Equity Theory Motivation In The Supermarket Workplace

The problem in my workplace is High Turnover rates due to lack of raises, wages, and benefits in the supermarket. Waldbaums a supermarket chain I work for lacks motivation and needs a solution to this problem.

In many cases at my job (supermarket) many employees are not rewarded for there hard work nor have motivation for staying. Full-time employment is no longer, or rarely an option, and the part-time workers receive no more then twenty cent raises twice a year. In many cases there are employees that don't work nearly as hard as others and get paid the same and in a majority of the cases get paid more for a half days work. Therefore making other employees either quit or having them pursue other employment opportunities. All though many of the part-time workers are of the younger crowd many of them are trying to save some money for school and later quit after being there for a few months but, if there was some sort of incentive of helping them pay for school, while working , would definitely cut down the turnover rate. As it states in the text book under management quotes the one that best fits the situation is , " Everyone wants something for nothing they all want the big pay, nice benefits, and to work in a nice air-conditioned office, but they all don't want to work hard for these things.

In the terms of the Equity theory proposed by J. stacy Adams it focused on social justice. According to his model, behavior is initiated, directed, and maintained by the attempts of individuals to preserve some internal psychological balance. The Idea behind the equity theory is that people's perceptions and beliefs about the fairness of their treatment at work affect their motivation attitudes, and behaviors. In the situation of my fellow co-workers not working nearly as hard and receiving the same pay as myself. This is a fine example of in-equity. The equity theory is based on the notion that we compare the ratios of what we bring to a situation and what we get out of it. There are four main postulates to this theory. People strive to maintain a state of equity. They include when inequity is perceived, a state of tension results, when faced with this tension, people are motivated to reduce tension, the greater the magnitude of the perceived inequity, the greater the motivation to act to reduce the tension.

Some inputs can include abilities, effort, resources such as money or educational level. Although there is no minimum education to work at Waldbaums, many prior work experiences such as being able to work a cash register and to deal with cash draws is a fine example of a possible input. For the outcome perspective this includes wages, benefits, feelings of satisfaction, and anything that the employee receives from its inputs. For example a more experienced cashier might receive 25-50 cents more then an inexperienced one.

Employees can reduce perceived inequity in