Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us

by Daniel H. Pink

If biological motivations came from within, this second drive came from without—the rewards and punishments the environment delivered for behaving in certain ways.

The joy of the task was its own reward.

It would appear that this drive . . . may be as basic and strong as the [other] drives. Furthermore, there is some reason to believe that [it] can be as efficient in facilitating learning.2

“When money is used as an external reward for some activity, the subjects lose intrinsic interest for the activity,” he wrote.5 Rewards can deliver a short-term boost—just as a jolt of caffeine can keep you cranking for a few more hours. But the effect wears off—and, worse, can reduce a person’s longer-term motivation to continue the project.

an L3C “operate[s] like a for-profit business generating at least modest profits, but its primary aim [is] to offer significant social benefits.”

Indeed, the very premise of extrinsic incentives is that we’ll always respond rationally to them. But even most economists don’t believe that anymore.

That means that your cousin the CPA, if he’s doing mostly routine work, faces competition not just from five-hundred-dollar-a-month accountants in Manila, but from tax preparation programs anyone can download for thirty dollars.

Take the curious example of Vocation Vacations. This is a business in which people pay their hard-earned money . . . to work at another job.

Routine, not-so-interesting jobs require direction; nonroutine, more interesting work depends on self-direction.

The best use of money as a motivator is to pay people enough to take the issue of money off the table.

“People use rewards expecting to gain the benefit of increasing another person’s motivation and behavior, but in so doing, they often incur the unintentional and hidden cost of undermining that person’s intrinsic motivation toward the activity.”

For artists, scientists, inventors, schoolchildren, and the rest of us, intrinsic motivation—the drive to do something because it is interesting, challenging, and absorbing—is essential for high levels of creativity. But the “if-then” motivators that are the staple of most businesses often stifle, rather than stir, creative thinking.

Adding a monetary incentive didn’t lead to more of the desired behavior. It led to less. The reason: It tainted an altruistic act and “crowded out” the intrinsic desire to do something good.

“if-then” rewards usually do more harm than good. By neglecting the ingredients of genuine motivation—autonomy, mastery, and purpose—they limit what each of us can achieve.

Goals that people set for themselves and that are devoted to attaining mastery are usually healthy. But goals imposed by others—sales targets, quarterly returns, standardized test scores, and so on—can sometimes have dangerous side effects.

The problem with making an extrinsic reward the only destination that matters is that some people will choose the quickest route there, even if it means taking the low road.

The fine shifted the parents’ decision from a partly moral obligation (be fair to my kids’ teachers) to a pure transaction (I can buy extra time). There wasn’t room for both. The punishment didn’t promote good behavior; it crowded it out.

The Russian economist Anton Suvorov has constructed an elaborate econometric model to demonstrate this effect, configured around what’s called “principal-agent theory.”

“Rewards are addictive in that once offered, a contingent reward makes an agent expect it whenever a similar task is faced, which in turn compels the principal to use rewards over and over again.”

In environments where extrinsic rewards are most salient, many people work only to the point that triggers the reward—and no further.

CARROTS AND STICKS: The Seven Deadly Flaws 1. They can extinguish intrinsic motivation. 2. They can diminish performance. 3. They can crush creativity. 4. They can crowd out good behavior. 5. They can encourage cheating, shortcuts, and unethical behavior. 6. They can become addictive. 7. They can foster short-term thinking.

For routine tasks, which aren’t very interesting and don’t demand much creative thinking, rewards can provide a small motivational booster shot without the harmful side effects.

“Rewards do not undermine people’s intrinsic motivation for dull tasks because there is little or no intrinsic motivation to be undermined.”

The essential requirement: Any extrinsic reward should be unexpected and offered only after the task is complete.

First, consider nontangible rewards.

Second, provide useful information.

Human beings have an innate inner drive to be autonomous, self-determined, and connected to one another. And when that drive is liberated, people achieve more and live richer lives.

Writing about the Type B person (and using the male-centered language common in the day), the cardiologists explained, “He may also have a considerable amount of ‘drive,’ but its character is such that it seems to steady him, give confidence and security to him, rather than to goad, irritate, and infuriate, as with the Type A man.”

Ultimately, Type I behavior depends on three nutrients: autonomy, mastery, and purpose. Type I behavior is self-directed. It is devoted to becoming better and better at something that matters. And it connects that quest for excellence to a larger purpose.

Type I behavior emerges when people have autonomy over the four T’s: their task, their time, their technique, and their team.

now these home-based customer service reps are working for a number of U.S. companies—including 1-800-Flowers, J. Crew, Office Depot, even the Internal Revenue Service—handling customer inquiries the way they choose.18 As in any effective Motivation 3.0 workplace, it’s their call.

in the United States, more than 50 percent of employees are not engaged at work—and nearly 20 percent are actively disengaged.

some members of the cleaning staff at hospitals, instead of doing the minimum the job required, took on new tasks—from chatting with patients to helping make nurses’ jobs go more smoothly. Adding these more absorbing challenges increased these cleaners’ satisfaction and boosted their own views of their skills. By reframing aspects of their duties, they helped make work more playful and more fully their own. “Even in low-autonomy jobs,” Wrzesniewski and Dutton write, “employees can create new domains for mastery.”7

“Figure out for yourself what you want to be really good at, know that you’ll never really satisfy yourself that you’ve made it, and accept that that’s okay.”

“Try to pick a profession in which you enjoy even the most mundane, tedious parts. Then you will always be happy.”

“Being a professional,” Julius Erving once said, “is doing the things you love to do, on the days you don’t feel like doing them.”16

In the end, mastery attracts precisely because mastery eludes.

the single greatest motivator is “making progress in one’s work.” The days that people make progress are the days they feel most motivated and engaged. By creating conditions for people to make progress, shining a light on that progress, recognizing and celebrating progress, organizations can help their own cause and enrich people’s lives.

“In a curious way, age is simpler than youth, for it has so many fewer options.”

But the people in the second group, who read about what their work accomplished, raised more than twice as much money, through twice as many pledges, as the other groups. A brief reminder of the purpose of their work doubled their performance.

“One cannot lead a life that is truly excellent without feeling that one belongs to something greater and more permanent than oneself.”

attainment of a particular set of goals [in this case, profit goals] has no impact on well-being and actually contributes to ill-being.”

“One of the reasons for anxiety and depression in the high attainers is that they’re not having good relationships. They’re busy making money and attending to themselves and that means that there’s less room in their lives for love and attention and caring and empathy and the things that truly count,”

the secret to high performance isn’t our biological drive or our reward-and-punishment drive, but our third drive—our deep-seated desire to direct our own lives, to extend and expand our abilities, and to make a contribution.

“Finite players play within boundaries; infinite players play with boundaries.”

the truly free individual is free only to the extent of his own self-mastery. While those who will not govern themselves are condemned to find masters to govern over them.”