Motivation

Recently I have been reading a really good book called Drive: the surprising truth about what motivates, by Daniel Pink.  I would highly recommend it to everyone.  The books whole premise is based on how the business world views motivation and management and how that view is at odds with reality and science.

There are two main drives that motivate people:  biological and external.  External motivation is known as extrinsic and motivation 2.0 throughout the book.  Biological motivation we eat to satisfy hunger and drink to quench thirst.  Extrinsic motivation means that our motivation comes from outside ourselves  we are paid to work, given rewards for good behavior.

It starts out describing how businesses try to motivate people.  Most businesses use pay to get employees to get work done.  They give bonuses to exceptional employees.  There is a manager to make sure things work the way they're supposed too.

Motivation 2.0 works well for monotonous tasks, such as filling out paperwork or working at McDonald's.  There is very little thought that goes into it.  Everyone needs money, right?  Work isn't fun, but it pays the bills, people say.  I have been told this ever since I got my first job at 16.  But I have never been satisfied with this approach to business.

Daniel Pink argues in Drive that using extrinsic forces to motivate people actually end up making them do less, not more.  Take an example he uses in his book.  when a child is 5 or 6 years old they start school.  Often times young kids love to draw and learn.  I have seen this in my life.  Young kids are naturally curious. Well, once they get into kindergarten they are taught how to draw.  If a child loved to draw, but didn't necessarily draw by the "rules", such as how a tree actually looks in reality, the art teacher will probably say, "that's great but not what a tree actually looks like."  They will then show the child how to draw it.

A remark like this can kill a child's natural curiosity.  If the child learns that he or she can't draw very well, and is told this in an unkind way, they will often stop trying.  As a child I decided I am not a good artist, because I was unable to draw well at a young age.  No child is very good by the time they are 6 or 7.  They have to work at it.

As the child grows and learns, he or she will go to first elementary school, then middle school.  How do these schools motivate this child to learn?  By the grading system.  They soon learn that an A means you are smart, and an F means you aren't.  This is a way adults use Motivation 2.0 as a way to motivate their child to learn.

This is not a good way to motivate someone.  By high school, some students just conclude their stupid and why try?  they don't learn the way public school is taught.  So their form of motivation doesn't work in the long run.

Work may seem to be run the same as schools.  That is because most businesses are.  They pay you to be there.  They use money as motivation.  I am not saying working for money is bad.  Far from it.  The book makes this clear, and I want to as well.  Using money as motivation is bad.

Why is it bad?  Well, once you know what you have to do in order to do your job well, you stop trying to be creative while working.  If it's not broke, why fix it?  Using extrinsic motivation to promote good behavior leads to undesirable behavior.  Daniel Pink writes extensively in the book as to why using motivation 2.0 leads to an increase in undesirable behavior.  I will give aa example here.

He uses a study recently conducted among a group of 153 women from Sweden who were interested in giving blood.  The 153 women were divided into 3 groups.  The first group of women were told that giving blood was voluntary.  These participants could give blood, but they would not receive money.  The second group was offered $10 for giving blood.  The third group received a variation of that second offer:  a $10 payment with an immediate option to donate the amount to a children's cancer charity.

52% of the women in the first group donated blood, less than 25% of women in the second group donated blood, and 52% of women in the third group donated blood.  So more of  those who did not personally receive money for donating blood ended up donating blood than those who were offered payment.

Motivation 2.0 would seem to suggest that the group that was offered $10 were more likely to donate.  But that wasn't the case in this study.  Giving blood is a good thing, right?  Well, monetary compensation used as a motivator lead to a decrease in blood donation.

I haven't finished the book yet, so I will write more about this subject once I'm through with the book.