Essay: EFFECTS OF MOTIVATION ON EMPLOYEES COMMITMENT IN THE WATER SECTOR

EFFECTS OF MOTIVATION ON EMPLOYEES COMMITMENT IN THE WATER SECTOR. A CASE STUDY OF NAIROBI CITY WATER AND SEWERAGE COMPANY LIMITED.
INTRODUCTION
Motivation refers to the urges, aspirations, drives and needs of human being directed to their behavior. In any organization the management has a duty to duly observe the employees’ attitude towards their commitment in achieving the organizational goals and objective. This means that giving a close attention on how employees can best be motivated through such means as fair remuneration, conducive working environment, training and development, involvement in decision making and good leadership. Important being, the work they do and the organization context within which they carry out their work in order for them (employees) to be more committed in their daily operations.
The success or failure of an organization is closely related to the effort and motivation of its employees. The motivation of employees is often the product of their commitment towards their job or career. Work commitment is an extremely important topic for organizations to understand. The level to which an employee engages in his or her work, commits to and believes in the organization’s goals and purpose, desires to work (work ethic), and commits to a specific career or profession can all have an impact on an organization. In today’s economy, where organizations are expected to do more with the scarce resources, it is extremely important for organizations to retain their highly productive employees. Allen and Meyer defined affective commitment as an emotional attachment to the organization such that the strongly committed individual identifies with, is involved in, and enjoys membership in, the organization (1990).
Finding ways to motivate employees has become a pressing concern for many organizations. Despite this, motivation still remains a big force that boosts behavior and it gives direction to behaviour, and underlies the tendency to persist (Bartol & Martin, 1998). For the goals of an organization to be realized, human resources, amongst the various factors of production, must be properly utilized. Hence, it is imperative for organizations to maximally utilize the various motivational factors, so as to generate the right attitude and morale from employees to generate the needed level of employee’s commitment for the attainment of the pre-determined objectives (Aborisade & Obioha, 2009).
Some employees are motivated by money. In fact, most are motivated by money; at least for their basic needs. Employee motivation through compensation can come in the form of raises, performance bonuses, commissions, profit sharing, or any number of “extra benefits” like, automobiles, vacations, or other tangible items purchased and used as rewards. If critically analyzed better pay will automatically impact on positive commitment and closely link to organizational performance. But until now there has been little or no empirical confirmation of this widely held belief. This proposal provides such confirmation. Interviews with a range of stakeholders in the Cambodian government, including central government personal, educational administrators, and school teachers and principals it revealed that pay was either most important, or at least a highly significant factor influencing employee’s commitment and it either adversely affected job performance or led to dissatisfaction with the employees.
There is close or strong correlation between leadership and employee commitment in that where the style of leadership applied is supportive in its application employees are more devoted in the execution of tasks and thus job commitment. It therefore imperative for the leaders to maximally utilize various leadership style so as to generate the right attitude and morale from employees to generate the needed level of job commitment. For employee to be satisfied, Parker (2001) suggested that there are three basic characteristics of a ‘motivating’ job; it must allow a worker to feel personally responsible for a meaningful portion of the work accomplished, it must provide outcome which have intrinsic meaning to the individual, and lastly it must provide the employees with feedback on the work performed, this is important to a worker’s level of satisfaction and job commitment.
In the organizations, employees often tend to do as they perceive the situation demands they should. Previous studies have suggested that an employee’s perceptions about an organization and his/her work environment may impact levels of interest in developmental activities within an organization (Hackman and Oldham, 1980; Weick, 1979; Maurer et al., 2003). In order to increase efficiency, effectiveness, productivity and job commitment of employees, the business must satisfy the needs of its employees by providing good working conditions. The objective of this research proposal is to analyse the effect of working environment on employee commitment.
Training provides necessary skills, knowledge and ability to perform the job properly. Recent studies on this topic claim that organizations that are concentrating more on training and development produce improved financial results and their employees grows their skills and knowledge to better perform their jobs. Progression in their skills will lead them to enhance their productively and subsequently will complete their task so on time and therefore their efficiency will increasingly lead to job satisfaction and commitment which this study aims to analyze.
The research proposal will be carried out at the Nairobi City Water and Sewerage Company Limited (NCWSC) which is a subsidiary of Nairobi County Government incorporated in December 2003 under the Company’s Act, Cap 486 of the Laws of Kenya. The mandate of the Company is to provide clean water and sewerage services to the residents of Nairobi County, in a financially sustainable manner and within the Government regulations. The City has an estimated population of 3.8million and projected to grow to 4.5 million by 2019. The 2002 Water Act brought about reforms in the Water Sector that were aimed at facilitating access to clean water and sewerage services to all Kenyans. The reforms saw the creation of regional Water Boards which were tasked with the responsibility of overseeing the operations of water and sewerage/sanitation utilities in their respective areas of jurisdiction, besides major asset development. The Company is also ISO 9001 certified to ensure the consumers on the quality management systems adopted within the Company.
The Company has developed vision, mission and core values as guide to assist in accomplishing its main objectives and targets;
Vision – To be a world class provider of water and sewerage services, Mission – Providing reliable quality water and sewerage services in an environmentally friendly manner that delights customers within Nairobi City County, Core Values – Accountability, Teamwork, Integrity, Customer focus, Commitment, Creativity and innovations and Professionalism.
This case study will strive to establish the effects of motivation on employees’ commitment at Nairobi City Water and Sewerage Company Limited focusing on the employees working at the Company’s Headquarters which has a workforce ranges between 250 to 300 employees’ distribution in various departments.
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