Motivation Case

It is one thing having a desire and it another thing being able to translate the desire into action such that the purported goal is achieved in the end.

Many people have great dreams, noble ideas and strong desire to contribute their quota to national development and for that matter the welfare of society but fail to do so due to poor enabling environment that would serve as catalyst in the achievement of their goals. As a result the intrinsic motivation (i.e. the desire to achieve certain goals and to contribute to the well being of society) in these people die out with time, thereby creating a gap between desire to perform and performance itself. Motivation, usually extrinsic motivation (i.e. the motivation that is generated by what is done to and for people such that an enabling environment is created as a result, for performance to take place) serves as the link.

Whilst intrinsic motivation is as a result of the in-born tendency which drives people to act or behave or move in a particular direction extrinsic motivation is generated by what is done to and for people. Extrinsic motivators can have immediate and powerful effect and often serve to sustain intrinsic motivators (Armstrong, M. 1996).

In Ghana as in most developing countries the Primary Health Care concept has been adopted as the best approach to improving the health status of the population; and the focus is on the rural health structures - the District Health System (Amonoo - Lartson et al 1984).

The Human Resource Division (HRD) of the Ministry of Health (MOH) faces the problem of professionally trained staff and their maldistribution between well-endowed big urban centres and less well-endowed peripheral areas. (MOH Human Resource Division 1997; Sagoe, K. 2000.)

The HRD, working on the premise that inadequate motivation of staff contributes greatly to their inequitable distribution, has come up with a policy proposal that contains