Complacency is an issue that has been plaguing human progression more and more in recent history than ever before. It is now all too often to find someone with a boring, repetitive job, or a low end, non-respected job, who is content with doing what they do for the rest of their lives because they are too lazy to improve themselves or their position in society. Becoming complacent can happen to anyone, all it takes is losing sight of long term goals and ceasing to embody the spirit of youth. When we are young, we are filled with ambition and an urge to achieve anything that we put our minds to. But as we grow up, some people lose that fire inside inspiring them to seek out and attain their goals. Endeavoring to retain the spirit of youth is the most effective way of avoiding becoming complacent, but how likely you are to become complacent can also greatly depend on who you are, and how you are motivated.
Complacency: Plaguing Business Productivity
Complacency is an issue that has been plaguing human progression more and more in recent history than ever before. It is now all too often to find someone with a boring, repetitive job, or a low end, non-respected job, who is content with doing what they do for the rest of their lives because they are too lazy to improve themselves or their position in society. Becoming complacent can happen to anyone, all it takes is losing sight of long term goals and ceasing to embody the spirit of youth. When we are young, we are filled with ambition and an urge to achieve anything that we put our minds to. But as we grow up, some people lose that fire inside inspiring them to seek out and attain their goals. Endeavoring to retain the spirit of youth is the most effective way of avoiding becoming complacent, but how likely you are to become complacent can also greatly depend on who you are, and how you are motivated.
Merriam-Webster’s dictionary defines complacency as self-satisfaction, especially when accompanied by unawareness of actual dangers or deficiencies. The real problem with complacency is that it brings you to a lull, and makes you okay with doing no better. Complacency makes you feel “good enough”, and there is no such thing as good enough. In business, complacency is the absolute death of improvement. Strive to do better every single day, and never become okay with average. Far too often, workers will not have their needs met, and not be able to excel, and end up falling in to a complacent depression where their drive to be promoted and be more successful slowly dries up and is replaced by boring, monotonous, nearly robotic repetition that hurts productivity.
Let us say that there are two workers. Both holding the same degree, from the same university, overall the same variable. The two workers will get an equal amount of work done, be equally as creative, and so on. However, say that one of the two workers is placed in a work environment that is unfavorable to his work style. Slowly, but surely, after not being in a conducive work environment, the worker will begin to lose any spark, any drive, any creativity at all. Meanwhile, the other worker who was placed in a helpful work environment, that plays to his strengths and caters to his weaknesses, will continue to perform well and be productive. This situation happens all too frequently when supervisors neglect to take into account the work styles of their different employees.
Complacency is most prevalent among workers who have not achieved self-actualization. There are nineteen traits that Maslow used to define a self-actualized person, and if one does not meet the criteria, they are not self-actualized, and in turn, not as successful and more likely to become complacent. If not constantly rewarded, workers who are not self actualized will become lazy and unmotivated. The complete theory of motivation and achievement can be used to explain how reactions and outcomes will influence the worker. Oftentimes, workers who have not reached actualization will begin to feel irrelevant and like they cannot make a difference. Lastly, those who have not already achieved the first four levels of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs will be unable to try and self-actualize
Maslow declared that there are nineteen traits that define what a self-actualized person consists of. These traits are a clear perception of reality, acceptance, spontaneity, problem-centered, solitude seeking, autonomous, having peak or mystical experiences, human kinship, humility and respect, ethical, sense of humor, creativity, resistance to enculturation, imperfections, and values. People who have all of these traits can maximize their potential. In short, “the need for self-actualization is "the desire to become more and more what one is, to become everything that one is capable of becoming."”[1] Those who are not able to accurately perceive reality may become disillusioned with what they need in life, and may end up daydreaming and fantasizing about the life that they want to the point where they have to resort to alcoholism to feel okay with their lives. A man without a clear perception of reality may end up drinking until they may vicariously live their dream life through a drunken state.[2] In addition, having spontaneous inward thoughts and outward behavior that conforms to rules and societal norms whilst remaining open and unconventional was noted to be a large part of a self-actualized person. A self-actualized person is problem-centering, which means that they possess a moral and ethical code that results in the individual trying to solve problems outside of their own realm of issues. Helping others and the world around them are a large part of being problem-centering. Autonomy, or the need for privacy and solitude, is also helpful. If someone is personable and works well with others, and communicates well but prefers to be alone, they may well be partially self-actualized. Complacency can also be explained as exhaustion with a life that oftentimes repeats itself. Becoming bored or tired of seeing the everyday world is the mark of an individual who is becoming complacent. Self-actualized individuals see every day with a fresh set of eyes, and are continually surprised and awestruck by normal occurrences.[3] Realizing that an individual may satisfy all or most of these traits will help separate those who will rarely become complacent from those who are prone to it.
David McClelland’s Motivational Needs Theory[4] explains the three different types of workers present in today’s workforce, and how they are motivated. The three types are the people motivated by achievement (n-ach), the people motivated by authority and power (n-pow), and the people who are motivated by affiliation (n-affil). N-ach are motivated by achievement, which is to say that achieving realistic goals and advancing themselves career-wise are what keeps them from becoming depressed and complacent. The n-ach has a strong need for feedback and approval, and must have a sense of accomplishment to remain motivated. The n-pow is motivated by a need for authority, and has an underlying urge to be influential, effective, and make an impact. Their ideas need to prevail, and they need to be a leader to retain their spirit. Increasing n-pow’s personal status and prestige will also keep them motivated. If n-pow happens to fall into a position where their ideas are discarded or they are not respected, they will likely become distraught and gain complacency. Finally, n-affil is a worker who seeks out affiliation and friendship with others, and interaction with others keeps them motivated best. N-affil needs to be liked by their peers and have social interaction to avoid complacency and depression. They work best in teams, and are more helpful in situations where they can join with others to be productive. The n-ach is the least likely to become complacent, because achieving goals is more important to them than material or financial success. Praise and recognition are less important to n-ach than to n-pow and n-affil. N-achs are constantly seeking out ways to be more productive and efficient, and only rely on feedback to be reliable and factual, so that they may use it to judge their productivity and as a means of judging how to improve.
In an Attributional Theory of Achievement Motivation and Emotion by Bernard Weiner at the University of California at Los Angeles[5], Weiner deduces a solid equation that can predict how individuals are affected by different decision. More often than not, when an outcome is positive, the individual is happy. Likewise, when the outcome is negative, the individual will be frustrated and sad. This outcome may be expected, unexpected, positive, negative, unimportant, or important. Specific other information regarding causal antecedents about the situation will lead to the worker’s motivation, shown in the diagram to be either achievement based or affiliate based. Achievement motivated individuals’s causal ascriptions may include things like ability, effort, strategy, and luck. The antecedents of the affiliate motivated individual include physical traits, personability, availability, and so on. Achievement motivated individuals are more positively affected when their pride and self esteem are strengthened, and recognizing their accomplishment will bring them hopefulness, whereas not recognizing the individuals success or failure will bring them hopelessness, since they strive to be acknowledged. Affiliate-motivated people are much more emotional, as Weiner’s research showed that they exhibited shame, guilt, and anger when their ideas were not successful and were only gracious and relaxed if their ideas were successful.
Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs[6] is one of the most referenced pieces of literature in psychology. The very bottom layer of the pyramid suggests that the most basic human needs are physiological, and necessary for survival. These needs include things like air, food, water, and sleep. To move up on the pyramid, all of these needs must be met. Once basic survival needs have been met, an individual strives for basic safety, such as shelter, security, or safety. These bottom two levels of Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs can be defined as basic human needs. Once these have been attained, psychological needs begin to come into play. A sense of belonging, and love, and friendship arises and the individual seeks out life partners through friendship and intimate relationships. After an individual’s sense of belongingness and love has been met, they can begin to satisy their esteem. Also psychological, this level of the pyramid points out the need for prestige and a sense of accomplishment, something that the achievement and power motivated workers held in very high regard and found absolutely imperative to success.[7] Once all other needs have been met, the need for self-actualization and self-fulfillment can begin to take form. An individual may become complacent at any point in the pyramid if they feel they can not achieve any higher. One who begins to feel they have climbed as high as they can on the pyramid, and will never find security, or friendship, or love, or prestige, or accomplishment or even one who achieves some but not all of the elements of self-actualization can become complacent.
So, now that we have deduced the causes of complacency, we can begin to pursue a solution. The overall easiest way to view a solution to complacency is to avoid it in the first place. By understanding your employee’s worker type, their motivation, and how they are affected by criticism, affiliation, recognition, and affiliation, you can alter your treatment of them to best suit their motivation. A worker who is achievement motivated should be praised for their actions and their work, so that they will feel motivated to continue pursuing higher accomplishments. A worker who is motivated by power should be given an important sounding, even if meaningless, title that will make them feel as though they are necessary and important. Power motivated workers should be promoted but monitored carefully to make sure there is no abuse of authority. Keeping power motivated workers in command, and giving them authority will help them avoid complacency. Affiliation motivated workers should oftentimes be given group tasks, and must have friendship and social interaction to avoid becoming depressed and complacent. Complacency is easy to avoid if you are a motivated leader and may strive ever to attain self-actualization for yourself. It takes a motivated leader to be able to motivate others. During the orientation process of new employees, have a test performed to see what kind of workers they are. Take into account the type of worker they are when placing them into teams, giving them certain tasks, and awarding them certain promotions. Rather than eliminating workers who have already become complacent, you may seek to instead motivate them out of it. Doing motivation tests on all current employees may help aid in boosting productivity. If a worker is complacent and does not appear to be able to change and become motivates, release them and trim the fat. Simple questions to test for self-actualization will reveal whether the worker in question has avoided complacency, and also determine how close or far away a worker may be from complacency. At the end of the day, it is in the hands of the leader to motivate the followers, and knowing your worker’s niches, how they work, how they are motivated, and so on will be able to not only boost production but lead to a better and more enjoyable workplace.
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[1] Maslow, Abraham Harold, Robert Frager, and Ruth Cox. Motivation and personality. Eds. James Fadiman, and Cynthia McReynolds. Vol. 2. New York: Harper & Row, 1970. p.3
[2] Sinha, Jai B. P. Culture and Organizational Behaviour. Los Angeles: SAGE, 2008. 217-19. Print.
[3] Wahba, M.A. & Bridwell, L.G. (1976). Maslow reconsidered: A review of research on the need hierarchy theory. Organizational Behavior and Human Performance , 15, 212–240.
[4] D. C. McClelland. (1961). The Achieving Society. Free Press, New York
[5] Weiner, Bernard. "Achievement and Motivation Theory."Theories of Motivation; from Mechanism to Cognition. Chicago: Markham Pub., 1972. N. pag. Print.
[6] Maslow, Abraham. Abraham Maslow: The Hierarchy of Needs. Corby: Institute of Management Foundation, 1998. Print.
[7] Maslow, Abraham H. Motivation and Personality. New York: Harper, 1954. Print.
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