Motivation in Arcedia Marketing

Established in Bristol, 1997, by Richard Jellard, Arcedia Marketing Limited is a direct marketing company with 17 offices branched across England.

Their major clients are ADT Alarms, Amerada Gas & Electric, charity link, Selling Scottish Power Gas and Electricity (bill paying customers) and NestMakers Gas and Electric (token meter users) selling to the residential consumers. The Birmingham branch, which is the largest office within the Scottish power division, is the focus of this investigation. The branch currently has 21 employees. Due to the nature of the business, the number of employees is determined by the time of year.Apart from the administration staff, everyone is paid on commission. Arcadia prides itself for aiming producing leaders instead of salesmen; allow everyone the same equal right to become future managers.

The aim of this research paper is to investigate the work place motivation which could be a barrier to effective communication. (See Appendix 1 for the definition of motivation) Certain words have been used to avoid confusion and allow easy reading. (See Appendix 2, for Glossary. ) There is no company literature, except the leaders' manual, which the merchandiser receives once he has reached trainee managerment (TM).

(See Appendix 3 for Company Promotional Structure) However, the manual is not filled with information as he is expected to make his own notes throughout his training. The only literature Arcedia has about their client Scottish Power is the same information which is given to the customer when they sign up to change their electricity supplier. An in-dept reading on the area is crucial before conducting any investigation, as it increase the researcher's confidence on the topic and aid the decision making process of choosing the most appropriate research method.Investing time and effort into studying, stimulates and provides ideas, opinions, advice, insight into different approaches/difficulties that may occurred, or even known existed.

Furthermore, the researcher is able to predict possible problems, barriers or conflict which could arise from and understand how other authors have dealt with a similar situation. Text book was the main method of obtaining background knowledge. The library shelved a sufficient amount of information. It might be dated, but it is the theory that is of importance. Moreover, it can be considered more reliable than the internet.The questionnaire was standardised because it was not necessary to produce different questionnaire for each roles, as there were a small number of employees.

This is less time consuming and reliable. E. g. If there was a questionnaire for crew managers, the data collected from one crew managers will not be unanimous.

This method is flexible and the "researcher can easily shift focus when new data" arise (Leedy, & Ormrod, P. 158). The disadvantage is that with the present of the researcher the employees might act differently to what they usually say or do.Therefore Simon permitted the researcher to participate in the recruitment and training process without informing anyone the researcher identity and purpose.

This provided a realistic experience into understanding why and how motivation could be used to persuade someone to work on commission. Moreover, as everyone is acting normally, this makes the investigation reliable. From the questionnaire, (see Appendix 12 for results), 30% stated that the reason why they came to Arcedia is because of the prospects and another 30% said it was the money.It also shows that everyone believed that all of Herzberg's Five Factors of motivation is important to gain job satisfaction. The reason why personal problem might be at top of the table is because Arcedia does not believe in the work and leisure balance. When a person ask for a time off, if he is not Simons favourite employee, sacking is the procedure.

Generally one immediately thinks of Maslow's 1970's hierarchy of needs or motives theory, when the subject of motivation arises. Managers know that the majority of the public have negative pre-conception of the door to door salesman, (see Appendix 4).With this understanding managers have to quickly and effectively change the observer's mentality through giving an impression of the job of being easy and secure. Simon does not mention door-to-door sales.

To stop the observer thinking about the information given, he quickly states the starting salary; expectations; outcome of the management scheme and time scale which a person is expected to reach it. (See appendix 3 for more detail). The vast number of questions asked is designed to put the observer into a 'yes roll' mindset.In effect he leaves the interview feeling excited, energetic, having high hopes, and saying yes to the job.

In addition, he took control of the conversation and raised the chances of the observer attending the second interview. The questionnaire and Professor Kovach research found that money was the top reward factor. This is why Simon quotes  350 which is a competitive salary and the prospects of promotion which he automatically assume quick promotion equals power and pay-rise. Referring back to Maslow's 'psychological needs' (Robertson, Smith ; cooper, P.20) our 'hunger or thirst for money in a necessary in the western civilisation'.

We need money to obtain food, water, clothes, sex and shelter. Freud theories explain that with money, we are able to indulge ourselves with the pleasurable things of life, attract more of the opposite sex, and have the power to do what we want, therefore satisfying our Id. However, money is not the only motivator, from the questionnaire 100% of employees who have not worked on commission before said that they would no have come back for the second interview if they knew it was door to door sells.