Motivational Theories in Healthcare

Motivational Theories in Healthcare
Introduction: Role of Motivational Theories in Healthcare
Lack of a motivated workforce is one of the impediments to the achievement of the millennium development goals in the context of healthcare. This is due to a lack of motivation among health care workers and especially in low and middle-income generating countries leading to poor provision of healthcare. There is a loss of clinical staff and this further cripples the health care system, which is already fragile due to insufficient workforce (Dieleman & Harnmeijer, 2006).
The lack of motivation among the health workers is as a result of inability by the health service managers to meet the needs of these health workers. It is, therefore, necessary that health service managers develop the appropriate mechanisms to retain and motivate health care workers. Health service managers need to understand the various theories that govern the motivation of health workers to work to ensure their motivation and retention in the workplace (MHEN & VSO, 2011). This paper will discuss why it is essential that health service managers understand what motivates health worker by looking at their needs with the help of various motivational theories.
Motivational Theories in Healthcare: Discussion
According to Deci and Ryan (2000), motivation is the impetus drive to do something. There is sufficient evidence to support the fact that workers’ performance is highly dependent on the level of motivation by the workers (Garcia-Prado, 2005; Rowe, 2005; Marsden, French & Kubo, 2000; Vroom, 1970). Different theories have been put forth to argue out the fact that the motivation to work is governed by various needs, which if not satisfied de-motivate workers to indulge in productive work and efforts.
Motivational Theories: Maslow’s-Hierarchy of Needs Theory
Abraham Maslow proposed the Maslow’s-Hierarchy of needs theory that outlines five universal needs as the main motivating factors for people (Dolea & Adams, 2005; Zurn et al., 2005). One thing to note with Maslow’s hierarchy of needs is that a lower must be significantly fulfilled before moving on to the next higher need on the hierarchy. His hierarchy of needs theory ranks the needs based on their level of influence on human behaviour as indicated in the figure below (Maslow, 1954):
 
To start with, there are physiological needs, which are considered to be the lowest-level needs and include needs such as food and water. When these needs are not satisfied in a person’s life, a driving/motivating force is created and it seeks to achieve these needs. When a person is hungry, this person develops a felt need that gives rise to psychological and physical tensions, which can be realized by the person’s overt behaviour aiming to reduce such tensions that result from the need to eat. After the person gets something to eat, the hunger and the resulting tensions are reduced. This is applicable in the case of a health worker who has various physiological needs, which motivates the health worker to continuously provide health care to patients. This way, he/she would get paid after his/her services hence can meet his/her physiological needs (Benson & Dundis, 2003).
When a person’s physiological needs are satisfied, they move on to the next needs, which according to Maslow’s hierarchy of needs are the safety. Safety needs include needs for shelter and security. Safety and security needs entail the desire for “security, stability, dependency, protection, freedom from fear and anxiety, and a need for structure, order, and law” (Hughes et al., 2002). Safety and security needs by health workers translate into a need for employment security and as such will stop at nothing until they are assured for continued employment.
Health workers will, therefore, engage in high levels of effort and productivity so that they do not lose their jobs. Subsequently, social needs are next and entail the need for belongingness and love. In the workplace, health workers aim at satisfying their social needs through interacting with colleagues, superiors and subordinates. The ability to work with others in peace and establish good working relations motivates the workers to put all their efforts to work because peace and good working relations with other workers define good working conditions (Benson & Dundis, 2003).
Once social needs have been met, there is the need to satisfy workers’ ego and esteem. The workers seek to achieve “self-respect, self-esteem and esteem of others” as intrinsic components of the esteem need (Dieleman & Harnmeijer, 2006). Also, there is an external element of the esteem need and it entails the need for “reputation, prestige, status, fame, glory, dominance, recognition, attention, importance, and appreciation&