An investigation into the motivational factors of call centre workers and the impact positive and negative forms of feedback have on employee performance.

Abstract

The concept of employee feedback has been around for many years. Viewed as the core of personal and professional growth, feedback helps employees get better at what they do. Research has shown that surprisingly employees crave feedback. One of the main issues organisations have is that their managers don’t give enough feedback. As straightforward as it may seem, the process of feedback giving is astonishingly complex due to the diverse nature of humans. Employee motivation has been a concept of great importance in organisations for many years and links to the area of recognition and feedback itself. This study utilised a mono method approach namely, a questionnaire. The author felt the desire to get an understanding into the question of what motivates call centre workers and if positive and negative forms of feedback influence employee performance. The author chose to carry out a questionnaire on 90 customer service advisors in one particular call centre in Ireland. This quantitative approach was used in order to obtain the relevant results needed to investigate this topic. As a way to gain access to employee motivations and the area of employee feedback there were a number of factors identified and it was determined if positive and negative feedback effect employee performance. Furthermore the motivational tools and success factors were identified. It was found that both positive and negative feedback have a promising impact on performance of call centre workers. The employees perception of both were optimistic and if constructed appropriate taken on board. Although results suggest pay, recognition and promotion were key motivational factors for employees, it is important to note there were a number of other factors employees felt strongly about and are mentioned throughout this dissertation. v | P a g e Due to the differences in previous research, it is hard to tell which system will work in call centres in Ireland. Other studies carried out focus mainly on motivation, which is not directed at either call centre employees or Irish employees. Therefore this dissertation will identify the motivational factors of employees in the Irish call centre chosen. Overall, this project provides an insight into employee motivation in a call centre environment and the effects positive and negative feedback have on their performance and will establish employee perceptions on this area of motivation and feedback.