Question

Directions: Answer in complete sentences.
1. How does motivation affect how well a work team performs?
2. Why is operations management important for a business?
3. Explain the difference between hygiene factors and motivators.
4. Give one example of how a business could use process improvement.
5. Why is controlling cost standards important for earning a profit?

Answer 1

1. Motivation affects a work team’s performance by increasing members’ effort, persistence, cooperation, and creativity, which raises productivity and quality while reducing absenteeism and turnover.
2. Operations management is important because it organizes and controls the processes that produce a company’s goods or services, ensuring efficiency, consistent quality, on-time delivery, and cost control that together support customer satisfaction and competitive advantage.
3. Hygiene factors are external job conditions such as pay, company policies, and working conditions that prevent employee dissatisfaction but do not by themselves create lasting satisfaction, while motivators are intrinsic factors like achievement, recognition, responsibility, and opportunities for growth that actively increase job satisfaction and motivation.
4. One example of process improvement is automating an order-fulfillment workflow—adding barcode scanning and conveyor systems to reduce picking errors and cycle time, which lowers costs and speeds customer deliveries.
5. Controlling cost standards is important for earning a profit because it keeps actual expenses within planned limits, preserves profit margins, enables accurate pricing and budgeting decisions, and highlights inefficiencies that would otherwise erode returns.