Life Stories of Recent

MBAs: Motivations

Section 2
Group: F2

Brendon Mascarenhas
Arpit Sharma
Sanjog Das
Rudra Singbal
Amrit Saikia
 In the case: Life stories of recent MBAs: Motivations, we develop different perspectives of motivation
and learn what motivates different people from different backgrounds. Careful analysis helps us to map
motivation on the framework of belief, values, perception, attitude and behavior. In the goal theory we
learn that values and belief lead to gal formation which in turn drives behavior. This can be illustrated in
the diagram given below.

Intension to Behave Experience

Beliefs
Past
Experience Perception Attitude Behavior Consequences
Values

Motivation Environment

In the story of Monica Chi, we find the common yet insurmountable talk of pin pointing what exactly
motivates employees and drives them to work at their full potential. Drivers of motivation are different
for different people and her manager generalized money as her motivation however this didnt motivate
Monica. Using McGregors theory, the boss assumed Monica to be an X employee i.e. money to be the
primary motivation and she naturally dislikes work. However, Monica was a Y employee and challenges
at her work motivated her more and she was an employee who enjoyed work and was self-motivated.
Monica as a person has a need for achievement(nAch) from the McClellands need theory. We can make
this observation as she takes up goals of moderate difficulty to be assured of achieving them. In this case
she talks of breaking down tasks and achieves them one at a time. She was also extrinsically motivated
to get into HBS as this would make her parents (external factor) proud. The tools that can be used to
motivate her are: Job design, this is more concerned about the type and challenge of her work as
compared to other motivators. Barriers to motivate Monica would be: attitude towards employees, as
her boss would motivate her by money and not by challenging work.
The life story of Ann Gildroy, a U.S. marine in the Iraqi war we see Maslows theory of need hierarchy at
work. Their primary needs were to cope with difficulties of not having water and bathrooms
(Physiological needs). They would protect themselves from attacks from the opposition (safety needs).
Only after these needs were fulfilled would they use the little money they had left and provide for the
inhabitants of the place they were in (belongingness need). This act of motivation by changing the lives
of people also highlights her need for affiliation (nAff) as seen from the McClellands need theory. This
story shows us that safety (Job dissatisfiers) is a hygiene factor which is usually taken for granted,
however in this case, the absence of safety resulted in Ann having moments of sadness. After her
hygiene factor of safety was fulfilled her motivator of helping the people of Iraq was the factor that gave
her satisfaction. In her story all her motivation was intrinsic motivation. Adams Equity theory postulates
that people prefer input and output to be equal. In Anns case, her brother Colin would put in hard work
however did not achieve the desired results. This created dissonance for Ann and it motivated her to
work harder. The barriers to motivation in this story would be not meeting hygiene conditions. As seen
in the case, lack of safety led to her depression.

Jaime Iricks motivation was to help others. This is an intrinsic motivation which drove him to help
others at an earlier age rather than helping others only after one is old. Using Vrooms expectancy
theory, we find that expectancy: working hard results in better performance to help others.
Instrumentality: better performance can lead to outcomes of increasing people enjoying life. Valence:
people enjoying life fulfills the desire of helping others in some way. His fianc helped him in setting his
goals and this is the application of goal theory in action. Once a goal is defined it helps to focus our
attention, plan our effort and help in better achieving the goals. His fianc helped him take a closer look
at his emotions, values and helped him in clearly defining his goal which motivated him to achieve it. His
tool for for motivation was goal and support to achieve goals.

Sachin Jain was brought up in a family that started various initiatives that reinforced her family culture
of giving back to the society. Thus, as he was growing up, the values, emotions, beliefs were
instrumental in her setting her goal of giving back to society which motivated her to do the same. This is
the crux of the goal theory. The Banduras social cognition and self-efficacy theory posits that individuals
act in a particular way because he hears and observes actions by others in the society. This cognition of
observing his family members take initiatives to start things motivated Sachin to start the debate team
in his school. This behavior displays the need for power (nPow) from McClellands need theory as he
desired to influence and achieve goals and he wanted to be indispensable when he works.

Alex Mandls motivation was to help people in difficult situations. This behavior illustrates that this is a
case of Y framework as he was a person who enjoyed his work and thrived under situations of
complexity and challenge. As he enjoyed working on problems which others neglected, he was a clear
case of a Y framework under McGregors X and Y theory. Under McClellands need theory, we see that
he was a need for achievement(nAff) as solving(achieving) complex problems were his primary
motivation.

Daniel Salvadori was motivated to make a difference in peoples lives. In McClellands need theory, we
observe that he has a need for affiliation(nAff) as one of his motivators was meeting new people. From
Banduras social cognition and self-efficacy theory, Sachin is inspired by grandfather emphasis on
learning, Sachin became motivated to learn. Her cognition of her grandfather constantly enquiring her
learning influenced her and eventually motivated her. This is also a case of intrinsic motivation

In conclusion, we have analyzed what motivates individuals through real life examples under different
circumstances. We analyzed the types of motivation(intrinsic/extrinsic). Each life story illustrated
different content theories of motivation and also process theories of motivation. The tools and barriers
to motivation were also looked at. We observed that in all these cases, self-motivation was a key factor
in their motivation and they were all Y framework under McGregors X and Y theory.