CC BY
68Journal of Siberian Federal University. Humanities & Social Sciences 3 (2012 5) 423-429
y^K 316.354
Professional Self-Actualization as the Basis of Employee Loyalty
Marina B. Perfilyeva*
Saint-Petersburg State University of Engineering and Economics 27Marata st., Saint-Petersburg, 191002 Russia 1
Received 4.11.2011, received in revised form 11.11.2011, accepted 18.11.2011
The main issue of the labour content development is the employee loyalty. This issue is closely related to the possibility of employee professional self-actualization. Specific character of the current labour activity consists in the fact that the process and result of the high quality work less depends on both compulsion and direct stimulation, and is more determined by the system of social conditions that ensure the labour humanization. It is precisely general system of social conditions and quality of career development that affect employee loyalty, which is the basis of employee self-actualization in the professional activity.
Keywords: professional self-actualization, employee loyalty, social conditions in the organization.
Point
Socio-economic changes that have happened in recent decades in our country have contributed to fundamental changes in the field of personnel management. Russian leaders have actively used the achievements of scientific management of human resources, built on the experience of successful West companies. Instead of command-administrative and ideological relations in the new Russian enterprises there are conditions for the formation of partnership based not on a tight subordination and total ideological control, but on the spirit of a unified team.
However, in modern world there is a burning problem of lack of employees' integrity, or disloyalty to the administration in particular, and the organization as a whole. This complex phenomenon is associated with the change of entire
* Corresponding author E-mail address: pmb05@list.ru
1 © Siberian Federal University. All rights reserved
system of social relations in the country that has led to dynamical increase of the level of workers claims: an increase in their demand for payment, environment and conditions of professional activity, their demand for generation of new ideas about the level and quality of life. Unwillingness of the organization management to face new realities is leading to the workers disloyalty. In most organizations today there is disharmony between the high level of technical equipment and unacceptably low level of employee interest in effective and high quality work. Distinctive feature of the modern paradigm of the whole complex of social and labour relations lies in the fact that general enterprises strategies can not be implemented without ensuring the interests of employees who are able and willing to work with high working efficiency. Providing of working
conditions that contribute to the realization of employee initiative and the actualization of personal aims in professional activities is a condition for the organization success and contributes to the achievement of its strategic objectives.
In addition to that, socio-labour relations in the organizations are able to provide the labour humanization and quality of working life, but they need to be coordinated and adjusted by the state and local government and trade unions. Therefore, such an adjustment should be based on social partnership principles. Due to these principles there is possible synergy in solving various economic and social problems, improving democracy, ensuring social stability, achieving consensus amongst all parties regarding major characteristics of economic and social sustainability. All these processes go beyond social and labour relations in the organizations.
Methodological basis for the development of mechanisms applied to employee loyalty management are the theories of motivation. Accordingly, system of payment, compensation or bonuses based on the current theoretical concept provides organizations with the rise of employee motivation to work productively, efficiently and with interest - to work loyally.
The concept of "motivation" is very complex and polysemantic, it has the variety of meanings and senses that explain the human motivation for activity. The complexity of the phenomenon and its polysemanticism serve as a prerequisite for the formation of different approaches to understanding the concept of "motivation". Today at least three well-established approaches can be identified: psychological, sociological and managerial approaches. Every approach, pursuing its scientific goals, has different level of abstraction and empirical content.
Psychological approach focuses on study of the individual inner life, therefore the psychological specificity of the concept of "motivation" involves searching of the personal determinants both of human activities and self-actualization.
Sociological approach to the motivation study is based on "interpretive" sociology, theory of social action, and follows from the fact that on the one hand, person is motivated by certain aims and values, and on the other hand, person is a social being, oriented by the expected behavior that is regulated by well-known rules. In general, the distinguishing feature of sociological approach to the motivation is study of social characteristics (aims, values, norms, patterns, etc.) of social activity.
Managerial approach considers motivation as one of the most important management functions (along with the organization, planning and control): "Motivation is the process of stimulating someone (individual or group of people) to work for the sake of organization aims. Motivation is necessary for a productive execution of planned work"(Mescon, p. 384). This applied approach is focused on the research of management tools for employee motivating in labour activity.
Considering the existing approaches, it should be noted that they do not exist in pure form. Quite natural tendency of sciences to integrate determines the particular approach that aims to motivate people in labour activity. This approach that synthesizes achievements of general sociology, economics, psychology, management and other sciences is management sociology approach.
Management sociology approach is considerably based on the achievements stored during the evolution of the theory of labour motivation. Today two main directions of this theory have already been established and recognized: procedural and need theories. Every
theory based on the up-to-date achievements of the various branches of science has contributed to the theory and practice of motivation. Both approaches have made it possible to understand the process of motivation as a complex multidimensional phenomenon in its various aspects:
Empirical prerequisites for the formation of need theory were practical experiments carried out in the 30s by Elton Mayo, Mary Parker Follett and others. As a result of this experiment it was established that human behavior during the work process is determined by different needs. Need theory of motivation is represented by the concepts of A. Maslow, D. McClelland, F. Herzberg, K. Alderfer and others. These concepts in whole and from different sides study human needs, their structure, nature of functioning and mechanism of forming of human incentives.
Intellectual stimulus for procedural theory of motivation was given by Kurt Lewin's "Force Field Theory" (the 1930s). "Force Field Theory" described factors of external (environment) and internal (subject) situation that affected human behavior. In contrast to need theories, that analyze needs and factors that determine human behavior, procedural theories of motivation (V. Vroom's "Expectancy theory", S. Adams' "Theory of justice", Porter-Lawler's theory) study the specific conditions (internal and external) that affect certain type of behavior.
Example
Thus, motivation is a set of internal and external driving forces that encourage people to work and determine work direction and forms. Motivation is characterized by two parameters that determine direction and intensity of activity. The first parameter indicates the degree of individual initiative realization and the second parameter focuses on the degree of personal interest actualization.
In general, «initiative» and «interest actualization" parameters involve four points:
• the first point - violence;
• the second point - manipulation;
• the third point - non-action (virtue);
• the fourth point - self-actualization.
With an ideal coincidence of parameters
person gets the opportunity to fully demonstrate initiative and satisfy personal interests. This is exactly the phenomenon of self-actualization. On the contrary, if person is deprived of the opportunity to realize the initiative and actualize own interests, person will conduct work activities just under external pressure and violence. Violence is the logical opposite of self-actualization. In the most general form violence is «the use of different forms of coercion by individual or social group against other individuals or social groups in order to obtain or retain economic and political domination» (Naletova, p. 310). The essence of violence, emphasized Russian classic, is the suppression of initiative, "violence is the usurpation of free will" (Guseynov, p.36). In its extreme expression violence against an employee may be used in the form of physical coercion. But violence can also be used in relatively «soft» forms - in the forms of economic and psychological coercion. Distinctive feature of "physical" coercion is the complete suppression of human initiative, while the "economic" and "psychological" coercion may include some elements of the "initiative" and "actualization of personal interests". Moreover, "economic" and "psychological" coercion may include different number of such elements. In some cases, "violence" can be transformed into its opposite - "the perfect motivation". Therefore, there are no rigid boundaries between these two points. A.I. Prigozhin emphasizes that the implementation of human management includes coercion, because it is necessary to overcome the well-known "hesitation" of human behavior in
the organization and give this behavior business precision (Prigozhin, p.62).
Initiative degree may be different, because person can be extremely initiative, but does not realize own interests. It occurs when person takes false interests as personal interests, i.e. acts under the influence of deception or manipulation. "Manipulation" like "the ideal motivation" encourages people to take quick actions that do not involve actualization of personal interests. On the one hand, in this case, manipulation is characterized by high level of personal initiative, on the other hand, by low level of actualization of personal aims. Manipulation as well as violence is the ancient way of the initiation of human work. During the thousand-year history mankind has accumulated a large arsenal of manipulative techniques (substitution of purpose, indoctrination). The most common techniques are described in the book written by H. von Senger (von Senger).
The logical opposite of "manipulation" is the phenomenon, in which the initiative is insignificant, but actualization of personal interests is extremely high. In the most general sense, the "non-action" (or "virtue" in the Russian tradition) is the switching of human physical activity and initiative to the energy of moral self-restraint to the natural flow of the world laws. This is the third point of above-defined parameters.
We have considered three points that are determined by the motivation parameters. They include limiters of human activity. In one case it is violence as an obvious and rigid form of restriction of human activity, in the other case it is manipulation that not obviously, but rather severely restrict human interests, and non-action (virtue), as a special form of limiter, that differs from the other two not in external limits, but in self-limiting.
Special phenomenon among above-defined phenomena is the "perfect motivation", that reveals
"initiative" and "actualization of interests" in a detailed way. Therefore, "perfect motivation" can be understood as "self-actualization". However, in current practice, this ideal is unachievable or difficult to achieve. Initiative and employee personal aims are often limited by the regulations and objectives of the organization.
Considering that there are no rigid boundaries between above-mentioned points (violence, manipulation, self-actualization, non-action), it should be taken into account that there should be a transition area between them. Distinctive feature of this transition area consists in the fact that sometimes person for various reasons does not show the initiative and does not actualize own interests. It is possible in the case when person consciously rejects the whole thing in order to get a part of another one. In the general sense it is a transaction or compromise. For example, an employee can hold his initiative, being aware of the fact that it will be the condition for the realization of his personal interests. Or vice versa, an employee can act in the initiative and self-sacrificial way, being aware of the fact that his personal aims will not be achieved. In all these cases, the employee consciously rejects one thing in order to get another one. So it is possible to talk about the transaction (the compromise) as a buffer area between four points. It must be stressed that the transaction is a typical, common form of motivation in the industrial age. People sell own work in exchange for various benefits, that provide their lives.
The idea of "self actualization" has become popular in science because of humanistic psychology, where it is understood as the development and implementation of individual potential. The most popular and detailed theory of self-actualization is devised by A. Maslow, who defines self-actualization as a main human need. Maslow marks it out of other needs and points out that it is not exactly a need, because instead of
consumption it has the efficiency (Maslow calls it a personal growth). Despite the current prevalence of self-actualization's type of personality (1% of the total number of people), Maslow believes that the need for self-realization is not exceptional, it is typical for most people. In his opinion, the highest specific personal features, such as love, creativity, etc., lie in human nature as possibilities that can be actualized under the influence of social conditions. However, social and cultural environment often suppresses the desire for actualization by certain norms. Therefore, in order to make individuals seek realization of their potential in a full way, the society should develop conditions for their self-actualization (Maslow, p. 201).
Thus, self-actualization is the process of implementation of personal interests, creativity, desire for development, the ability to be responsible and independent. Self-actualized person shows such behavior features, as responsibility, independence, democracy and goodwill in the relationships, the desire for development. There is no doubt that self-actualization involves the inner work of self-knowledge and understanding of own capabilities and abilities, interests and aims, self-awareness of own activity, the search of real values, but, above all, the realization of the personality and own interests through involvement in work that is valuable for the person and loyalty to this work.
An important part of the self-actualization process is a professional self-actualization, that lasts for the whole life and represents an important process of finding and simultaneous self-realization in a particular profession, the implementation of individual interests and creativity in professional activities, and also shows an attitude to the profession, that is expressed by loyalty to this work, desire for achieving possible perfection in the chosen field of work. A. Maslow believed that "self-actualized people are involved
in any work without exception... They are devoted to this work, it is something very important to them - it is a kind of vocation" (Psychology of personality, p.110). Professional self-actualization is the process of implementation of individual interests and creativity in professional activities, development of professional competence and use of own potential to benefit of the organization.
Problem of professional self-actualization is especially urgent in current economy, when work conditions and standards are rapidly changing, employee independence and responsibility are growing during the work process, there are special requirements for professional competence, for the interest in the process and work results. Under these circumstances, the need of organizations to have loyal employees is evident. Employee loyalty should be revealed through ability to actualize and mobilize personal and professional potential for the successful solution of professional problems.
Resume
With the theory of humanistic psychology, analysis of the concept of self-actualization by A. Maslow and studies of modern psychology and management sociology, it is possible to determine the following indicators of professional self-actualization, that act as the basis of employee loyalty:
1. professional competence, that can be regarded as a specific ability to respond and the readiness to solve effectively both typical and unusual issues and difficulties that can arise in real situations of productive activity. Professional competence involves not only knowledge of the professional activities rules and application skills, but also improvement of the quality of work by developing an optimum strategy and tactics;
2. importance of professional activity for an individual (characterized by the extent to which interest in the professional activity exceeds the
interest in the profession as a tool to meet the needs of the individual);
3. adequate professional self-esteem as a real awareness of own professional capabilities and understanding of the need for professional growth;
4. striving for professional growth, personal development (the need for professional training, raising the level of skills, making a career and achieving professional success);
5. responsibility for the result and work process as well as initiative as the ability to make decisions independently. Awareness of oneself as a subject of professional activity means awareness of own responsibility and own role in setting objectives, developing aims, choosing the activity techniques and getting the final product. It is also important to be aware of own individuality during the activity;
6. quality of professional work, that is revealed in the process and result of work (Maslow emphasized that desire for doing well something that you can do is a sign of self-actualization);
7. mobility is the ability to adequately perceive and respond to the environment changes. Mobility is an important indicator of self-actualization in the profession and is based on the self-confidence and faith in the surrounding world. At the same time mobility is a factor of adapting to innovative changes;
8. work satisfaction is an important indicator of professional self-actualization.
Today the problem of professional self-actualization as the basis of employee loyalty is developed in terms of defining subjective and objective factors of personal actualization in the profession, motivating staff and solving the problems of professional selection and training.
The main tendency in the development of work content that affects the specificity of modern
staff loyalty consists in the fact that the process and result of the high quality work less depends on both compulsion and direct stimulation, and is more determined by the system of social conditions that ensure the labour humanization. General system of social conditions that affects employee loyalty and motivation for self-actualization in professional activity is defined in the concept of working life quality and the labour humanization.
The concept of working life quality establishes the direct link between the level of labour productivity, degree of human self-realization in the professional activity and satisfaction of personal needs in the enterprise. The idea of "working life quality" itself describes the working conditions in the aspect of the most efficient implementation of staff abilities and represents an integrative indicator that includes several different indicators, e.g. quality of work place, content of work, bonuses, the employees of the enterprise, senior management of the enterprise, the state of social partnership in the organization, career, social guarantees, etc. Thus, working life quality is determined by the whole set of work activity conditions that characterizes the state of working conditions and work safety, guarantee of the psycho-physiological opportunities compliance with the employee workplace, the degree of every employee participation in organization management, etc.
The whole set of parameters of working life quality is rather large and depends on the economic development of society, ideology and economic well-being of the organization. Capabilities and objectives of different organizations may differ quite significantly, but every organization can form a certain set of favourable social conditions that can ensure the employee loyalty and act as factors of professional self-actualization.
References
Бессокирная Г.П. [G.P. Bessokirnaya] Динамика ценности и мотивов труда рабочих (20032007 гг.). // Социс. 2010 № 2. С. 56-63
Бессокирная Г.П. [G.P. Bessokirnaya] Мотивация труда и отношение к нему рабочих// Социологический журнал. 2005. № 4.
Гусейнов А.А. [A.A. Guseynov] Понятие насилия и ненасилия. // Вопросы философии. 1994. №6. С. 36.
Гусейнов А.А. [A.A. Guseynov] Философия России второй половины ХХ века (материалы «круглого стола»). // Вопросы философии. 2011. №4. С. 6.
Зингер Х.фон. [Harro von Senger] Стратагемы. О китайском искусстве жить и выживать: В 2-х тт. М.: Эксмо, 2004.
Курбатова М.Ф., Апарина Н.Ф., Коган Е.С. [M.F. Kurbatova, N.F. Aparina, E.S. Kogan] Выбор работниками способов защиты своих трудовых прав // Социс. 2009. №7. С.48-60 Маслоу А. [A. Maslow] Мотивация и личность. - СПб: Евразия, 1999 Мескон М. Х., Альберт М., Хедоури Ф. [M.H. Mescon, M. Albert, F. Khedouri] Основы менеджмента. - М.: Дело, 2007.
Налетова А.Д. [A.D. Naletova] Насилие // Российская социологическая энциклопедия. - М.: Инфа-М, 1998. - С. 310.
Пригожин А.И. [A.I. Prigozhin] Современная социология организаций. - М.: Интер-пресс, 1995.
Пригожин А.И. [A.I. Prigozhin] Качество целей // Общественные науки и современность. 2010. № 1. С. 114-125
Психология личности [Psychology of personality]: Тексты. - М.: МГУ, 1982.
Профессиональная самоактуализация как основание лояльности работника
М.Б. Перфильева
Санкт-Петербургский инженерно-экономический университет Россия 191002, Санкт-Петербург, ул.Марата, 27
Основная проблема в развитии содержания труда - лояльность персонала. Эта проблема тесно связана с возможностью профессиональной самоактуализации работника. Специфика современной трудовой деятельности заключается в том, что процесс и результат качественного труда в меньшей мере зависит и от принуждения, и от прямого стимулирования, а в большей мере определяется системой социальных условий, обеспечивающих гуманизацию труда. Именно общая система социальных условий, качество трудовой жизни влияют на такую лояльность работников, которая служит основанием их самоактуализации в профессиональной деятельности.
Ключевые слова: профессиональная самоактуализация, лояльность работников, социальные условия организации.
