poor motivation of employees and lack of effective leadership

Psychology:

Project Management Body of Knowledge [PMBOK] (2011) posits that a project is considered underperforming when it fails to deliver what is required in line with expectations of cost, quality and time. Patience (1988), avers that despite advancements in project management methodologies, many projects continue to underperform due to a number of reasons including: poor motivation of employees and lack of effective leadership among others.

According to Patience (1988), motivation of employees is a basic enthusiasm about work and acts as an incentive to accomplish work. There is strong evidence suggesting that motivating employees at work place is a requirement for high productivity and employers should always strive to ensure that people who work for them always feel motivated. He theorized that employee motivation is the process that is set up to boost their morale by rewarding and acknowledging their effort (Patience, 1988).

Douglas McGregor (1964), one of the renowned gurus of management theory developed a philosophical view of mankind through his theory X and theory Y. He based his work on Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. He categorized the hierarchy into needs of lower order (Theory X) and needs of higher order (Theory Y). He stated that management could either use a set of needs to motivate their employees, but impressive results could be obtained by use of Theory Y, instead of Theory X.

Theory X holds that the role of management is to control and coerce employees. Theory X argues that employees have inherent dislike for work and can do anything to avoid work.

Theory Y holds that the role of management is to enhance the potential in employees by helping them to release their potential to achieve organizational goals. Theory Y avers that employees consider work to be interesting and enjoyable

References

McGregor, D. (1964). The Side of Human Enterprise. New York: McGrawHill.

Patience, M. (1988). Organizational behavior. New York: Sage publishers.