A telecom company is facing difficulties in the financial year 2002-2003 and I am the line manager of the software development group of this company. Chapter 4, in the book "Essentials of Organizational Behavior" by Stephen P. Robbins states that theories of motivation are culture-bound (Page 53), so to give this article and the situation described in the question a different perspective, I will set this telecom company called BPL Mobile in India and I will consider the cultural factors that influence motivation and productivity and explain them in this paper. My software development group has 15 employees working under me and we have lost 3 employees due to layoffs. We provide software and training to around 25 stores in Bombay, India and these are specialty stores that provide only BPL mobile phones and calling plans (contract and prepaid) to customers. Overall BPL Mobile is one of the leading mobile phone companies in India, its main competitors are Orange (the British telecom giant). In India, Orange and BPL Mobile have a fair and equitable market share of around 30% each, with the rest belonging to smaller companies. As Chapter 2 describes the framework for assessing cultures, I would apply the following characteristics to Indian employees and customers (Page 18). Power distance in India is largely unequal, there is an equal blend of individualism and collectivism, it is the quantity in life that matters most and this is because India is a poor country, as far as escaping from uncertainty is concerned they prefer structured situations and finally people are long-term oriented. Hope this gives you an insight into corporate life in India. I will now explain how I will handle the situation described in the question. There are many people struggling for jobs in India but since I have assembled a good team, who are now demoralized, it is my job to motivate them to perform better. According to Abraham Maslow's hierarchy of needs theory (Page 43) the need for physiological needs will be primary, but in the work environment safety and security needs will be an increasing concern. The reason for this is that because there is a large population of qualified people waiting to be hired, people who have jobs are under pressure to keep them. In such a situation, knowing that I have a qualified and valuable team with me, I would not want to hire different people and train them.