Confession: Speaker attended law school in the late 1980s but did not excel or practice law.
Current Goal: To make an evidence-based case for rethinking business operations, especially in motivation.
The Candle Problem
Origins: Created by Karl Dunker in 1945.
Task: Attach a candle to a wall without dripping wax on the table using a candle, thumbtacks, and matches.
Solution: Overcoming 'functional fixedness'; use the box as a platform for the candle.
Experiment by Sam Glucksberg
Objective: Demonstrated the power of incentives using the candle problem.
Method: Two groups were timed for solving the problem.
Group 1: Timed for norms.
Group 2: Offered monetary rewards.
Findings: The incentivized group took longer, showcasing how rewards can dull creative thinking.
Broader Implications
Robust Findings: Contingent rewards work for rule-based tasks but hinder creative tasks.
Mismatch: Between what science knows and business practice.
20th vs 21st Century Tasks: Routine tasks are easily automated; creative, right-brain tasks need intrinsic motivation.
Scientific Studies on Motivation
Daniel Ariely's Research: Higher financial rewards can lead to poorer performance on cognitive tasks.
London School of Economics: Found financial incentives can negatively impact performance.
Modern Business Motivation
Traditional System: Built around extrinsic motivators (carrots and sticks).
New System: Focused on intrinsic motivators:
Autonomy: Desire to direct our own lives.
Mastery: Desire to get better at something that matters.
Purpose: Doing work for a larger cause.
Examples of Autonomy in Practice
Atlassian's FedEx Days: Encourage engineers to work on anything for 24 hours leading to innovative solutions.
Google’s 20% Time: Engineers spend 20% of time on personal projects leading to products like Gmail.
Results-Only Work Environment (ROWE): Workers have no schedules, focusing on results which increases productivity.
Case Studies
Encarta vs Wikipedia: Demonstrates the power of intrinsic motivation. Wikipedia, based on intrinsic motivators, outperformed Encarta, which used traditional incentives.
Conclusion
Science vs Business Practice: There is a critical mismatch.
Call to Action: Update motivation strategies to align with intrinsic motivators for better business outcomes.
Final Thought: Emphasizing intrinsic drives can solve modern business problems and potentially change the world.