The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us
My viewing of this RSA featuring Daniel Pink talking about “examples of how intrinsic motivation functions both at home and in the workplace” came about as part of an engaging larger assignment during my first quarter participation in the Stagen Integral Leadership Program. This ‘clip’ of a longer presentation essentially focusses one on the merits of creating an organizational environment in which Autonomy, Mastery and Purpose are nurtured and respected.
I came away with the sense that the perspectives are well worth the 10 minutes or so of viewing time – recognizing that rather than being an “answer in a box” for all that challenges organizations, this is but one component piece that goes into creating a race-worthy engine. The best part of this assignment for me was reading the comment posted by others – some of whom predictably stated “brilliant piece of work” and “my day was made better by this bit of inspiration and enlightenment” to those who shared some realities from their experience, including those a person purporting to be a software architect and development manager for the past 35 years who pointed out:
-Thirty-five years of seeing this phenomenon over and over would cause me to be inclined to ultimately disagree with the notion that autonomy will make people more productive . . . realistically most people simply do the minimum required to be by. Incentive, one way or the other makes little difference.”
And, “each one has their own idea of what autonomous means and by simply allowing autonomous development to occur you wind up with pieces that are like ships passing in the night. When you ask them to follow standards and talk to their co-workers about that it seems to them that they are no longer autonomous.”
Links:
http://comment.rsablogs.org.uk/2010/04/08/rsa-animate-drive/
http://www.danpink.com/about
