Doing business in dangerous places
...netheless, the fact that all satisfied needs seems relate only to a certain level, suggests that Herzberg’s approach could play a role. Indeed, Herzberg’s two factors theory classified needs into two groups: Hygiene factors and Motivating factors. These two groups are related to Maslow’s needs as follow: Maslow Herzberg Self-actualization needs Esteem needs Motivating factors: achievement challenge recognition responsability work itself (satisfying) Affiliation / belonging Security Physiological Hygiene factors: conditions of work pay / benefit job security quality of relationships (dissatisfying) Hygiene factors deals with the question “Why work here?” motivators deal with “Why work harder?” (Handy, Understanding Organizations, 1993). The interesting thing is that satisfying and dissatisfying factors are not opposite each other. Dealing with dissatisfying don’t turn them into satisfying or motivating factors. Back to our analysis, the point of the question seems to be linked mostly to the Hygiene factors. Again, from at a first look, people accepting to work as expat in danger places are in the following conflictual situation: But, this being true, nobody would accept to go. On the other hand, how can someone be satisfied by working nowadays in Iraq, when even before the Gulf War II it was considered to be too danger to go (many openings were available in the UN, since it was considered radioactively polluted) ? Is the graph just reported correct? Are hygiene factors so much unsatisfied? Reanalyzing carefully the Hygiene factors we could argue that only the conditions of work are surely negative. Pay is not a problem, being usually much higher than usual salaries, and even the quality of relationship is probably higher and than in usual working environments (in stressful situations the links and relationship created are stronger). So it would seems the whole decision is more linked to the very personal perspective of conditions of work and to the basic question “Is it worth it?”. to answer this, we need to do a step forward to focus on the personality of the people involved. Holland (Making Vocational Choices, 1973) has described how people with different orientation choose different work environments to suit their skills and needs defining six typologies of persons: Realistic, Intellectual, Social, Conventional, Enterprising, and Artistic. Among these the realistic profile seems to fit our needs at the best: he/she seeks objectives, concrete goals and tasks, he/she is best suited by outdoor work and practical jobs. This help to draw a profile but, again, some points still remain uncleared; most of all, it doesn’t give any insight on why people accept the risk. At this point the individual process designed by Handy (Understanding Organizations, 1993). can probably help to understand the final step. The process is summarized by the following model: The model helps explaining the way persons deal with individual decisions, to do or not to do something, to go or not to go somewhere. The approach is based on the idea that we are self-activating organisms and can, to some degree, control our own destiny and our response to pressure, that we can set our goals and choose the path toward them. Each of us has some needs (as we saw, we’ll consider Hertzberg’s) and some desired results (our own personal objectives). The decision to do or not to do something, and the energy we put into (the ‘E’ factor), derives from a calculus we interiorize. Each calculus, however, depends on our personality and is operated within the limits of a psychological contract (coercitive, calculative or co-operative) - between the company and the individual. The calculative contract, the psychological contract which fits our case, is a voluntary one, with an explicit exchange of goods and money for services rendered. ‘Desired things’ do not include only money but promotion, opportunities and work itself. At this point we can probably draft the overall picture of the persons who chose danger overseas jobs. They are realistic, strongly motivated by pay or other benefits and who appreciate strong interpersonal relationship in the work environ...