Motivate Employee free essay sample

Question 1 (30 marks) Read the case below and answer the questions that follow: Case: Is this any way to motivate employees? Click Commerce Inc. is a diversified software company whose solutions help manage and improve the business processes of multiple industry segments including, aerospace and defence, high-tech, logistics, manufacturing, healthcare, and e- commerce. Its Service Network Solutions division is the leading provider of software that locally manages and globally optimizes complex service networks across an xtended enterprise, including logistics and inventory. The companys solutions enable organizations to monitor materials flow in real-time and adapt quickly to changes, resulting in cost savings, faster customer service and a competitive advantage. Click Commerces offices are similar to other dot. com businesses † casual attire (normally Jeans and t-shirts), white boards everywhere for employees to write or sketch on, and an entertainment room with three pinball machines and six Daytona 500 simulators. The Chicago-based company was originally founded in 1996 as Click Interactive, Inc. We will write a custom essay sample on Motivate Employee or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page but changed its name to Click Commerce in December 1999 to better reflect its focus on the business-to-business e-commerce market. The CEO, Michael Ferro, one of the Top 40 Entrepreneurs under 40, has led the company through the difficulties of an Internet start-up to a successful initial public offering of stock in June 2000. However, his approach to motivation can be described as a bit unusual because it involves taking employees out of their normal work environment and equiring them to do something completely different as a form of punishment. Ferro believes that an occasional kick in the pants is good for employee motivation. He has created what he calls the penalty box for his programmers who are burned out or who act overly cocky. In reality, this is a temporary assignment † from a few weeks to a few months † in the companys sales department. While those chosen may see such a stint as a penalty, Ferro focuses on the positive † it gives isolated rogrammers new experiences and broadens their responsibilities. The punishment part of the box is that all salespeople, including programmers on temporary assignment, are required to wear professional business attire at all times. For programmers who are used to wearing the more typical Jeans and T-shirt, wearing suits and ties is somewhat humiliating. In addition, most programmers, who enjoy their insulated lifestyle, dont relish giving up the cloistered existence of working full-time on their computer and instead of writing oftware they have to call on customers. Put it in other words, they are acting as salespeople. This isnt easy for people who are used to interacting with a computer and who have chosen this profession to a large degree because of the Jobs independence and isolation. Although there is a stigma attached to being temporarily assigned to sales, some of the programmers do acknowledge the value of the assignment. For example, Jim Heising, admits he gained some valuable insights into customers while forced to