
The science behind what motivates us to get up for work every day - mikesun
http://blog.bufferapp.com/the-science-of-what-motivates-us-to-get-up-for-work-every-day
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cjlars
The underlying study to this whole, "money doesn't motivate us," idea often
gets misinterpreted. What did the study actually say?

They took a group and had them perform two tasks. One was a problem solving
task that required an abstract / creative solution. The other was a mechanical
task that basically required the group to assemble widgets. The control group
was offered no money and the test group was offered a payout. The results are
well known, in the mechanical task, money was an effective motivator. People
will put more effort forth for cash. In the creative task, money negatively
impacted performace. i.e. Pressure chokes creativity.

The common interpretation misses an important confounding factor: Stress. The
cash prize for success (up to a month's salary in some of the tests performed
overseas), is stressful, and it's just as likely that stress, not money,
caused the poor performance in the creativity task.

If you give an employee a good wage and strong job security, are they likely
to feel more stressed, or less?

If we accept that stress kills creativity, then everything fits together
nicely. Mastery, purpose and autonomy make for a comfortable work environment.
So does job security. So does a fair (market) wage. I think the insight here
isn't so much that you should (or can) pay people less, but that crafting a
good work environment as defined in the article isn't expensive, or even
necessarily hard, and can produce large gains.

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dgreensp
Great article. Note that if you achieve everything in this article with
respect to your work, you may actually become the person the author sets up a
contrast with at the beginning:

 _So, here is the thing right at the start: I’ve always been uncomfortable
with the traditional ideal of the professional — cool, collected, and capable,
checking off tasks left and right, all numbers and results and making it
happen, please, with not a hair out of place. An effective employee, no fuss,
no muss, a manager’s dream._

Real heartfelt drive and professionalism, like real grief or real love, is
subtle and not theatrical. Sometimes it looks like a lack of emotion because
being unhappy with your work stirs up a lot more drama by comparison.

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ashray
Pretty interesting post. A lot of this was covered in a book I read a few
months ago, one of the best 'motivational' books that I ever came across
(because it's scientific)

[http://www.amazon.co.uk/59-Seconds-Think-little-
change/dp/02...](http://www.amazon.co.uk/59-Seconds-Think-little-
change/dp/023074429X)

~~~
PakG1
Off topic, but I bought that book, and I think it gets a little too much
credit for being scientific. A lot of stuff in there is not tested theory, but
rather conjecture. Conjecture can be scientific in spirit, yes, but conjecture
is many times not tested and scientific in practice. I felt it had too much
untested conjecture, and so doesn't deserve the hype.

~~~
d2vid
I agree, I got the book because it was recommended by someone here on HN, and
I found it full of reference to studies that I think most interested readers
would already be familiar with. Then it would take those study results and
extrapolate, leaving me thinking "wait a second, that wasn't proved at all."

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dschiptsov
This oversimplified, naive generalization-based psychology.)

Money is a weak motivator? Wrong! _Small money_ , median income, _same as
everyone_ salary - yes, this a weak motivator. I would rather do something to
improve my life, rather than wasting my precious time in a cubicle.

But let's talk about a lottery, or a mere $250k per year, and, you see, your
motivation indicator is getting hard.

The ideas of independence and mastery (as a shortest way to the prior) is
little bit closer, but, most of individual has their own individual
motivations.

Some dreams of a status-showing gadgets or a car, some dream to impress a girl
next door, or show that silly neighbors who worth what. Some like to go to
most expensive restaurants and being served like a top tier, only to go back
in a subway. There are as many individual motivators as people around.

But one of the "observations" is correct - yes, small money is indeed a weak
motivator.)

~~~
jeremyjh
I rather think status-seeking lies behind almost everything.

~~~
mattgreenrocks
Would you mind elaborating? I've thought this too; but it tends to come out
when I'm down.

~~~
jeremyjh
Its hard to give it a proper treatment here but I think its an important
topic. So I'll give a couple of links back to websites where there is a lot of
related material and where much of my current thinking comes from.

I've been reading Robin Hanson's blog for at least six years. A lot of what he
writes about relates to the topic of status-seeking motivations in disguise.
Here is a short one that is pretty decent (if a little argumentative):
[http://www.overcomingbias.com/2009/12/hiding-status-
grubbing...](http://www.overcomingbias.com/2009/12/hiding-status-
grubbing.html)

I'm not sure if this next particular article is a good starting point either,
but it is the one where the light-bulb finally went on and I realized nearly
all my own motivations are related to status-seeking (you can see my comment,
I'm "jhuffman" on this website).
<http://lesswrong.com/lw/8gv/the_curse_of_identity/>

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nine_k
Autonomy, mastery, purpose — all good for motivation beyond a certain
threshold. But money is still what makes you "get up for work" every day.
Otherwise it's a hobby.

~~~
espyb
True to a certain degree, but you could also say that money provides greater
autonomy. However there are also people who work because they choose to,
rather than because they have to, and I doubt they all consider it a hobby.
Some people may not need the money, but they need work to give them purpose,
which falls in line with the article. It's a good article, though a bit too
simplistic, as I feel that motivation is more individualistic and diverse than
what's set forth. But I think the purpose was to set forth the authors premise
in a straight-forward, scientific manner, so the simplistic nature of the
article is likely unavoidable.

~~~
nine_k
I can remember some CEOs who works for a symbolic $1/year
(<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/One-dollar_salary>). They certainly do it
because they like what they do, not because they have unpaid bills.

I still posit that most people who "go to work" consider monetary or other
material reward their work provides very important. Many of them would trade
their current place of employment to another comparable place that would pay,
say, 30% more. This probably does not matter when you earn $100k+, but most
people don't.

What is true from my experience is that paying more does not increase
motivation when autonomy, mastery, and purpose are addressed poorly. It just
feels like a more fair compensation for the pain of working in such an
environment.

~~~
refurb
The CEOs who get $1/yr have huge equity positions that mean they will receive
a serious payout if they and the company succeeds.

I'm pretty sure none of them would work at a job that the total compensation
was $1/yr.

~~~
nine_k
A founder of a startup may be _losing_ money at huge pace during the first few
years. People working for charity might do it without being paid.

But you're right, they can afford it because their material needs are already
addressed.

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enraged_camel
Actually, the part about money not being a motivator is only partially true.
Dan Pink goes into more detail about it in his book: the motivating effect of
"more money" disappears _if and only if_ the individual believes they are
getting paid fairly. But if a person believes they are underpaid then it can
seriously demotivate them.

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lhnz
I really agree with this whole Autonomy, Mastery, Purpose idea, but I also
think that it misses something very important: the emotional connection to the
people you work with and the company itself.

We are social creatures. A company which ensures that its employees form
strong bonds will have good retention.

The other thing which is important is internal competition.

I don't have any references for these things at hand so take what I say with a
pinch of salt. However, I'm fairly sure there is psychology which supports
this.

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mkeener
Was it just me that found this curious?

“Negative emotions like fear and sadness can lead to brain activity and
thought patterns that are detrimental to creative, productive work: (a)
avoidance of risk; (b) difficulty remembering and planning; and (c) rational
decision-making.”

'a' and 'b' I'll grant, but rational decision-making is detrimental to
productivity and creativity? Fear incites rationality? This seems out of place
to me.

~~~
minikites
Rational decision-making can lead you to talk yourself out of great, gutsy
ideas:

In the article about Steve Jobs at Corning re: Gorilla Glass:

> This turned Jobs around, and he said he wanted as much gorilla glass as
> Corning could make within six months. “We don’t have the capacity,” Weeks
> replied. “None of our plants make the glass now.”

> “Don’t be afraid,” Jobs replied. This stunned Weeks, who was good-humored
> and confident but not used to Jobs’s reality distortion field. He tried to
> explain that a false sense of confidence would not overcome engineering
> challenges, but that was a premise that Jobs had repeatedly shown he didn’t
> accept. He stared at Weeks unblinking. “Yes, you can do it,” he said. “Get
> your mind around it. You can do it.”

~~~
JoeAltmaier
Weeks was being a Negative Nelly. What he said was a non-sequitur. Not making
it now does not necessarily lead to not having any in 6 months. Jobs was
gently pointing that out. I suppose he could have said "Then get the capacity!
I don't want to hear excuses!" but that probably wouldn't have worked out so
well.

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magic5227
I'm pretty sure it's not science that gets people to work, just money. It got
people to work in Ancient Rome, and still does today.

~~~
mbesto
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Candle_problem>

------
captobvious
Why not just pay everyone at the company the same salary, and adjust it each
year to be 10% over the average salary.

That would

1\. take the issue of money off the table 2\. free up lots of resources spent
on navigating politics, negotiating, competing with colleagues 3\. probably
make the workplace less hostile

4\. bring out all that potential of creativity and cognitive power

It still wouldn't be a below average salary, so it wouldn't turn away the good
people.

Seriously, I can't see _one_ single reason why it wouldn't work, if people
care strongly for purpose, autonomy and mastery.

I know it's (for some reason) a huge tabu to mention this, and there's always
the immediate "but that's evil socialism!" comeback.

But seriously, I think it would actually make sense.

I know they did this at NeXT, and that it was abandon after a while, don't
know the details of why though..

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chmod775
They should have added "in 1st world countries". I bet at least half of the
world population is going to work _because they need to eat_.

Needing to find _motivation_ for work is really just a first world problem a
minor part of the population is facing

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OrdojanAndrius
Haven't read the article yet, but is it somehow related to this video?
<http://youtu.be/u6XAPnuFjJc>

~~~
biroran
Was just about to put that link. On a personal note, I find it very true.
However, I find that while not influencing happiness on the long run, salary
does determine the acceptability of a position (good people tend not to
gravitate to lower-than-average paying jobs). Once you're "hooked", it becomes
more about A-M-P then salary and bonuses (not that those hurt :) ).

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sbierwagen
Unsurprising that a management blog would conclude that paying workers less
would make them happier.

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kafkaesque
Isn't this line of reasoning

 _You need thinkers, problem solvers, people who can be creative and using
money to motivate them will not get you that_

a double-edged sword?

I understand this can be used as a reason for your employer to provide a
(better) lifestyle approach (work-life balance), but it can also mean an
employer doesn't have to pay you as much because no matter how much money they
throw at you, it still won't motivate you to work optimally or strive to be
the best creatively.

The reason why this jumped out at me is because I was in a similar situation.
I applied to a huge company I wanted to work for, gave them my salary
expectation from the get-go, and many wasted days and hours later, they
offered me the job but with a salary that was a lot less than I had asked for.
I asked if they needed further proof and mentioned that I had excelled at the
tests they had given me and surpassed their job requirements (I had all the
nice-to-haves and the required skills). They just said they were sorry I
wouldn't be taking the position, because obviously I wouldn't at that salary.
I think I would have been absolutely stellar at this position, but I wouldn't
even be able to survive on that wage.

I consulted with a few personal friends who are managers or pretty high in
their respective corporation's ladder, and they said I should feel insulted
and that they were astonished.

So, while

 _Group B, on the other hand, having never been offered money in exchange for
working on the puzzles, worked on the puzzles longer and longer in each
consecutive session and maintained a higher level of sustained interest than
Group A._

I question how this applies to the real world, where people usually are being
paid to work, and move to another job usually for better working/living
conditions and pay. Does this only apply to job-seekers who have no current
job prospects? I think most people who take pay-cuts definitely think "It
really has to be worth my while" to get paid less; variables such as
neighbourhood, commute, etc., are taken into account.

And lastly, this

 _The way our brains are built make it necessary that emotions “cloud” our
judgment. Without all that cloudy emotion, we wouldn’t be able to reason, have
motivation, and make decisions._

sounds very Nietzschean--chaotic, unorganised, 'organic'/'natural'. This may
be the philosopher inside of me talking, but this goes against a lot of my own
philosophy. It is true that there needs to be a strong enough flow
(<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flow_(psychology)>) to motivate us to do what
we like, but I don't think this occupies a large percent of the motivation
pie, if you will. I think a balance is needed and there is an initial gut
sensation of excitement that needs to be recognised, but in the end, this
excitement will wear off and one really needs to concentrate and ground
oneself in reality. According to my interpretation of Nietzsche, these
"clouded" judgments I think are very attractive to artists, and I think it
manifests itself as a sense of childishness and naivete in, for example,
(liberal) arts students. I was an arts student, before anyone jumps on me for
this. Sorry to bring this into the equation, but this type of idealism is not
suited for our times and, as arts students as witness/examples, they do not
help the working world, when they put into practice this Nietzschean concept
of passion; it seems too extreme.

I'm an emotional being, yes, but I need to balance it with rational judgment,
not clouded judgment. The less I do this, the more I recognise this as a "high
risk".

~~~
anonymous
About the money issue, it's not so bleak. As you pointed out - you have an
expectation about your salary and won't work for less. On the other hand, you
also have an expectation on how much you'll work. So you're basically telling
people "I will do X work for Y money" with X and Y being respectively the
minimum and maximum values you'll take. The question isn't for the company to
pay you more money so you'll work more, they have to pay you more money so
you'll work for them at all and that is what drives programmer prices up (or
down).

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TinyBig
This article seems a bit odd because it almost seems to dismiss money out of
hand. There must be some threshold level required to get people thinking about
the 3 "real reasons" the author specifies.

~~~
alxndresp
I remember reading a study somewhere that people are motivated and become
happier with more money until around $79k/year. I can't seem to find that
article now...

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dydreamer12
This is the video that image was taken from:
<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u6XAPnuFjJc>

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pythonbiters
i call this basic psychology

