Welcome to Things I Wish I Knew Earlier Sunday!
This week, I finished an incredible book by Daniel Pink called Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us.
Here are the three best ideas I found.
Money is a Threshold Motivator
The foundational idea of Drive is that our traditional models of motivation don’t align with the demands of modern professional life.
A common belief is that money motivates people, and therefore, more money motivates people more. It turns out, this is wrong. Money, Pink argues, is a “threshold motivator.” It is highly motivating when you don’t have enough, but once you do, more money doesn’t necessarily lead to more motivation.
In fact, Nobel Prize winner Daniel Kahneman found that in 2010, a salary of $75,000 per year was the threshold amount. Beyond that, increases in income did not correspond with increases in happiness.
This idea contradicts our intuition. If it’s true, why do people strive to earn far more than that? Why do some work tirelessly even when they have more money than they could ever spend?
The Three Sources of Deep Motivation: Autonomy, Mastery, and Purpose
It always amuses me when people talk about the ultra-wealthy.
They often say things like, “If I were worth a billion dollars, I’d be on a beach somewhere relaxing for the rest of my life. Why do they still work so hard?” Many people can’t understand the drive to achieve at that level because their relationship to work is different. They think of work as something they have to do to earn money, so if they had enough, why keep working? But high achievers don’t see work that way.
They tap into deeper wells of motivation than just money.
Take Warren Buffett, for example. He has been one of the wealthiest people on Earth for longer than I’ve been alive, yet at 93 years old, he still runs Berkshire Hathaway. Yes, you heard that right. Ninety-three!
So, why would someone worth an estimated $137.8 billion (remember, a billion is a thousand million) still get up every day and go to work? Because he is addicted to playing the game.
Pink identifies the three deepest sources of motivation as autonomy, mastery, and purpose.
Autonomy is the freedom to make decisions about what you do, when you do it, how you do it, and who you do it with. The opposite of autonomy is control. Buffett has had the freedom to do whatever he pleases for over 60 years. But pure freedom isn’t enough.
Mastery is the desire to continually improve at something meaningful. This is key for Buffett. He has been pursuing mastery in business, both in leading and investing in companies, since the 1950s. That’s what gets him out of bed each morning. He’s not driven by the need to make more money for its own sake; he loves playing the game.
Purpose is about being goal-oriented. Buffett knows exactly what he wants to accomplish and is relentless in pursuing his goals. He obsesses over them. His fire hasn’t dimmed with time—it’s only grown stronger.
If you want to find the motivation to compete at this level for this long, work to establish autonomy in your work. Then, identify goals you want to dedicate your life to achieving, and commit to mastery of your craft along the way.
Carrots and sticks can REDUCE motivation
We were all taught about carrots and sticks as children.
If you want to encourage a behavior, offer a reward (a carrot) for completing it. If you want to discourage a behavior, inflict a punishment (a stick) for completing it. It is a metaphor for how to motivate a donkey by either dangling a carrot out in front of it or whacking it with a stick from behind. The problem is that humans aren’t donkeys (at least not all humans).
This overly simplistic approach to motivation has surrounded us in school, at home, and at work for far too long.
I have never responded well to this approach because I have never lacked the internal motivation to do well. But until I read this book, I had never seen it truly exposed to criticism. Turns out, this approach is not only ineffective for most things that matter, it is actually detrimental to performance.
To be clear, carrots and sticks can work, but only within strict bounds. When a task is obvious and straightforward, you can encourage speed of execution with carrots and sticks. A good example is the manual assembly of a simple product. But when a task is ambiguous and open-ended, carrots and sticks can actually decrease motivation.
When we are faced with tasks that are inherently meaningful, like learning to play the guitar or building a business, we don’t need to be encouraged to try hard with monetary rewards or punishments. We need only three things:
- freedom to do it in whatever manner we please (autonomy),
- a why for doing it that is important to us (purpose),
- and the desire to master the skill (mastery)
Beware of carrots and sticks in work that matters.
We were all taught about carrots and sticks as children.
If you want to encourage a behavior, offer a reward (a carrot) for completing it. If you want to discourage a behavior, impose a punishment (a stick) for doing it. It’s a metaphor for motivating a donkey: dangle a carrot in front of it or use a stick from behind. But humans aren’t donkeys (well, not all of us).
This simplistic approach to motivation has permeated our lives in school, at home, and at work.
Personally, I’ve never responded well to it because I’ve never lacked internal motivation to do well. Until I read this book, though, I hadn’t seen it thoroughly criticized. It turns out, this approach isn’t just ineffective for most important things—it can actually harm performance.
To be clear, carrots and sticks can work, but only within strict boundaries.
When a task is obvious and straightforward, you can incentivize speed with carrots and sticks. A good example is the manual assembly of a simple product. But when a task is ambiguous and open-ended, carrots and sticks can decrease motivation. When we’re faced with tasks that are inherently meaningful, like learning to play guitar or building a business, we don’t need monetary rewards or punishments to motivate us.
We need three things:
•autonomy (the freedom to do it our way),
•purpose (a reason for doing it that matters to us),
•and mastery (the desire to improve).
Beware of using carrots and sticks in work that truly matters.