Employee Satisfaction

E mployee Motivation and Work
Satisfaction in a Public Enterprise'
Prayag Mehta

Data on employee motivation, work satisfaction, and
organizational climate were collected from a recently
nationalized public sector organization to study the implications of organizational variables for efficient working, with
particular reference to workers' participation in management.
While the managerialemployees showed strong motivation for influence and influence-backed motivation for
personal achievement, the workers showed strong motivation for social achievement backed by need for
personal achievement. The author feels that the patterns
discerned in the analysis are likely to create interpersonal
problems and conflicts, and would come in the way of
workers' participation in management.T he present study examines the implications
of employee motivation, work satisfaction, and
o rganizational climate for the functioning of
t he public sector enterprises with particular
reference to workers' participation in management. The data on employee motivation in a large
p ublic enterprise were collected with the help
o f a semi-projective instrument consisting cf a
s et of sixpictures. The subjects wrote stories
in response to each picture, following standard
i nstructions. The stories were analysed for
personal achievement motivation or need for
personal achievement (nPA), social achievement
motivation or need for social achievement (nSA)
a nd desire for influence (Inf) as well as for
the combination of these three motivations. Each
o f the six stories wasexamined for each of
the seven types of motivation, resulting in seven
total scores for each individual. Details of the
s coring system and certain conceptual issues
a re discussed elsewhere (Mehta, 1976a).

Employee Motivation
Prayag Mehta is Senior Fellow at the National Labour
I nstitute, New Delhi. He has been a visiting lecturer at
t he Harvard School of Education, a visiting faculty att he University of North Carolina, and a consultant to
t he UNESCO on Communication and Development.

Need for Personal Achievement (nPA): Need
for personal achievement or personal achievement motivation indicates desire for competing for personal success in relation to certain
s tandards of excellence. This is reflected in
desire for personal career development desire for
i mprovement inone's own life, desire for better
1. The author gratefully acknowledges the assistance of
M ahaveer Jain in this study.

Vikalpa, Vol. 2, MJ. 3. July
1977

223

education and better prospects for children, and
d esire for improving one's own work performance. In each situation, there is a personal
achievement goal. In the context of an organization, it could be reflected in theconcern for
career advancement as well as concern for
improving one's own performance. Conceptually
it is similar to need for achievement with somewhat different sub-categories.
N eed for Social Achievement (nSA): N eed
for social achievement or motivation for social
achievement is indicated by desire for some kind
of collective success in relation to some standards of excellence. It is indicatedby desire for
raising overall productivity and production, desire
f or national prosperity, desire for better life for
t he community, and desire for safety. These
desires reflect some kind of superordinate
achievement goals. In the context of an organization it may be reflected in desire for better
group performance and desire for overall human
resource and production development. Thediference between motivation for personal achievement and motivation for social achievement
e ssentially lies in the nature of achievement
goals. In the former case, the emphasis is on
one's own personal advancement/improvement,
while in the latter case the emphasis is on community/group advancement, improvement, or performance. This is similar to the concept of
group achievement motivation...