
The analysis was carried out in SPSS, and the statistical framework along with the outputs can
be seen in appendix 8.5.
From the analysis, it is possible to conclude that there are differences among the preferences
towards motivational factors within the white-‐collar group. Differences among the general
white-‐collar group and the knowledge workers were found relating questions 9, 18, 19, 21
and 23. Question 9 relates to McClelland’s need for affiliation and deals with relationship with
manager. In this question, it was clear that it was more important for the general white-‐collar
group than that of knowledge workers. A possible explanation of this could be found in the
definition relating to knowledge workers, as they are defined as specialists which might
58
indicate that they, based on their education but maybe also self-‐confidence, might not have
the same need for a relationship with their manager. Also, it seems that knowledge workers
are very much independent in the work they perform, as autonomy is one of distinctive
characteristics of knowledge work according to Newell et al. (2002) and therefore, this might
also explain why knowledge workers do not have the same need for a good relationship with
their manager as the general white-‐collar workers. In this relation it also makes sense to
discuss the next two questions, where differences were found namely questions 18 and 19
relating Hackman and Oldham’s job characteristics model and the concept of autonomy. As
just mentioned, autonomy is defined as a distinct characteristic of knowledge workers
(Newell 2002), which might also explain why question 18 “that I can organize my own
workday” and question 19 “that I decide how my tasks are carried out” were rated
significantly lower by the knowledge workers than the general white-‐collar group. So, a
possible explanation of the low ratings for autonomy by knowledge workers could be that
autonomy actually implicitly is a part of their job. Therefore, knowledge workers might take
autonomy for granted, as they have never tried not to have autonomy in the work they
perform.
Still, it is very interesting why autonomy is rated significantly lower by knowledge workers, as
operational autonomy was classified as one of the four key motivators for knowledge workers
by Tampoe (1993). Operational autonomy should be understood as a work environment
where knowledge workers have the possibility to achieve the tasks assigned to them within
the constraints of self-‐measurement indices and strategic direction (Tampoe 1993). As
especially question 19 “that I can decide how my tasks are carried out” can be identified as
operational autonomy, the results found by this analysis actually contradicts what Tampoe
found, namely that operational autonomy was found to be second most important motivator
after personal growth. In relation to the fact that personal growth should be the most
important motivator for knowledge workers (Tampoe 1993), it is therefore also interesting
that only 28% of the knowledge workers in our sample chose Herzberg’s motivator “personal
growth” (see appendix 8.5). In our questionnaire, personal growth was defined as “the
possibility to get better at what I do and acquire more skills and thereby experience a
personal development”, whereas Tampoe defined it as “the opportunity for individuals to fully
realize their potential” (Tampoe 1993, p.51). Even though the explanations of the two
59
concepts in both our study and Tampoe’s study seems to be somewhat similar, personal
growth was only rated as the fifth most important of Herzberg’s factors in our study which is
contradicting Tampoe’s analysis stating that personal growth is the most important motivator
for knowledge workers (Tampoe 1993).
The second most important motivator according to Tampoe was operational autonomy, as
explained above, whereas task achievement was found to be the third most important factor
and money the final and fourth factor (Tampoe 1993). By task achievement is meant “the
achievement of producing work to a standard and quality of which the individual can be
proud” (Tampoe 1993, p.51). The definition of task achievement could to a certain degree be
compared to our description of Herzberg’s factor of recognition “appreciation for the work I
perform” and the description of Hackman and Oldham’s task significance “that the work I
perform has significance for my company and our customers”. Even though there was no
statistical difference between the two groups relating Herzberg’s recognition factor, one could
argue that there is a difference as 44% of the knowledge workers chose the factor compared
to 12.5% of the general white-‐collar workers, however the difference is not statistically
significant. Relating Hackman and Oldham’s task significance it is very clear that there is no
difference at all between the two groups as the mean rating of task significance for the
knowledge workers was 4.36 compared to 4.38 of the general white-‐collar workers. So, the
Herzberg’s recognition factor might support the fact that knowledge workers value task
achievement as defined by Tampoe.
The final factor identified by Tampoe as key motivator for knowledge workers was money
rewards. Money rewards was identified as having the least importance of the four key
motivators with a percentage of only 7.07%, whereas all the other three motivators had a
rating in importance from 28.8% up to 33.7% (Tampoe 1993). Money rewards should be
understood as “an income which is a just reward for their contribution to corporate success
and which symbolizes their contribution to that success.” (Newell 2002, p.70). In his two-‐
factor theory, Herzberg defines salary as a hygiene factor, thus it should only be able to
dissatisfy. However, there is a difference in the way respectively Herzberg defines his “salary”
factor and the way money rewards are defined by Tampoe as Herzberg does not link his
“salary” term directly to performance such as Tampoe does. Furthermore, Herzberg’s factor is
not called reward and he does not even mention the concept of rewards when explaining
60
what salary means in his theory (Herzberg, Snyderman & Mausner 2004). However, he does
mention salary increases as a part of this factor, but not whether the salary increases is
related to performance (Herzberg, Snyderman & Mausner 2004). Based on our analysis,
12.5% of the general white-‐collar group found salary to be important compared to 24% of the
knowledge workers. However, our phrasing of this factor was only called “salary” without any
explanation, so whether the respondents thought of salary in terms of a monthly payment or
relating rewards, is unfortunately impossible for us to know. Not having personal interaction
with the respondents and not getting a possibility to ask in depth questions, is unfortunately
one of the disadvantages of using a questionnaire compared to a personal interview.
Opening a debate about money rewards also requires consideration about extrinsic and
intrinsic rewards. As explained in section 1.1.1 intrinsic and extrinsic rewards relates to
whether individuals are internally or externally motivated. The external motivation and
thereby extrinsic rewards are created from outside the individual (Buelens, Sinding &
Waldstrøm 2011) and theorists, including Herzberg, define money as an extrinsic reward and
external motivation is said to have less long term impact on motivation than does internal
motivation. Therefore, it is quite interesting that extrinsic motivation in the shape of money
rewards is of great importance to knowledge workers according to Tampoe. An article by
McKinsey also questions the power of financial incentives by stating: “Numerous studies have
concluded that for people with satisfactory salaries, some nonfinancial motivators are more
effective than extra cash in building long-‐term employee engagement” (Dewhurst, Guthridge
& Mohr 2010, p.1). Whether or not Tampoe is correct in assuming that knowledge workers
are motivated by money rewards cannot be confirmed on the basis of our study, however, it
would be a very interesting area of future research.
Continuing with the differences found between the general white-‐collar group and the
knowledge workers, a significant difference was also found relating question 21, where it was
more important for the white-‐collar group “to get specific information about the effectiveness
of my own work” than it was for the knowledge workers. Again, this difference might relate to
a possible higher self-‐confidence and autonomy by the knowledge workers, resulting in that it
might not be as important for the knowledge workers to know exactly how effectively they
are performing.
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When analyzing question 22, there was no difference between the general white-‐collar group
and the knowledge workers as both groups generally chose need for achievement as the
highest factor. However, significant differences were found when looking at some of
Herzberg’s factors in question 23 as there were differences between the two groups relating
relationship with superiors, responsibility and work itself. Relationship with superior is a
hygiene factor, so basically it should not even be able to motivate according to Herzberg.
However, 37.5% of the general white-‐collar group chose that factor as one of the three factors
generating the greatest motivation compared to 8% of the knowledge worker group. Also
worth acknowledging is that there is no inconsistency found in this analysis when comparing
the answers of question 9 “to have a good relationship with my manager” and Herzberg’s
factor “to have a good relationship with my superiors” as it was discovered that the general
white-‐collar group valued relationship with superiors higher than the knowledge workers in
both questions. As mentioned when discussing question 9, a possible explanation for this
difference between the groups might be that the knowledge workers are highly educated, and
therefore they may have high confidence in the work they perform, which could mean that
they do not feel it is as important as the general white-‐collar group to have a good
relationship with the superiors.
The general white-‐collar group also valued responsibility much higher than did the
knowledge workers as 50% of the general white-‐collar group found responsibility to be
important compared to only 4% of the knowledge workers. The factor of responsibility was
phrased as “the possibility to decide how my work should be carried out” in our questionnaire
(see appendix 8.1 and 8.2), and this could in some ways be associated with the autonomy
factor in Hackman and Oldham’s job characteristics model. So, the explanations given for why
autonomy (question 18 and19) was not found to be important for knowledge workers might
also be used in relation to responsibility. Another possible explanation for why knowledge
workers did not find this factor important could be that the entire training and education of
knowledge workers have led them to expect a certain amount of autonomy and responsibility
in their work (Newell 2002), which knowledge workers therefore might take for granted.
The last significant difference found within the white-‐collar group was relating work itself as
25% of the general white-‐collar group had chosen this factor compared to 79,2% of the
knowledge workers. So, “that the work itself is exciting and interesting” is very important for
62
the knowledge workers. A possible explanation could be found in the length of the knowledge
workers’ education, as the minimum years of education of a knowledge worker, based on our
classification, would be a total of 16 years (10 years of primary school, 3 years of secondary
school, and 3 more years to get a bachelor’s degree). As the knowledge workers have such a
long education, this might also explain why they find it so important that the work itself is
exiting.
5.5 Implications for Companies and Managers We have in our discussion established that there are different factors of work that motivate
blue-‐ and white-‐collar employees respectively. Because the two groups value some factors
higher than others there are certain implications that companies, and especially managers,
should be aware of in order to motivate their employees as much as possible. Blue-‐collar
workers value the relationship with their co-‐workers and managers highly; therefore, it might
be a good idea to get these employees to work in groups as this is one of the characteristics
for people with a higher need for affiliation. Furthermore, Larsen (2005) suggests that
because young knowledge workers in his study valued the social connection at the workplace,
organizing people into project groups that change from time to time might be a good idea.
This approach might also work for the blue-‐collar employees, because knowing more people
at the workplace gives a stronger sense of belonging. Moreover, both white-‐ and blue-‐collar
employees might benefit from “team building” exercises that takes place during working
hours. The blue-‐collar workers also valued Hackman and Oldham’s feedback factor and
Herzberg’s recognition factor, therefore managers should include the employees in decision
making about the tasks, as argued by Kovach (1995), which gives them the feedback needed
to define the job. In addition, bonuses based on the profit generated by the company might be
a good idea, as this both serves as recognition that the employees have done a good job but
also addresses the factor that is most important among Herzberg’s factors, namely salary,
which is what Orskov already practices.
For the white-‐collar employees Herzberg’s “work itself” factor was the most important factor.
In addition, the vast majority of the white-‐collar sample had a higher need for achievement.
One of the characteristics for people with a high achievement need is that they require more
feedback (Hein 2009). Based on these two factors it might be a good idea for managers to
63
have conversations with white-‐collar workers about their job content from time to time. In
this way the employees both get feedback and at the same time the manager knows whether
the employee is satisfied by the work he/she performs. Even though our white-‐collar sample
did not place a high value on goal setting, Erez (1986) argues that high achievers perform
better when they have a goal that they have taken part in setting. Therefore managers could
try, along with the employee, to set specific goals. Larsen (2005) found out in his research that
among young knowledge workers it did not matter whether they received a super high salary
as long as it was about the same as other people with similar work received. In our study, the
white-‐collar group did not place a high importance to salary; therefore the claim offered by
Larsen (2005) might be general for white-‐collar workers.
Along with the differences in our blue-‐ and white-‐collar sample, we have also found some
differences among age groups and within the white-‐collar sample. Kovach (1995) argues that
younger people are more motivated by salary, which is also the case for generation Y in our
sample, however not statistically proven. Thus the younger people might be more motivated
by salary whereas this becomes of less significance when the employees become older. There
are also differences within the white-‐collar group that managers need to be aware of.
However, managers can take departure in general findings and look at the type of people they
employ, but they have to remember that people are different therefore what works for one
company will not always work for another.
5.6 Future Perspectives In this section future perspectives of research on motivation will be addressed. We will try to
provide our suggestion for what other theories could have been included in relation to this
study and address other aspects also relevant for employees’ motivation.
Concerning the theories chosen in this paper, we do find that they have all been useful.
However, Latham and Locke’s goal theory and Hackman and Oldham’s job characteristics
model could have been presented better in our questionnaire (as commented upon in section
4.4.1 Internal Validity). Still, it might have been useful to include other theories as well and an
example of this could be equity theory. Equity theory could have been interesting to address
as people being treated unfairly typically reacts very strongly as it is quite natural to compare
one’s own input and output with that of others (Pinder 2008). Furthermore, usage of equity
64
theory would have enabled us to estimate how important fairness is for both the blue-‐ and
white-‐collar workers.
In our limitation, we chose not to take leadership theories into account. However, combining
employee motivation with leadership could provide an interesting perspective of the study. A
really interesting theory in this relation could be Douglas McGregor and his idea that the
assumptions people make about one another becomes self-‐fulfilling prophecies (Pinder
2008). Furthermore, the impact of “what goes around comes around” is very important to
keep in mind when considering leadership and the way employees are motivated.
Perspectives relating blue-‐ and white-‐collar workers and their future in the Danish job market
might also be relevant to address as there is a tendency for outsourcing entire production
sections to countries with lower wage levels (Jürgensen 2011). In this relation it might be
relevant to investigate how to keep motivation high in the rest of the company if they are
experiencing outsourcing or cuts. Even though we addressed motivation of the knowledge
worker to a certain degree in this paper, it might be very relevant to focus even more on this
type of worker as they seem to become important for the Danish companies’ competition in
the future global market place.
Another factor, which would also be interesting to address, could be that of stress and the
concept work-‐life balance. Herzberg does consider the concept of work-‐life balance as a
hygiene factor and it was rated as one of the three most important aspects at an importance of
21.4% for the blue-‐collar workers and 30.3% for the white-‐collar workers. However, in
today’s technological world where e-‐mails and mobile phones makes it possible for people to
be reached all the time, the work-‐life balance is under constant pressure and therefore it
would also be interesting to address this factor even more (Hein 2009).
Furthermore, the concept of teams could have been investigated as motivation of the
individual compared to motivation of individuals in teams might be of great difference. It
would also be interesting to know whether there are differences in how you motivate teams
compared to the individual employee (Locke, Latham 2004).
Also, it could have been considered to look upon newer motivational theories such as
Cognitive Evaluation Theory (CET) and Self-‐Determination Theory (SDT) as these theories
65
provides new insights to motivation especially relating the fields of intrinsic and extrinsic
motivation. However, the above theories are still quite new, and are maybe not yet ready to be
used as stand alone theories (Pinder 2008). Still, the theories chosen in this study do show
signs of relevance despite their age, as they despite hard critique have survived for many
years.
6 Conclusion
The aim of this paper was to investigate how factors of work affect blue-‐ and white-‐collar
employees’ motivation as the motivational needs of the employees vary with the nature of
their work and skills levels. Based on changes in demography and increasing globalization,
there is a greater demand for productivity and high quality for companies to be competitive.
This competitiveness can be derived from having motivated employees; thus, paying attention
to the fact that motivational needs differ among various groups is therefore important.
The theoretical framework used to address this problem formulation consists of McClelland’s
achievement needs theory, Herzberg’s two-‐factor theory, Latham and Locke’s goal theory, and
Hackman and Oldham’s job characteristics model. These theories were chosen as they
complement each other well. Further, each theory gives different viewpoints of what
motivates.
The study was developed by use of quantitative methods in form of a questionnaire. The
questionnaire was given to employees in two different companies, Orskov Yard and
Systematic. Orskov Yard employs both blue-‐ and white-‐collar workers and Systematic only
employs white-‐collar workers. In order to analyze the responses, the statistical tool, SPSS, was
used.
Based on our analysis, we discovered that blue-‐collar workers found McClelland’s need for
affiliation to be most important, whereas the white-‐collar workers preferred the need for
achievement. This means that blue-‐collar workers value the social interaction with colleagues
and superiors more than a challenging job and personal responsibility, and more than the
power to influence and affect other people. White-‐collar workers, on the other hand, value a
challenging job and responsibility, and thus, this is how white-‐collar employees should be
motivated.
66
Both the blue-‐ and white-‐collar group did not value goal theory among the factors of greatest
importance, even though goal theory is considered one of the most dominant theories of work
motivation. A possible explanation for why our respondents did not choose goal setting could
be that it is already implicitly incorporated in their work. Also, one of the characteristics of
high achievers is that they are result-‐oriented, which also could be linked with goal theory.
Still, our sample of both blue-‐ and white-‐collar workers did not find goal theory important.
Concerning the five job characteristics mentioned by Hackman and Oldham in their job
characteristics model, it was found that the blue-‐collar employees generally valued all the
characteristics higher than the white-‐collar employees except questions relating to task
identity and task significance. It was very interesting that the white-‐collar workers valued the
task significance factor highly, however, this might be due to the large proportion of our
sample working for Systematic where they work with healthcare solutions, which can be
concluded to have a great deal of task significance. The only characteristic in which a
significant difference was found between the two groups relates to the feedback factor and
the fact that blue-‐collar employees value this factor more than white-‐collar employees.
Concerning autonomy, the blue-‐collar employees generally rated this of greater importance
than the white-‐collar workers. A possible explanation for this might be that the white-‐collar
workers, and especially knowledge workers, have a greater degree of autonomy in their work,
which might result in white-‐collar workers taking this characteristic for granted. One the
other hand, blue-‐collar employees might not have as much influence in the planning of their
work, which might explain why they consider autonomy of higher importance.
The last theory used in this paper was Herzberg’s two-‐factor theory, where it was found that
the blue-‐collar workers generally valued the hygiene factors of salary and company policy
higher than the white-‐collar group, whereas the white-‐collar workers valued the motivators
of sense of achievement, work itself, and recognition higher than the blue-‐collar group. The
fact that blue-‐collar workers actually are motivated by salary is contradictory to Herzberg
findings, and salary was chosen as one of the three most important factors by 71.4% of the
blue-‐collar employees. However, one might suppose that the reason salary was rated so high
by the blue-‐collar workers from Orskov, could be due the large amount of profit sharing they
have received in the last couple of years. Also, it is very interesting that it is mostly white-‐
collar employees who are motivated by the motivators, meaning they are attracted to being
67
motivated intrinsically, whereas blue-‐collar workers are more focused on extrinsic factors.
Another interesting finding was that blue-‐collar employees did not choose job security as an
important factor, despite increasing globalization and previously experienced layoffs.
In conclusion, we found that job type influences which factors of work serve to motivate
employees. Thus, these different factors of work are something managers and companies
need to be aware of in pursuit of increasing motivation among their employees.
68
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8 Appendices
8.1 Appendix 8.1: Questionnaire in English
We are two students from Aarhus School of Business who currently are writing our bachelor
thesis about motivation of employees. We would like to find out if there is a difference in the
elements that are motivating for respectively white- and blue-collar employees. It would
therefore be a great help for us, if you would fill out the questionnaire below. Thank you in
advance.
1. What is you gender?
2. What is your age?
3. What is your highest finished education?
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4. How are you employed?
75
Prioritize the following statements on a scale from 1 to 5, depending on how important the
statement is for you. 5 is very important and 1 is not important.
5. To be able to see measurable results in what I do
6. To feel that my manager recognizes my work
7. To be able to advice others within my work area
8. To be able to affect others to perform an extra effort
9. To have a good relationship with my manager 10. That we do something social together at the
workplace 11. To have a good relationship with my colleagues at the
workplace 12. To work towards clearly defined goals in my work 13. To have a specific plan of action for what to achieve in
my work
14. To have clear variation in the work I do 15. To be able to see the overall purpose in what I do 16. To have a feeling that what I do becomes a part of the
final result 17. That the work I perform has significance for my
company and our customers
18. That I can organize my own workday 19. That I decide how my tasks are carried out 20. To get direct and clear feedback on the work I
perform 21. To get specific information about the effectiveness of
my own work
76
22. What is most important for you at your workplace? (Put 1 mark)
The social connection with colleagues and superiors _________
To influence other people and events _________
To have a challenging job and a personal responsibility for the work _________
23. Which 3 factors give you the greatest motivation to perform an extra effort? (Put 3
marks)
Salary __________
Job security understood as e.g. stable surroundings and permanent employment __________
To have a good relationship with colleagues __________
That the job has prestige __________
That the overall company policy and administration functions well, meaning that there e.g. are clear lines of communication between managers and employees, and that the personnel policy works well ___________ To have a good relationship with my superiors ___________
That the physical working conditions and surroundings are satisfactory ___________
To have a good work-‐life balance ___________
The possibility to get better at what I do and acquire more skills and thereby experience a personal development ___________
That there is opportunity to use my skills and abilities fully ___________
Appreciation for the work I perform ___________
That the work itself is exciting and interesting ___________
The possibility to decide how my work should be carried out ___________
Possibility of being promoted ___________
Thank you very much for your time
Line Kirkegaard and Kristina Larsen
77
8.2 Appendix 8.2: Questionnaire in Danish Spørgeskema
Vi er to studerende fra Handelshøjskolen i Aarhus, som er ved at skrive vores bacheloropgave
omkring motivation af medarbejdere. Vi vil undersøge om der er forskel på, hvilke elementer der
virker motiverende for henholdsvis funktionærer og produktionsmedarbejdere. Derfor vil det
være en stor hjælp for os, hvis du vil udfylde nedenstående spørgeskema. På forhånd tak.
1. Hvad er dit køn?
2. Hvad er din alder?
3. Hvad er din højest afsluttede uddannelse?
4. Hvordan er du ansat?
78
Prioriter de følgende udsagn på en skala fra 1 til 5 alt efter hvor vigtigt udsagnet er for
dig. 5 er meget vigtigt og 1 er ikke vigtigt.
5. At kunne se målbare resultater i det jeg laver 6. At føle min leder anerkender mit arbejde
7. At kunne rådgive andre indenfor mit arbejdsområde
8. At kunne påvirke andre til at yde en bedre indsats 9. At have et godt forhold til min chef 10. At vi laver noget socialt sammen på arbejdspladsen 11. At have et godt forhold til mine kollegaer på
arbejdspladsen 12. At arbejde frem mod klart definerede mål i mit
arbejde 13. At have en klar handlingsplan for hvad jeg skal nå på
mit arbejde
14. At have en klar variation i det arbejde jeg laver 15. At jeg har muligheden for at se det overordnede
formål i det jeg laver 16. At have en fornemmelse af, at det jeg laver bliver en
del af det endelige resultat
17. At det arbejde jeg laver har betydning for mit firma og vores kunder
18. At jeg selv kan strukturere min arbejdsdag 19. At jeg selv bestemmer, hvordan arbejdsopgaverne
udføres 20. At få direkte og klar feedback på det arbejde jeg laver 21. At jeg får klar information om effektiviteten af mit
eget arbejde
79
22. Hvad er vigtigst for dig på din arbejdsplads? (sæt 1 kryds)
Det sociale sammenhold med kollegaer og overordnede _________
At have indflydelse på andre mennesker og begivenheder _________
At have et udfordrende arbejde og et personligt ansvar for arbejdet _________
23. Hvilke 3 faktorer giver dig den største motivation til at yde en ekstra
arbejdsindsats. (Sæt 3 krydser)
Løn __________
Job sikkerhed forstået som fx stabile omgivelser og fastansættelse __________
At have et godt forhold til kollegaer __________
At jobbet har prestige __________
At den overordnede firmapolitik og administration fungerer godt, hvilket vil sige, at der fx er klare kommunikationsveje mellem ledere og medarbejdere, samt at personalepolitikken fungerer godt ___________ At have et godt forhold til mine overordnede ___________
At de fysiske arbejdsforhold og omgivelser er tilfredsstillende ___________
Et godt sammenspil mellem arbejdsliv og privatliv ___________
Muligheden for at dygtiggøre sig og tilegne sig flere kompetencer og derved opleve en personlig udvikling ___________
At der er mulighed for at bruge mine kompetencer og evner fuldt ud ___________
Anerkendelse for det arbejde jeg udfører ___________
At arbejdet i sig selv er spændende og interessant ___________
Muligheden for selv at bestemme hvordan mine arbejdsopgaver udføres ___________
Muligheden for at blive forfremmet ___________
Mange tak for din tid
Line Kirkegaard og Kristina Larsen
80
8.3 Appendix 8.3: Statistical Framework for Analysis of Blue- and White-
Collar Workers
In order to find if there is any statistical difference between blue-‐ and white-‐collar employees,
we have performed statistical tests in SPSS. Normally, when applying hypothesis testing, one
goes through seven steps consisting of hypothesis, significance level, test statistic,
calculations, critical values, p-‐value and finally a conclusion. However, as we only intend to
show the general framework applied, we will only present the first four steps, and therefore
not comment on the critical values, the p-‐value, or the conclusion. The conclusion of the entire
analysis will be commented on in the analysis section of the report.
Statistical framework for questions 5-21
As the data generated from questions 5-‐21 are interval data, a t-‐test will be used to identify
possible differences between the blue-‐ and the white-‐collar group.
1. Hypothesis
H0: (µ1-‐µ2) = 0, the mean rating of the questions are the same between the blue-‐and white-‐
collar sample
H1: (µ1-‐µ2) ≠ 0, the mean ratings are not the same
2. Significance level α=0.1
α=0.05
3. Test statistic In order to find the right test statistic, we need to find out whether there are equal variances
between the two groups. We are therefore applying Levene’s test of variances and performing a
hypothesis testing within the actual hypothesis:
1. Hypothesis
H0:
€
σ 12 −σ 2
2 = 0, the variances of the two groups are the same
H1:
€
σ 12 −σ 2
2 ≠ 0, the variances of the two groups are not the same
81
2. Significance level
α=0.05
3. Test statistic
€
S12
S22 ~ Fn1−1;n2 −1
4. Calculations
By using SPSS we found that the only three factors that did not have variance
homogeneity was question 7, 10, and 12 as their p-value was below 0.025.
As we have now discovered that not all the questions had equal variances, two different test
statistics will be applied:
Test Statistic for questions with equal variance:
€
X 1 − X 2( ) − µ1 −µ2( )0
Sp2 1n1
+1n2
⎛
⎝ ⎜
⎞
⎠ ⎟
~ Tn1+n2 −2
Test Statistic for questions with unequal variance:
€
X 1 − X 2( ) − µ1 −µ2( )0S12
n1+S22
n2
~ Tv
82
4. Calculations
83
Statistical framework for questions 22 and 23
In these questions, we cannot perform a t-‐test as in question 5-‐21 as the data generated from
these questions are nominal and to perform a t-‐test, you need to work with interval data.
Therefore, we will perform a chi-‐squared test of homogeneity instead.
1. Hypothesis H0: the distribution of factor X is similar for the blue-‐ and white-‐collar employees H1: the distribution of factor X is not similar for the blue-‐ and white-‐collar employees
2. Significance Level α=0.1 α=0.05
3. Test Statistic
€
Fij − Eij( )2
Eij~ χ (r−1)(c−1)
2
j=1
c
∑i=1
r
∑
4. Calculations
84
8.4 Appendix 8.4: Statistical Framework for Analysis of Generations As the data generated from questions 5-‐21 are interval data, a t-‐test will be used to identify
possible differences within the white-‐collar group.
1. Hypothesis
H0: µ1= µ2 = µ3, the mean rating of the questions are the same between generation X, Y and BB
H1: At least two means differ
2. Significance level α=0.05
Even though we have used both a significance level 0.1 and 0.05 in the other calculations, we
will only perform the ANOVA analysis with a significance level of 0.05. This is due to the fact
that when analyzing between which of the three groups the differences are, we will construct
Bonferroni’s confidence intervals by using SPSS and this will be done with a 5% significance
level. Therefore, testing with a significance level of only 5% will make more sense in this
particular case.
3. Test statistic As we want to compare three means, we use the one-‐way analysis of variance (ANOVA) in
SPSS and the test statistic is the following:
€
MSTMSE
~Fk−1;n−k
85
4. Calculations
86
87
88
89
Statistical framework for questions 22 and 23
In these questions, we cannot perform a t-‐test as in question 5-‐21 as the data generated from
these questions are nominal and to perform a t-‐test, you need to work with interval data.
Therefore, we will perform a chi-‐squared test of homogeneity instead.
1. Hypothesis H0: the distribution of factor X is similar for generation Y, X, and BB H1: the distribution of factor X is not similar for generation Y, X, and BB
2. Significance Level α=0.1 α=0.05
3. Test Statistic
€
Fij − Eij( )2
Eij~ χ (r−1)(c−1)
2
j=1
c
∑i=1
r
∑
4. Calculations
90
91
8.5 Appendix 8.5: Statistical Framework for Analysis within the White-
Collar Group
Statistical framework for questions 5-21
In order to find if there is any statistical difference within the white-‐collar group among the
general white-‐collar workers and the knowledge workers a new dataset has been derived
from the old dataset. The new dataset entails only white-‐collar workers, and based on this
dataset we will use SPSS to analyze whether there is any differences in what motivates the
general white-‐collar workers and the knowledge workers. Normally, when applying
hypothesis testing, one goes through seven steps consisting of hypothesis, significance level,
test statistic, calculations, critical values, p-‐value and finally a conclusion. However, as we only
intend to show the general framework applied, we will only present the first four steps, and
therefore not comment on the critical values, the p-‐value, or the conclusion. The conclusion of
the entire analysis will of course be commented on in the discussion section of the report.
As the data generated from questions 5-‐21 are interval data, a t-‐test will be used to identify
possible differences within the white-‐collar group.
1. Hypothesis
H0: (µ1-‐µ2) = 0, the mean rating of the questions are the same between the general white-‐
collar workers and the knowledge workers
H1: (µ1-‐µ2) ≠ 0, the mean ratings are not the same
2. Significance level α=0.1
α=0.05
3. Test statistic In order to find the right test statistic, we need to find out whether there are equal variances
between the two groups. We are therefore applying Levene’s test of variances and performing a
hypothesis testing within the actual hypothesis:
92
1. Hypothesis
H0:
€
σ 12 −σ 2
2 = 0, the variances of the two groups are the same
H1:
€
σ 12 −σ 2
2 ≠ 0, the variances of the two groups are not the same
2. Significance level
α=0.05
3. Test statistic
€
S12
S22 ~ Fn1−1;n2 −1
4. Calculations
By using SPSS we found that all of the factors had variance homogeneity.
As we have now discovered that all the questions had equal variances, the following test statistic
will be applied:
€
X 1 − X 2( ) − µ1 −µ2( )0
Sp2 1n1
+1n2
⎛
⎝ ⎜
⎞
⎠ ⎟
~ Tn1+n2 −2
4. Calculations
93
94
95
Statistical framework for questions 22 and 23
In these questions, we cannot perform a t-‐test as in question 5-‐21 as the data generated from
these questions are nominal and to perform a t-‐test, you need to work with interval data.
Therefore, we will perform a chi-‐squared test of homogeneity instead.
1. Hypothesis H0: the distribution of factor X is similar for the general white-‐collar workers and the knowledge workers H1: the distribution of factor X is not similar for the general white-‐collar workers and the knowledge workers
2. Significance Level α=0.1 α=0.05
3. Test Statistic
€
Fij − Eij( )2
Eij~ χ (r−1)(c−1)
2
j=1
c
∑i=1
r
∑
4. Calculations
96
![INDEX [] · n.r.i questionnaire 3 keyman questionnaire with annexures 5 employer-employee scheme questionnaire 11 personal financial questionnaire 12 general occupation questionnaire](https://img.dokumen.tips/doc/110x75/5e7f0927f331ad3020486c35/index-nri-questionnaire-3-keyman-questionnaire-with-annexures-5-employer-employee.jpg)
