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CHAPTER 8: MOTIVATION AND EMPOWERMENT 233
At Nucor, rewarding people richly, treating them with respect, and giving them
IN THE LEAD real power sparks amazing motivation and performance. Employees are organized

into teams in a decentralized, flattened, four-level organization. With most decision-

making authority pushed down to the division level, employees run their part of
the business as if it were their own. It’s not unusual for front-line workers to take
it upon themselves to work 20-hour shifts to get a disabled plant up and running,
for example. As Iverson once put it, “Instead of telling people what to do and then
hounding them to do it, our managers focus on shaping an environment that frees
employees to determine what they can do and should do, to the benefit of them-

selves and the business. We’ve found that their answers drive the progress of our
business faster than our own.”
Base pay at Nucor is relatively low, but under the company’s performance-
based compensation system, weekly bonuses can average 80 to 150 percent of
a steelworker’s base pay. Even though base pay starts at around $10 an hour, the
average Nucor steelworker took home around $100,000 in 2005. In a bad year,
everyone—the CEO included—shares the pain. The financial incentives are impor-

tant, but motivation at Nucor relies more on leaders’ determined focus on creating
an environment where front-line workers can thrive. It’s an environment that long-
time employees have called “magical.”
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Leaders at Nucor have successfully applied the two-factor theory to provide both
hygiene factors and motivators, thus meeting employees higher as well as lower
needs. It’s a formula that has created happy, engaged employees and a successful
organization.

Acquired Needs Theory
Another needs-based theory was developed by David McClelland. The acquired Acquired needs theory
Acquired needs theory
McClelland’s theory that
needs theory proposes that certain types of needs are acquired during an individual’s McClelland’s theory that
proposes that certain types of
proposes that certain types of
lifetime. In other words, people are not born with these needs, but may learn them needs (achievement, affi liation,
needs (achievement, affi liation,
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through their life experiences. For example, the parents of Bill Strickland, who power) are acquired during an
power) are acquired during an
individual’s lifetime
founded and runs a highly successful non-profit organization, always encouraged individual’s lifetime

him to follow his dreams. When he wanted to go south to work with the Free-
dom Riders in the 1960s, they supported him. His plans for tearing up the family
basement and making a photography studio were met with equal enthusiasm.
Strickland thus developed a need for achievement that enabled him to accomplish
amazing results later in life. You will learn more about Bill Strickland’s leader-
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ship approach in Chapter 12. Three needs most frequently studied are the need
for achievement, need for affi liation, and need for power.
• Need for achievement—the desire to accomplish something difficult, attain
a high standard of success, master complex tasks, and surpass others.
• Need for affiliation—the desire to form close personal relationships, avoid
conflict, and establish warm friendships.
• Need for power—the desire to influence or control others, be responsible
for others, and have authority over others.
For more than 20 years, McClelland studied human needs and their implica-
tions for management. People with a high need for achievement tend to enjoy
work that is entrepreneurial and innovative. People who have a high need for

affiliation are successful “integrators,” whose job is to coordinate the work of
people and departments. Integrators include brand managers and project man-
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agers, positions that require excellent people skills. A high need for power is often