MOTIVATION AS A FACTOR INFLUENCING TEACHERS/LECTURERS PERFORMANCE.

Background of the study

Education has been recognized as the fundamental basis on which any nation could function effectively. Its socio-political and economic viability depends solely on the qualitative education given to her citizens. Any nation that wants to be recognized as a developed country must build its human resources firmly. Hence, a country is said to be technologically developed, if majority of her populace are well educated.

High quality teaching staff is the cornerstone of a successful education system. Many studies have associated motivational factors to enhance job performance, positive work values, retains loyalty and stability of organizations’ employees, increases creativity and active participation among employees, high level of employee motivation and lower rate of turnover and burnout.

Motivation comes from the Latin root word “movers” which means to move. So motivation can mean the process of arousing the interest of an individual to take a move towards certain goals.

Herzberg (1978), defines motivation as all those phenomena  which are involved in the stimulation of actions toward particular objectives where previously, there was little or no movement towards these goals. Waitley (1996), Defines motivation as an inner drive which prompt people to act in a certain way.

Motivation according to Otu (1999 pg 79), is related to morale, in that a person who is motivated would not only be enthusiastic in his job but also ask for extra work and undertake other functions on his own initiative. Also Uba (1990 pg 5), sees motivation as an individual urge, desire, tendency of striving to achieve a goal or fulfill certain needs.

Motivation  is an Internal and external factors that stimulate desire and energy in people to be continually interested and committed to a job, role or subject, or to make an effort to attain a goal.

Motivation results from the interaction of both conscious and unconscious factors such as the (1) intensity of desire or need, (2) incentive or reward value of the goal, and (3) expectations of the individual and of his or her peers. These factors are the reasons one has for behaving a certain way. An example is a student that spends extra time studying for a test because he or she wants a better grade in the class. Motivation is a psychological feature that induces an organism to act towards a desired goal and elicits, controls, and sustains certain goal-directed behaviors. It can be considered a driving force; a psychological one that compels or reinforces an action toward a desired goal. For example, hunger is a motivation that elicits a desire to eat. Motivation is the purpose or psychological cause of an action.

Abraham Maslow believed that to understand motivation at work, we much understand human motivation in general and he felt motivation arose from workers’ needs. These needs included: Physiological needs, safety needs, social needs, esteem needs, and self-actualization needs. He felt that if these needs were met with the worker their motivation would provide a workplace that enabled employees to fulfill their own unique potential and work to the best of their ability. He felt most of the world’s workers struggle all day simply to meet the basic everyday needs such as food, water, and shelter. These factors are considered lower-level needs in Maslow’s pyramid: hierarchy of needs. The lowest level of needs is physiological needs and these are the basic survival needs. Once these lower-level needs have been met, people can move on to the next level of needs, which are for safety and security. Safety needs is the need to feel secure at work and at home. Social needs is the need to feel loved, accepted, and part of a group. The next level of needs on the pyramid is esteem needs. This is the need for recognition and acknowledgement from others, as well as self-respect and a sense of status or importance. The last level is self-actualization. Maslow emphasized the importance of self-actualization, which is a process of growing and developing as a person in order to achieve individual potential. In the case study the employees aren’t working to their full potential and it seems they do not like their job since they are complaining about it. They are getting paid well but money is a poor motivating factor in the long term. Being able to enjoy challenging, responsible work is more important than increased pay. Motivation will come from the job itself. It’s up to the manager to develop a work place that is as rewarding for employees as possible. 

Likewise, other theories of motivation like, The expectancy theory, Mcgregor’s theory X and  Y  and others are imperative if  Teachers performance at work would be guaranteed.

 Orphlims (2000) is of the view that motivated teachers always look for better ways to do their teaching job, they are more quality oriented and more productive. Therefore, it means that motivated teachers are determine, to give, their best to achieve the maximum output (qualitative education).

Human relation school of thought recognizes workers as human being and should be treated as such. This implies bearing in mind constantly that the employee is more important than the  work itself, even though the work has to be done.

Motivation can be in the form of regular payment of salary, fringe benefits, such as allowances, bonus on the job training, promotion of teachers, provision of good working environment and improving the teachers’ general wellbeing.

Therefore, teachers’ motivation should be taken serious by the government in order to avoid strikes as experienced currently in our education sector as well as in other sectors of the Nigeria economy.