The puzzle of motivation | Dan Pink | TED

Summary

The speaker humorously confesses to attending law school and makes a compelling case for rethinking business practices. He discusses the candle problem to illustrate the limitations of extrinsic motivators like rewards and punishments, which can stifle creativity and hinder performance on complex tasks. Instead, he advocates for intrinsic motivation, focusing on autonomy, mastery, and purpose as the keys to high performance in the 21st century.

Takeaways

• 📚 The speaker admits to attending law school but not practicing law, setting a tone of humility and self-deprecation.
• 🔍 The 'candle problem' is introduced as a metaphor for overcoming 'functional fixedness' and thinking outside the box.
• 🏁 Sam Glucksberg's experiment is highlighted to illustrate the counterintuitive effect of incentives on problem-solving, where higher rewards can actually hinder performance.
• 💰 The speaker challenges the traditional business belief in the effectiveness of extrinsic motivators like bonuses and commissions.
• 🔬 The mismatch between scientific findings on motivation and current business practices is emphasized, suggesting that the latter are outdated.
• 🛠 The 20th-century business model, based on extrinsic motivators, is critiqued as ineffective for the creative and conceptual tasks of the 21st century.
• 🤔 The importance of intrinsic motivation for high performance in complex tasks is underscored, including autonomy, mastery, and purpose.
• 🌐 Examples of companies like Atlassian and Google are given to demonstrate the success of providing employees with autonomy in their work.
• 📈 The Results Only Work Environment (ROWE) is presented as an example where removing traditional work constraints leads to increased productivity and satisfaction.
• 🌐 The success of Wikipedia over Microsoft's Encarta is cited as a real-world example of the triumph of intrinsic motivation over extrinsic rewards.
• 🚀 The speaker concludes by advocating for a new business approach centered on intrinsic motivators to drive creativity, engagement, and ultimately, world change.

Q & A

What is the speaker's confession about their past?

The speaker confesses to attending law school in the late 1980s, where they did not perform well academically and never practiced law professionally.

What is the candle problem and its significance in the speech?

The candle problem is an experiment created by Karl Duncker in 1945 to illustrate the concept of functional fixedness. It is used in the speech to demonstrate the importance of creative thinking and the limitations of certain types of incentives.

What did Sam Glucksberg's experiment on the candle problem reveal about incentives?

Glucksberg's experiment showed that offering financial incentives to solve the candle problem actually made participants take longer to find the solution, indicating that incentives can sometimes hinder creative problem-solving.

Why do traditional management practices and extrinsic motivators fail in the context of modern work?

Traditional management practices and extrinsic motivators are less effective for modern work because they are better suited for simple, rule-based tasks. They do not foster the creativity and autonomy needed for complex, conceptual tasks that are common in the 21st century.

What are the three elements of a new operating system for businesses according to the speaker?

The three elements are autonomy, mastery, and purpose. Autonomy is the urge to direct one's own life, mastery is the desire to improve at something meaningful, and purpose is the drive to contribute to something larger than oneself.

How does the Results Only Work Environment (ROWE) differ from traditional work environments?

In a ROWE, employees do not have set schedules or mandatory office hours. They are given the freedom to complete their work as they see fit, which can lead to increased productivity, engagement, and satisfaction.

What is the significance of the comparison between Microsoft Encarta and Wikipedia?

The comparison highlights the power of intrinsic motivation. Wikipedia, which is created by volunteers for the love of sharing knowledge, outperformed Encarta, which was a commercially driven project with financial incentives.

What is the '20% time' policy at Google, and how has it contributed to the company's innovation?

The '20% time' policy allows Google engineers to spend 20% of their work time on projects of their own choosing. This policy has led to the creation of several successful products, such as Gmail and Google News.

How does the speaker define intrinsic motivation?

Intrinsic motivation is defined by the speaker as the desire to do things for their own sake, because they matter, are interesting, or are part of something important, without the need for external rewards.

What is the main argument the speaker makes against the use of traditional extrinsic motivators in business?

The speaker argues that traditional extrinsic motivators, such as bonuses and punishments, are outdated and can actually harm performance, especially in tasks that require creativity and conceptual thinking.

What does the speaker suggest as a solution to the mismatch between scientific knowledge and business practices?

The speaker suggests adopting a new approach to motivation based on intrinsic factors such as autonomy, mastery, and purpose, which are more aligned with the needs of the 21st-century workplace.

Outlines

00:00

🎓 Confessions of a Law School Dropout

The speaker begins by humorously confessing to attending law school in the late 1980s, an experience they regret due to their poor performance. Despite graduating in the bottom 10% of their class, they never practiced law and instead want to use the occasion to 'make a case' for rethinking business practices. They introduce the 'candle problem,' an experiment by Karl Duncker that illustrates the concept of 'functional fixedness,' where people struggle to think outside the box. The speaker uses this to set the stage for discussing the limitations of traditional incentives in business.

05:03

🧩 The Paradox of Incentives

The speaker delves into the science of human motivation, contrasting extrinsic and intrinsic motivators. They highlight a study by Sam Glucksberg that shows how offering financial incentives can actually hinder performance on tasks requiring creative thinking. The paradox is that while incentives are thought to improve performance, they can reduce creativity and problem-solving abilities, especially for complex tasks. The speaker emphasizes the disconnect between scientific findings and common business practices, suggesting that traditional reward-and-punishment approaches are outdated for modern tasks.

10:04

🌐 The Shift to Intrinsic Motivation

The speaker discusses the changing nature of work, with a shift from routine, rule-based tasks to more creative and conceptual work that requires intrinsic motivation. They argue that traditional management practices, which focus on compliance, are being replaced by self-direction and autonomy, which are more effective for engaging employees. Examples are given, such as Atlassian's 'FedEx Days,' where engineers are given complete freedom to work on any project for 24 hours, resulting in innovative solutions and software fixes.

15:06

🌟 Autonomy as a Catalyst for Innovation

The speaker focuses on the concept of autonomy as a key element of the new business operating system, alongside mastery and purpose. They provide examples of companies like Google, where '20% time' allows engineers to work on passion projects, leading to successful products like Gmail. The Results Only Work Environment (ROWE) is introduced as an example of extreme autonomy, where employees have no schedules and complete control over their work, leading to increased productivity and satisfaction. The speaker concludes by emphasizing the need to move away from outdated extrinsic motivators and towards intrinsic ones to achieve high performance and potentially change the world.

Keywords

💡Confession

A confession is an admission of wrongdoing or a disclosure of a truth that has been concealed. In the context of the video, the speaker humorously confesses to attending law school and not excelling there, setting the stage for the main theme of the talk, which is rethinking traditional approaches to motivation and business practices.

💡Youthful Indiscretion

Youthful indiscretion refers to a poor decision made when one is young, often due to lack of experience or judgment. In the video, the speaker uses this term to describe his decision to attend law school, which he implies was not the best choice for him, and it adds a personal touch to the narrative, making it relatable to the audience.

💡Candle Problem

The candle problem is a classic psychological experiment designed to test creativity and problem-solving skills. In the video, it is used as a metaphor for the challenges faced in business and the importance of overcoming conventional thinking. The speaker explains how people typically struggle to find a solution, illustrating the concept of 'functional fixedness'.

💡Functional Fixedness

Functional fixedness is a cognitive bias that limits a person to the common use of an object, hindering creative problem-solving. The speaker uses the candle problem to demonstrate this concept, where participants initially fail to see the box as something other than a container for thumbtacks, thus struggling to solve the problem.

💡Incentives

Incentives are rewards or motivations offered to encourage certain behaviors or outcomes. The video discusses how incentives, particularly financial ones, can have a counterproductive effect on creativity and problem-solving, contrary to common business practices that rely on them to drive performance.

💡Extrinsic Motivators

Extrinsic motivators are external rewards or punishments that influence behavior. The speaker contrasts these with intrinsic motivators, arguing that the former can be detrimental to creative and complex problem-solving tasks, which are more common in the modern workforce.

💡Intrinsic Motivators

Intrinsic motivators are internal drives that inspire individuals to perform tasks due to personal satisfaction or interest. The video emphasizes the importance of intrinsic motivators like autonomy, mastery, and purpose, which are more effective for stimulating creativity and high performance in the workplace.

💡Autonomy

Autonomy refers to the freedom to make one's own choices and decisions. The speaker argues that providing autonomy can lead to increased engagement and productivity. Examples from the script include Atlassian's FedEx Days and Google's 20% time, which allow employees to work on projects of their own choosing.

💡Mastery

Mastery is the pursuit of becoming highly skilled or proficient in a particular area. The video suggests that the desire for mastery is a powerful intrinsic motivator that can drive individuals to excel in their work, contributing to overall business success.

💡Purpose

Purpose is the sense of being part of something meaningful or significant. The speaker posits that having a purpose beyond just financial gain can be a strong motivator, aligning individual goals with the broader mission of the organization.

💡Results Only Work Environment (ROWE)

The ROWE is a management approach where employees are not bound by traditional working hours and are judged solely on their output. The video uses ROWE as an example of how providing radical autonomy can lead to improved productivity and job satisfaction.

💡Encyclopedia Example

The encyclopedia example contrasts Microsoft's Encarta, created through traditional management and financial incentives, with Wikipedia, which is built on voluntary contributions driven by intrinsic motivation. This example serves to illustrate the power of intrinsic motivators in achieving remarkable outcomes.

Highlights

Speaker confesses to attending law school and graduating in the bottom 10% of his class, setting a humorous and candid tone for the talk.

Introduction of the candle problem, a classic behavioral science experiment designed by Karl Duncker in 1945 to illustrate functional fixedness.

Description of Sam Glucksberg's experiment showing that incentives can paradoxically hinder performance on tasks requiring creative thinking.

Contradictory findings that incentives can improve performance on simple, rule-based tasks but impair performance on complex, creative ones.

The speaker's exploration of the science of human motivation, highlighting the difference between extrinsic and intrinsic motivators.

Critique of the traditional business model that relies on extrinsic motivators like bonuses and punishments, which are outdated and unscientific.

Evidence from Dan Ariely's study showing that higher rewards can lead to worse performance in tasks requiring cognitive skills.

Cross-cultural validation of the negative impact of high rewards from a study conducted in Madurai, India.

Findings from the London School of Economics that financial incentives can negatively affect overall performance in companies.

The need for a new approach to motivation in business, focusing on intrinsic motivators such as autonomy, mastery, and purpose.

The concept of autonomy in the workplace and its benefits, as demonstrated by companies like Atlassian and Google with their innovative work policies.

Introduction of the Results Only Work Environment (ROWE), a radical management approach that eliminates schedules and increases productivity and satisfaction.

The battle between Microsoft's Encarta and Wikipedia as a real-world example of the triumph of intrinsic motivation over extrinsic rewards.

The mismatch between scientific understanding of motivation and current business practices, and a call to update motivational strategies for the 21st century.

The conclusion that intrinsic motivation—driven by autonomy, mastery, and purpose—is key to high performance and can potentially change the world.

The speaker's closing argument that by aligning business practices with scientific insights, we can enhance our businesses and address complex challenges.

Transcripts

I need to make a confession at the outset here.

A little over 20 years ago, I did something that I regret,

something that I'm not particularly proud of.

Something that, in many ways, I wish no one would ever know,

but here I feel kind of obliged to reveal.

(Laughter)

In the late 1980s,

in a moment of youthful indiscretion,

I went to law school.

(Laughter)

In America, law is a professional degree:

after your university degree, you go on to law school.

When I got to law school,

I didn't do very well.

To put it mildly, I didn't do very well.

I, in fact, graduated in the part of my law school class

that made the top 90% possible.

(Laughter)

Thank you.

I never practiced law a day in my life;

I pretty much wasn't allowed to.

(Laughter)

But today, against my better judgment,

against the advice of my own wife,

I want to try to dust off some of those legal skills --

what's left of those legal skills.

I don't want to tell you a story.

I want to make a case.

I want to make a hard-headed,

evidence-based,

dare I say lawyerly case,

for rethinking how we run our businesses.

So, ladies and gentlemen of the jury,

take a look at this.

This is called the candle problem.

Some of you might know it.

It's created in 1945

by a psychologist named Karl Duncker.

He created this experiment

that is used in many other experiments in behavioral science.

And here's how it works. Suppose I'm the experimenter.

I bring you into a room.

I give you a candle, some thumbtacks and some matches.

And I say to you,

"Your job is to attach the candle to the wall

so the wax doesn't drip onto the table."

Now what would you do?

Many people begin trying to thumbtack the candle to the wall.

Doesn't work.

I saw somebody kind of make the motion over here --

some people have a great idea where they light the match,

melt the side of the candle, try to adhere it to the wall.

It's an awesome idea. Doesn't work.

And eventually, after five or ten minutes,

most people figure out the solution,

which you can see here.

The key is to overcome what's called functional fixedness.

You look at that box and you see it only as a receptacle for the tacks.

But it can also have this other function,

as a platform for the candle.

The candle problem.

I want to tell you about an experiment using the candle problem,

done by a scientist named Sam Glucksberg,

who is now at Princeton University, US,

This shows the power of incentives.

He gathered his participants and said:

"I'm going to time you, how quickly you can solve this problem."

To one group he said,

"I'm going to time you to establish norms,

averages for how long it typically takes someone to solve this sort of problem."

To the second group he offered rewards.

He said, "If you're in the top 25% of the fastest times,

you get five dollars.

If you're the fastest of everyone we're testing here today,

you get 20 dollars."

Now this is several years ago, adjusted for inflation,

it's a decent sum of money for a few minutes of work.

It's a nice motivator.

Question:

How much faster did this group solve the problem?

Answer:

It took them, on average, three and a half minutes longer.

3.5 min longer.

This makes no sense, right?

I mean, I'm an American. I believe in free markets.

That's not how it's supposed to work, right?

(Laughter)

If you want people to perform better, you reward them. Right?

Bonuses, commissions, their own reality show.

Incentivize them.

That's how business works.

But that's not happening here.

You've got an incentive designed

to sharpen thinking and accelerate creativity,

and it does just the opposite.

It dulls thinking and blocks creativity.

What's interesting about this experiment

is that it's not an aberration.

This has been replicated over and over again

for nearly 40 years.

These contingent motivators --

if you do this, then you get that --

work in some circumstances.

But for a lot of tasks, they actually either don't work

or, often, they do harm.

This is one of the most robust findings in social science,

and also one of the most ignored.

I spent the last couple of years

looking at the science of human motivation,

particularly the dynamics of extrinsic motivators

and intrinsic motivators.

And I'm telling you, it's not even close.

If you look at the science, there is a mismatch

between what science knows

and what business does.

What's alarming here is that our business operating system --

think of the set of assumptions and protocols beneath our businesses,

how we motivate people, how we apply our human resources--

it's built entirely around these extrinsic motivators,

around carrots and sticks.

That's actually fine for many kinds of 20th century tasks.

But for 21st century tasks,

that mechanistic, reward-and-punishment approach

doesn't work,

often doesn't work,

and often does harm.

Let me show you.

Glucksberg did another similar experiment,

he presented the problem in a slightly different way,

like this up here.

Attach the candle to the wall so the wax doesn't drip onto the table.

Same deal. You: we're timing for norms.

You: we're incentivizing.

What happened this time?

This time, the incentivized group kicked the other group's butt.

Why?

Because when the tacks are out of the box,

it's pretty easy isn't it?

(Laughter)

If-then rewards work really well for those sorts of tasks,

where there is a simple set of rules

and a clear destination to go to.

Rewards, by their very nature,

narrow our focus, concentrate the mind;

that's why they work in so many cases.

So, for tasks like this,

a narrow focus, where you just see the goal right there,

zoom straight ahead to it,

they work really well.

But for the real candle problem,

you don't want to be looking like this.

The solution is on the periphery. You want to be looking around.

That reward actually narrows our focus

and restricts our possibility.

Let me tell you why this is so important.

In western Europe,

in many parts of Asia,

in North America, in Australia,

white-collar workers are doing less of this kind of work,

and more of this kind of work.

That routine, rule-based, left-brain work --

certain kinds of accounting, financial analysis,

computer programming --

has become fairly easy to outsource,

fairly easy to automate.

Software can do it faster.

Low-cost providers can do it cheaper.

So what really matters

are the more right-brained creative, conceptual kinds of abilities.

Think about your own work.

Think about your own work.

Are the problems that you face,

or even the problems we've been talking about here,

do they have a clear set of rules,

and a single solution?

No. The rules are mystifying.

The solution, if it exists at all,

is surprising and not obvious.

Everybody in this room

is dealing with their own version of the candle problem.

And for candle problems of any kind,

in any field,

those if-then rewards,

the things around which we've built so many of our businesses,

don't work!

It makes me crazy.

And here's the thing.

This is not a feeling.

Okay? I'm a lawyer; I don't believe in feelings.

This is not a philosophy.

I'm an American; I don't believe in philosophy.

(Laughter)

This is a fact --

or, as we say in my hometown of Washington, D.C.,

a true fact.

(Laughter)

(Applause)

Let me give you an example.

Let me marshal the evidence here.

I'm not telling a story, I'm making a case.

Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, some evidence:

Dan Ariely, one of the great economists of our time,

he and three colleagues did a study of some MIT students.

They gave these MIT students a bunch of games,

games that involved creativity,

and motor skills, and concentration.

And the offered them, for performance,

three levels of rewards:

small reward, medium reward, large reward.

If you do really well you get the large reward, on down.

What happened?

As long as the task involved only mechanical skill

bonuses worked as they would be expected:

the higher the pay, the better the performance.

Okay?

But once the task called for even rudimentary cognitive skill,

a larger reward led to poorer performance.

Then they said,

"Let's see if there's any cultural bias here.

Let's go to Madurai, India and test it."

Standard of living is lower.

In Madurai, a reward that is modest in North American standards,

is more meaningful there.

Same deal. A bunch of games, three levels of rewards.

What happens?

People offered the medium level of rewards

did no better than people offered the small rewards.

But this time, people offered the highest rewards,

they did the worst of all.

In eight of the nine tasks we examined across three experiments,

higher incentives led to worse performance.

Is this some kind of touchy-feely socialist conspiracy going on here?

No, these are economists from MIT,

from Carnegie Mellon, from the University of Chicago.

Do you know who sponsored this research?

The Federal Reserve Bank of the United States.

That's the American experience.

Let's go across the pond to the London School of Economics,

LSE, London School of Economics,

alma mater of eleven Nobel Laureates in economics.

Training ground for great economic thinkers

like George Soros, and Friedrich Hayek,

and Mick Jagger.

(Laughter)

Last month,

just last month,

economists at LSE looked at 51 studies

of pay-for-performance plans, inside of companies.

Here's what they said:

"We find that financial incentives

can result in a negative impact on overall performance."

There is a mismatch between what science knows

and what business does.

And what worries me, as we stand here in the rubble

of the economic collapse,

is that too many organizations are making their decisions,

their policies about talent and people,

based on assumptions that are outdated,

unexamined,

and rooted more in folklore than in science.

And if we really want to get out of this economic mess,

if we really want high performance

on those definitional tasks of the 21st century,

the solution is not to do more of the wrong things,

to entice people with a sweeter carrot,

or threaten them with a sharper stick.

We need a whole new approach.

The good news is that the scientists

who've been studying motivation have given us this new approach.

It's built much more around intrinsic motivation.

Around the desire to do things because they matter,

because we like it, they're interesting, or part of something important.

And to my mind, that new operating system for our businesses

revolves around three elements:

autonomy, mastery and purpose.

Autonomy: the urge to direct our own lives.

Mastery: the desire to get better and better at something that matters.

Purpose: the yearning to do what we do

in the service of something larger than ourselves.

These are the building blocks of an entirely new operating system

for our businesses.

I want to talk today only about autonomy.

In the 20th century, we came up with this idea of management.

Management did not emanate from nature.

Management is not a tree, it's a television set.

Somebody invented it.

It doesn't mean it's going to work forever.

Management is great.

Traditional notions of management are great

if you want compliance.

But if you want engagement, self-direction works better.

Some examples of some kind of radical notions of self-direction.

You don't see a lot of it,

but you see the first stirrings of something really interesting going on,

what it means is paying people adequately and fairly, absolutely --

getting the issue of money off the table,

and then giving people lots of autonomy.

Some examples.

How many of you have heard of the company Atlassian?

It looks like less than half.

(Laughter)

Atlassian is an Australian software company.

And they do something incredibly cool.

A few times a year they tell their engineers,

"Go for the next 24 hours and work on anything you want,

as long as it's not part of your regular job.

Work on anything you want."

Engineers use this time to come up with a cool patch for code,

come up with an elegant hack.

Then they present all of the stuff that they've developed

to their teammates, to the rest of the company,

in this wild and woolly all-hands meeting at the end of the day.

Being Australians, everybody has a beer.

They call them FedEx Days.

Why?

Because you have to deliver something overnight.

It's pretty; not bad.

It's a huge trademark violation, but it's pretty clever.

(Laughter)

That one day of intense autonomy

has produced a whole array of software fixes

that might never have existed.

It's worked so well that Atlassian has taken it to the next level

with 20% time --

done, famously, at Google --

where engineers can spend 20% of their time

working on anything they want.

They have autonomy over their time,

their task, their team, their technique.

Radical amounts of autonomy.

And at Google, as many of you know,

about half of the new products in a typical year

are birthed during that 20% time:

things like Gmail, Orkut, Google News.

Let me give you an even more radical example of it:

something called the Results Only Work Environment (the ROWE),

created by two American consultants,

in place at a dozen companies around North America.

In a ROWE people don't have schedules.

They show up when they want.

They don't have to be in the office at a certain time, or any time.

They just have to get their work done.

How they do it, when they do it, where they do it, is totally up to them.

Meetings in these kinds of environments are optional.

What happens?

Almost across the board,

productivity goes up, worker engagement goes up,

worker satisfaction goes up, turnover goes down.

Autonomy, mastery and purpose,

the building blocks of a new way of doing things.

Some of you might look at this and say,

"Hmm, that sounds nice, but it's Utopian."

And I say, "Nope.

I have proof."

The mid-1990s, Microsoft started an encyclopedia called Encarta.

They had deployed all the right incentives,

They paid professionals to write and edit thousands of articles.

Well-compensated managers oversaw the whole thing

to make sure it came in on budget and on time.

A few years later, another encyclopedia got started.

Different model, right?

Do it for fun.

No one gets paid a cent, or a euro or a yen.

Do it because you like to do it.

Just 10 years ago,

if you had gone to an economist, anywhere,

"Hey, I've got these two different models for creating an encyclopedia.

If they went head to head, who would win?"

10 years ago you could not have found a single sober economist

anywhere on planet Earth

who would have predicted the Wikipedia model.

This is the titanic battle between these two approaches.

This is the Ali-Frazier of motivation, right?

This is the Thrilla in Manila.

Intrinsic motivators versus extrinsic motivators.

Autonomy, mastery and purpose,

versus carrot and sticks, and who wins?

Intrinsic motivation, autonomy, mastery and purpose, in a knockout.

Let me wrap up.

There is a mismatch between what science knows and what business does.

Here is what science knows.

One: Those 20th century rewards,

those motivators we think are a natural part of business,

do work, but only in a surprisingly narrow band of circumstances.

Two: Those if-then rewards often destroy creativity.

Three: The secret to high performance isn't rewards and punishments,

but that unseen intrinsic drive--

the drive to do things for their own sake.

The drive to do things cause they matter.

And here's the best part.

We already know this.

The science confirms what we know in our hearts.

So, if we repair this mismatch between science and business,

if we bring our motivation, notions of motivation

into the 21st century,

if we get past this lazy, dangerous, ideology

of carrots and sticks,

we can strengthen our businesses,

we can solve a lot of those candle problems,

and maybe, maybe --

we can change the world.

I rest my case.

(Applause)