HOW TO MOTIVATE EMPLOYEES IN THE IT INDUSTRY

Transcription

1 HOW TO MOTIVATE EMPLOYEES IN THE IT INDUSTRY ABSTRACT, E-BOOK 2017

2 LIST OF CONTENTS Introduction Specialists about motivating developers - desk research Best practices - how do tech giants do it A survey on motivating people in IT Conclusions Sources 02

3 INTRODUCTION APPCHANCE Poznan, Poland INTRODUCTION ABOUT THIS E-BOOK This text focuses on motivating employees in the IT industry, with a special emphasis on developer positions. While researching the subject, we focused on 3 main areas: expert opinions, good practices from the biggest technological companies and primary research. We ran a survey with 195 participants working in IT. Our goal was to determine the most common factors which influence motivation, and then to examine their importance. Thanks to that, we managed to create this e-book, which serves to help you manage your team and raise the efficiency. Particular chapters gather the most important thoughts in the form of bullet points. We hope that the collected views will come in handy when you choose and adapt an adequate management strategy in your company. ABOUT THE AUTHOR Appchance is a software house specializing in building mobile and web apps, IoT solutions, API and CMS systems. The company designs high quality digital products for startups, corporations, big brands and advertising agencies from all over the world. Thanks to connecting good technical competencies and soft skills, Appchance has been helping its clients for 6 years to develop their business by using new technologies. 03 MOTIVATIONS MOTYWACJA MOTYWACJE PRACOWNIKÓW OF IT INDUSTRY Z EMPLOYEES BRANŻY IT IT

4 DESK RESEARCH SPECIALISTS ABOUT MOTIVATING DEVELOPERS DESK RESEARCH Motivating your employees is the basis for achieving good results by your company, so economists and psychologists have created dozens of motivation theories so far. Despite that, there are many convictions which don t apply to modern professions. When it comes to those which are marked by the level of specialization and complexity, the carrot and stick method doesn t do the trick. RECENT PUBLICATIONS CLEARLY SHOW THAT SIMPLE PUNISHMENT AND REWARD ARE JUSTIFIED IN THE CASE OF UNCOMPLICATED, REPETITIVE ACTIVITIES. On the other hand, when creative work is required, such motivators slow one down and negatively affect quality. In the case of the IT industry, which is characterised by a high degree of specialisation, the dynamics of change, innovation and creativity, the Self Determination Theory, which talks about three types of motivators (competence, autonomy and relatedness), can be applied. Competence refers to achieving better results in one's field and increasing one's effectiveness, autonomy refers to the level of decision-making within the tasks performed, while relatedness relates to the sense of belonging to a given group and building interpersonal relations. By analyzing the statements made by individual IT professionals, we can see that the recommended team motivation techniques often confirm the assumptions of the Self Determination Theory. 04

5 DESK RESEARCH Dan Pink's lecture the Puzzle of Motivation is also a good source of knowledge on this topic. It describes this theory, somewhat modifying it - social bonds are replaced with a purpose (sense of a mission), that is, performing tasks that are important to the employee. We can therefore see that internal motivators are the main source of good results. Most of the factors affecting a team's effectiveness depend on the soft skills of the management staff. MANAGERS AND TEAM LEADERS INCREASE THEIR FOCUS ON CLEAR COMMUNICATION, WHICH IS TO BECOME THE CORNERSTONE OF EFFECTIVE COOPERATION. We can therefore see that technical knowledge is the basis for doing the work, while soft skills contribute to its full use and to achieving better results. By observing the IT market and by looking at available sources on the web and publications on best practices employed by leading businesses, we can see that the management of a team of developers increasingly relies on the motivators mentioned above. That is why we have attempted to identify the practices recommended by the experts using a classification that takes into account the Self Determination Theory. So we have looked at the available sources one by one and summarised them in the table using short nominal sentences. Each module contains an abstract of the articles, with hyperlinks at the end of this e-book. 05

6 DESK RESEARCH Focusing on the most aspects, when managing results of a developer team, you need to take care of: recognizing the developer s competences and adjusting the tasks accordingly, clear communication of requirements and ways of verifying results, ensuring the right work conditions (friendly atmosphere, feeling of support, respect), options for promotion - establishing goals and path of career development, work/life balance - ensuring the appropriate ratio, adequate compensation, additional benefits, e.g. health insurance, learning and development opportunities - providing seminars, training sessions, support from Senior Developers, stimulating creativity - brainstorming sessions, participation in hackathons, clear and understandable communication - listening to your team and having development meetings, giving feedback about the work and progress to individual members of the team, providing conditions for innovation, e.g. work place and time flexibility, accepting employees ideas and justified assertiveness, solidifying information about the project among all team members, setting the example for employees, playtime during breaks (e.g. fussball or table tennis) Verifying the subject of motivating employees, you need to mention the results that it brings. Efficiency is the resultant of the employee s motivation and skills. So, influencing either motivation or the competences of an employee, we alter their efficiency and, subsequently, the results the company achieves. The efficiency can thus be stimulated by raising the employee s qualifications or applying appropriate motivators. Knowing general research on motivation and verifying individual employee preferences, we can raise our efficiency as a manager. 7 EFFICIENCY = motivation x skills 09

7 BEST PRACTICES BEST PRACTICES HOW DO TECH GIANTS DO IT Theories are a good basis for choosing the directions that will be taken by a company. However, they won t give the full picture of how to implement particular rules, i.e. research findings, to create a functioning mechanism in a company. Thus, we looked at the tech giants, famous for their well-developed system of employee nurturing and having advanced employee management mechanism, to see how they do it. We summed them up in a short way: 1 Google 8 the main, HR, mission of the company is to create the happiest, most productive space for the employee. Google implements systems that are supposed to make the communication and knowledge distribution easier and ensure a sense of belonging in the company. The methods used by the company are e.g.: democratization of knowledge: a forum, on which the company answers 20 most popular questions each Friday, a culture based on feedback: numerous surveys, manager evaluation, tools for sharing your thoughts, transparency and inspiring trust through sharing information; passing the board s presentation to all employees, giving the rank: 30-minute meetings, where you can discuss interesting matters with a founder, freedom in managing your own time: choosing the place your work from, and managing your relax breaks (massage, gym, others), flexibility: the employees have the chance to choose projects they want to participate in, passing decision making: the 80/20 rule, where the employees can spend 20% of their time working on what they like (during this time, most of the innovations come to be), fun activities as part of the regular work (e.g. breaks for physical activity), nice extras for the employees - special restaurant and cafe, inspiring office design, tracking the progress: the percentage of project completion, and a two-year deadline for each project. 10

8 SURVEY A SURVEY ON MOTIVATING PEOPLE IN IT In June 2017, we conducted a survey on 195 IT employees on motivating and demotivating factors at work. We created an online survey whose main purpose was to verify job motivation and satisfaction among developers and people working closely with them. The survey questions were selected on the basis of desk research by verifying expert articles on motivation in IT field (look at previous chapters). More than 80 % of participants were developers (programmers). The graph below gives a detailed account of the subject group. 1What is your position? 82,05 % of participants were developers, 8,21 % constituted Other, other groups were project managers (3,59 %), team leaders (3,08 %), graphic designers (2,05 %) and testers (1,03 %). 100% percentage of people 80% 60% 40% 20% 0% Developer Other Project Manager Team Leader Graphic Designer Quality Assurance Specialist positions source: Appchance 13

9 SURVEY 6Demotivating factors on a scale from 1-5 A 5-point scale was used as well to analyze the demotivating factors. Its purpose was to identify the parameters which do not demotivate and those which are strong demotivators. RATINGS OF DEMOTIVATING FACTORS ON A SCALE FROM 1 TO 5. (1 IS A WEAK DEMOTIVATOR AND 5 A HIGHLY DEMOTIVATING FACTOR) 80% weak demotivator strong demotivator 70% 60% percentage of people 50% 40% 30% 20% 10% 0% lack of additional benefits no promotion possibilities unpaid additional hours no clear information what to do lack of competency of the manager too much of workload no support in team lack of trust from the manager demotivating factors source: Appchance no feedback form the manager lack of appreciation of my work unpleasant atmosphere interruptions work not connected with my core activities when someone tells me how to do my job Unfriendly atmosphere was identified as the strongest demotivating factor by nearly 67 % of participants. Next, unpaid extra working hours were chosen by 61,54 %. Lack of clear information on what to do and shortage of skills among managers who lead projects were also seen as demotivating. The least demotivating factor were perks, which 20 % of participants gave a mark of 1. 18

10 SOURCES SOURCES [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] [8] [9] [10] [11] [12] [13] pid st 30&#entry

11 DO YOU LIKE SHORT VERSION OF THE E-BOOK? DO YOU WANT TO KNOW MORE? Download full version DOWNLOAD APPCHANCE ul. Jana Matejki 46/5, Poznań contact@appchance.com