Motivational methods in China: a study across chinese private and public sector

Abstract

Motivation is the inner drive that directs a person’s behavior toward goals. It is the inner desire to do the best possible job and to make the greatest effort in performing an assigned task. Consequently, low employees’ satisfaction, poor motivation and the loss of labor force can have a negative effect on the daily operations of the enterprise. This is the reason why motivation plays a fundamental role in Human Resources Management. In order to better understand and to improve motivation process, many motivational theories arose during the 90’s. As many studies report, the satisfaction of wants and needs of an employee is strictly related to the values and the culture of a person. However, researches of motivation for employees were focused on companies in the U.S. and Europe. When China opened up for foreign investors, much was unknown about its culture and about what were the main morale and values of Chinese people, as a consequence, what could have motivated employees was unknown too. Motivational theories, based on western cultural situations, didn’t actually apply to Chinese/Asian cultures, that’s why new researches in this area began to rise. The aim of this thesis is to analyze the importance of culture in motivation, focusing on Chinese society. First, we will focus on the importance of motivation in Human Resources Management and how it affects the outputs of the enterprise, then we will focus on the interdependence between Chinese culture and motivational methods applied in Chinese firms, and we will make a focus on motivational methods adopted in public and private sector in order to understand the preferences of the new Chinese generation.