MGT302 Organization Behavior and Teamwork

MGT302 Organization Behavior and Teamwork

Assignment Overview

As in some of the other assignments in this course, you will draw upon your personal experience for this Module 2 Case Assignment. For the assignment, you will consider the topic of telecommuting and motivation. You will prepare a blog entry that discusses your own experience and applies the background material to the prospect of becoming a telecommuter.

For an overview of some important current issues in telecommuting and working remotely please read:

Peck, E. (2015, March 18). Proof that working from home is here to stay: Even Yahoo still does it. Huffington Post. Retrieved from http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/03/18/the-future-is-happening-now-ok_n_6887998.html

Case Assignment

In the background materials, you read about some very traditional theories of motivation such as Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs and Herzberg’s Two-Factor Theory. There is sometimes a challenge in applying these theories.

Begin with some personal reflection. Consider a time at work when you felt highly motivated. Apply Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs and Herzberg’s Two-Factor Theory to your situation. Think about what motivates you personally. Can you apply Maslow’s and Herzberg’s theories to yourself? For this assignment, you will discuss these ideas in a hypothetical situation in which you are offered the opportunity to work remotely, that is, telecommute to your job.

For this Module 2 Case Assignment, you will prepare a blog entry with the title:

My company has offered me a chance to work remotely. Should I telecommute? How can I stay motivated working from home? If I decide to work from home, what can my company do to help me stay highly motivated?

Your blog entry should discuss the following:

• What motivates you?
• How do Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs and Herzberg’s Two-Factor Theory explain your own and other employees’ motivation?
• How can employees remain highly motivated when telecommuting? What can they do to motivate themselves? What can the company do to motivate telecommuting employees?
• Will you become a telecommuter? Why or why not?

What is a blog assignment? A blog is like a conversation between you and the world. It is like having a conversation just with yourself, too. In this particular blog, you are given questions that you are to respond to in your blog (conversation). Like a regular essay assignment, your blog entry will have cover and reference pages.

Your blog entry should be the equivalent of a 3-page paper. Also, be sure to use in-text citations and a reference list, with at least 2 scholarly references for support. You can write the blogs in first person since the assignment is not an essay paper. For administrative purposes, please add a title page so that your assignment can be readily identified. Each entry should have a heading to separate it from the next entry.

Note: A URL (website address) is NOT a reference. A reference always contains four parts: author, publication date, article title, and the source of the article. Sometimes there is no author, but the APA manual tells you what you can put in that spot instead. The source for a high-quality peer-reviewed journal article is the journal!

Upload your assignment to the Case 2 Dropbox. Be sure to review your TurnItIn Originality report. If the score is over 20%, you may not be writing in your own words and you will need to contact your professor and arrange to revise and resubmit your assignment.

Assignment Expectations

The Case papers in this course will be evaluated using the criteria as stated in the Case rubric. The following is a review of the rubric criteria: 

• Assignment Requirements: Does the paper directly address all aspects of the assignment? Have the assignment instructions been followed closely?
• Critical Thinking: Does the paper demonstrate a college level of analysis, in which information derived from multiple sources has been critically evaluated and synthesized in the formulation of a logical set of conclusions? Does the paper demonstrate that the student has read, understood, and can apply the background materials for the module?
• Writing and Assignment Organization: Is the essay logical, well organized and well written? Are the grammar, spelling, and vocabulary appropriate for college-level work? Are section headings included? Are paraphrasing and synthesis of concepts the primary means of responding, or is justification/support instead conveyed through excessive use of direct quotations?
• Use of Sources and Mechanics: Does the paper demonstrate that the student has read, understood, and can apply the background materials for the module? If required, has the student demonstrated effective research, as evidenced by student’s use of relevant and quality sources? Does the student demonstrate understanding of a consistent (e.g., APA) style of referencing, by inclusion of proper citations (for paraphrased text and direct quotations) as appropriate? Are appropriate sources from the background material included? Have all sources cited in the paper been included on the References page?

Required Reading

Alanis Business Academy. (2012, August 11). Maslow’s hierarchy of needs [Video file]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wx3qR3gLh60. Standard YouTube License.

Alanis Business Academy. (2013, February 9). Frederick Herzberg’s two-factor theory of motivation [Video file]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UB2wiubO0fM. Standard YouTube License.

Organizational behavior. (2017). Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota Libraries Publishing Edition. Retrieved from http://open.lib.umn.edu/organizationalbehavior/. CC BY-NC-SA License.

Read the following sections in Chapter 5:
Section 5.2 Need-based theories of motivation
Section 5.3 Process-based theories

Read the following sections in Chapter 6:
Section 6.3 Motivating Employees through Goal Setting
Section 6.5 Motivating Employees through Performance Incentives

Peck, E. (2015, March 18). Proof that working from home is here to stay: Even Yahoo still does it. Huffington Post. Retrieved from http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/03/18/the-future-is-happening-now-ok_n_6887998.html

Optional Reading

Luthans, F., Luthans, K. W., & Luthans, B. C. (2015). Chapter 6: Motivational needs, processes, and applications. In Organizational behavior: An evidence-based approach. Charlotte, North Carolina: Information Age Publishing.
Available in the Trident Online Library. (Go to Additional Library Sources under the search box, then choose EBSCO eBook Collection, type in Luthans Organizational Behavior in the Summon search box; check book/ebook on the left.)

MGT302 Organization Behavior and Teamwork