I’ve been reading, watching and listening to a lot about motivation lately. Not intentionally but once you start thinking about what motivates people to create, to participate, to get involved it starts to show up in places you don’t expect it. Sometimes I got looking for it too. Over and over I notice the same theme, it’s not about the money. Sure money is important up to a certain point, but after that you need something else.
In times like these when we are asked to do more with less this is something managers should keep in mind.
One of the videos I watched is this TED talk by Dan Pink on the surprising science of motivation. He talks about the mismatch of what science knows about motivation and what business does. Essentially as long as you’re paying people adequately and fairly, money is no longer the most powerful motivation. Watch the video and maybe buy the book
There are a lot of interesting points, here is one of my favorites:
“Results Only Work Environment. The ROWE. Created by two American consultants, in place in place at about 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.”
What do you think? If more money wouldn’t motivate you, what would?
Librarian by Day 
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