Motivating Employees Case Study Essays Example

1. To be competitive in this fast changing business environment, organizations need to manage their resources effectively. Human resources, being one of the most valuable assets of an entity are no exception, and consequently, employees should be treated with the utmost handling and management. One of the biggest challenges faced by a manager is keeping employees highly motivated to ensure a high level of performance and productivity. Accordingly, the SAS Institute has developed an excellent employee motivating system making it one of the best companies to work in America.
A company’s motivating practice is a key factor that keeps the loyalty and high productivity of its employees. How SAS Institute attracts and retains top talent in the software developing industry is dependent on how it motivates its employees. Being a billion dollar industry, one can speculate that SAS financially rewards its employees considerably; however, it is the company’s way of treating its employees that won it the accolades of businesses and groups in this industry. Financial rewards are important, but the resilient driving factor that motivates employees to work harder for an entity is the happiness or enjoyment during their stay with the company. SAS demonstrated how it values its employees’ contributions and talents by creating ways for them to be able to contribute to the company. For instance, while it could be easier for SAS to purchase companies that have already an existing and developed product, the entity chose to develop these products internally. SAS knew that this is an interesting work and would encourage the creativity of the employees in developing successful products. The success of an employee and the importance given to it by the company serves to increase their self-esteem and drive to perform better.
2. One among the many factors that sets SAS Institute different among other employers is its practice of motivating employees intrinsically. Intrinsic motivation encourages positive attitude or behaviour for the sake of enjoying a task at hand. The drive to perform better comes from the pleasurable experience and the sense of fulfilment in being able to satisfactorily completing a task. At SAS Institute, there are several factors that contribute to intrinsic motivation; these are the meaningfulness of the work, the freedom to be innovative, ability to prove one’s competence and the sense of progression in ones work or career.
Employees at SAS found meaning in their work by creating software solutions that they knew can greatly influence the way of doing business globally. It is the culture of SAS management to convey to its employees that the company is relying on their creativity in advancing the cause of their business. For instance, the organization emphasized their belief to the ability of their employees by choosing to internally develop their products instead of opting for the easier choice of purchasing. By trusting in the ability of its employees, their people were encouraged to exert higher levels of effort as they become determined to deliver SAS the highest quality of software solutions for business. As SAS employees are continually motivated and inspired at work, they are able to prove their competence and this leads to the sense of satisfaction and pride on being able produce high quality results. The feeling that the employees are achieving progress in their work gives them the confidence to be able to do better at work. Their career growth in the company is also another motivation why they choose to stay. SAS was able to keep jobs interesting to employees by encouraging them to change jobs within the company to keep them attracted in their jobs and avoid becoming uninterested.
3. Extrinsic motivation is a driving factor that encourages certain behaviors that are associated to being compensated with material or social compensation. It is SAS Institute policy to allot over 20% of its annual revenue to help it withstand economic weakening. This is a part of its program of taking care of its employees even during times of recession. The employees tend to perform better with a company that can be relied upon to be there despite occurrences of economic downturns. This is another highlight of the SAS experience; the management being innovative enough to have retained its employees despite other technology companies who laid people during the recession from 2007 to 2009.
In addition to being assured of a continuous job, SAS employees are driven by various extrinsic motivational factors. The employees are fairly rewarded with pay and bonuses in accordance to their performance. What makes it enjoyable to work at SAS is the fact that each employee has their own offices letting them have sense of independence in their work. SAS employs the most innovative and creative of people, and the management knew that they needed the freedom provided by their own offices to bring forth innovative ideas.
The SAS employees do not only receive remarkable work and financial rewards but also benefits that include the well-being of the employees and their families. For instance, the SAS Institute offers the low-cost child care facilities, summer camp and subsidized cafeterias where employees can have lunch with their families. Even the location of their headquarters speaks of a well thought and employee friendly environment with atriums overlooking hills and excellent artworks on the walls. These are just among the incentives that come with being an employee of SAS. Though these perks sum up to a considerable amount, it always showed a net positive result through the employees’ drive to do better.
4. Accordingly, SAS today is as focused if not more focused than before. It is the SAS philosophy to add value to their customers and in ensuring that the employees understand how their efforts can contribute to the long term goal of the company. Interestingly, SAS management has gone to a great extent to let its employees knew how their contributions are being valued by the company. It is the main concern of the leaders of SAS to support and help their employees become successful in their careers and in return, leaders who showed the utmost importance employees are rewarded in return. It is a helping community at SAS, with employees who can be trusted to promote the welfare of the organization and leaders who advocated support for the employees in return.
The long term focus of SAS motivates its employees to perform better in their jobs. With the company’s policy to become an improved software provider, it would naturally maintain its way of inspiring its employees to perform at their best. SAS has always the advantage that other technology based companies don’t have: it is lacking the power of the shareholders in the decision making processes. As a result, the management can focus more in what is more important, that is of being the best software technology provider. This company has already proven itself in its people oriented approach of managing. It is people oriented in a way that it can go as far as to provide the best customer experience, while ensuring great rewards to its employees who are keen at producing excellent results.