Expanding on Dan Pink

It has been interesting how much attention has been paid to Dan Pink’s latest message on motivation that was presented at TED.  The number of tweets, blogs, and other messages about this have been huge.  We ourselves highlighted the speech here on this blog a couple of weeks ago (http://wp.me/pypb9-31 ).

What I find interesting and a little worrisome, is the idea that many are taking from Dan’s presentation that all incentives (or at least most) are bad.  I disagree 100% with that concept.   I would like to expand the conversation to explore why.

The debate about intrinsic vs extrinsic motivation has been going on for a long time.  The candle experiment presented by Pink was done in the 1950’s.  Deci & Ryan research from 1970’s and 1980’s suggested that extrinsic rewards can decrease intrinsic motivation.  Alfie Kohn wrote about how he thought extrinsic rewards were bad in “Punished by Rewards” in the 1990’s. However, research on both performance data and academic research show a different side to this debate.

First, performance data from a number of sources points to an increase in performance when incentives are used.  Stajkovic and Luthans’ meta-analysis of 72 contingent based behavior programs found that money incentives increased performance by 23%, social recognition increased performance by 17%, and feedback increased performance by 10%.  Paul Hebert does a nice job of highlighting research by the International Society for Performance Improvement that indicate a 22% increase in performance for individual incentives and 44% for team based incentives – (see it here http://tiny.cc/nHfAj –  he also discusses some other arguments around Dan Pink’s message).

Second the way that incentives are structured has a significant impact on their performance as well as on the impact they have on intrinsic motivation.   Work by Eisenberger, Cameron and Pierce show that extrinsic rewards, if structured correctly, can actually increase intrinsic reward. They state, “The findings suggest that reward procedures requiring ill-defined or minimal performance convey task triviality, hereby decreasing intrinsic motivation. Reward procedures requiring specific high task performance convey a task’s personal or social significance, increasing intrinsic motivation.”  Specific to creativity, Eisenberger and Cameron “concluded that decremental effects of reward on intrinsic task interest occur under highly restricted, easily avoidable conditions and that positive effects of reward on generalized creativity are readily attainable by using procedures derived from behavior theory” [emphasis added].  In our own work, we’ve seen that when individuals are given a choice in choosing levels of goals and subsequent rewards, they have an increased motivation to choose (and achieve) higher goals than what management would have given them.

That being said, Dan Pink has gotten the discussion flowing on this – which I think is very good.  He has also highlighted the fact that most organizations only see one lever to pull when trying to impact employee motivation – i.e. pay systems.  As he points out, there are other aspects that influence employee’s motivation.

Dan talks about Autonomy, Mastery and Purpose – these fit right into the Four Drive Model of Employee Motivation.  Autonomy and Mastery align with our Drive to Challenge and Comprehend, while purpose fit nicely with the Drive to Defend.  What Dan leaves out is the power that the Drive to Bond has on motivating employees.  Overall, I think the discussion that will result from Dan’s presentation is great, I just hope that it doesn’t get boiled down to the simple sound bite that “incentives are bad.”

Let me know your thoughts.

Kurt