Think Pink - What Drives Motivation?

I had the pleasure of attending the Annual Rotman Life-Long Learning Conference for Leaders May 6, 2011 at the new Ritz Carlton in downtown Toronto. The keynote speaker was Daniel Pink, past speechwriter for Al Gore, bestselling business author (Free Agent Nation). He was speaking on the topic of motivation and his most recent New York Times Bestseller, DRiVE – The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us. .

Drawing on four decades of scientific research on human motivation. Daniel delivered an entertaining speech on the juxtaposition of what we think motivates employees and what is the most effective means. This content built on the general theme of the conference, which was “How to Get Your Business Back to Reality.” Pink discussed what he found to be the three elements of true motivation – ‘Autonomy, Mastery and Purpose.’ He advised on how to set context as a leader to truly inspire employees. Contrary to traditional theories that financial reward works best – he challenged that this really works better with more mechanical work not today’s knowledge workers. Pink advised that long-term motivation and productivity is best achieved by using the three elements of ‘Autonomy, Mastery and Purpose.’ Autonomy was stressed as a key factor to allow people to do better work. The Google 20 per cent time projects policy was cited as an example of greater autonomy resulting in greater productivity and creative gains.

Pink briefly overviewed the importance of ‘Mastery’ as key to employee engagement. He advises that, “only engagement can produce mastery – getting better at something that matters to you…it is a mindset that you can always improve”. ‘Purpose’ was explained as the importance of finding meaning and context in your work. Several examples were cited of the importance of finding meaningful work with business school graduates within the first 10 years of their career and non-profits’ ability to attract highly skilled employees from the corporate sector.

Perhaps these are not brand new themes in what motivates us mere mortals to be more productive in our work. However, when these three themes are combined this does make a strong argument against avoiding too much of a focus on traditional monetary rewards in the workplace. I would add that this provides insight towards greater engagement of our Gen-Y workforce.

Patricia McQuillan

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