GMAT Essays (AWA)

This is one of the mba.com argument essay prompts I was not able to find a book with an example. If you have a book that has an example essay for this argument essay, please let me know!

The following appeared in a memorandum from the head of a human resource department at a major automobile manufacturing company to the company's managers:

"Studies have found that employees of not-for-profit organizations and charities are often more highly motivated than employees of for-profit corporations to perform well at work when their performance is not being monitored or evaluated. Interviews with employees of not-for-profit organizations suggest that the reason for their greater motivation is the belief that their work helps to improve society. Because they believe in the importance of their work, they have personal reasons to perform well, even when no financial reward is present. Thus, if our corporation began donating a significant portion of its profits to humanitarian causes, our employees' motivation and productivity would increase substantially and our overall profits would increase as well."

The head of human resources concludes that donating a significant portion of the companies' profits to humanitarian causes increases employee's motivation and productivity and therefore the companies' bottom line. His conclusion is based on studies about employees of non-for-profit organizations that suggest that these employees perform well without monitoring because of their belief in the importance of their work and that they believe to improve society. This argument is highly flawed for several reasons.

First, even though I agree with the general statement that people who believe in the importance of their work perform better, the mere general fact alone does neither warrant research nor large donations to humanitarian causes. Believing in your work has more to do with your attitude than humanitarian causes. A test driver may very well know his work is of utmost importance to the company and to many people but his motivation may not include humanitarian clauses.

Secondly, the assumption that research findings about employees from not-for-profit organizations apply to employees of automobile manufacturer is also flawed, since it is very questionable if the employees of manufacturing and non-for-profit organization are in fact interchangeable.

Thirdly, it is highly doubtful that because people are motivated to improve society, their productivity would improve by their companies large donations to humanitarian causes. Doctors chose their profession to help people and society but there is no evidence that hospitals productivity would improve if large parts of profits are spent on humanitarian causes.

In conclusion, all three points make this argument very questionable, even without considering the validity of the actual research in terms of its representative values or sufficient size. The head of human resource may have to produce evidence that proves that these employees of different organizations are in fact interchangeable, that the general motivation of employees of all company's is to improve the world and that large donations to humanitarian causes can improve the companies' productivity, not to mention the overall profit. Without such proof, the argument remains flawed.

Believing in your work has more to do with your attitude than humanitarian causes.

What is the backing to this statement?

their productivity would improve by their companies large donations to humanitarian causes

Look for grammatical error...use of would

Overall the reasoning is good. A 5 for me. Keep writing. Best of Luck