Show Me the Money
(This one’s a bit long, but it’s an important topic. Thanks for reading.)
Continuing along with Daniel Pink’s “Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us” for one more week, let’s look at money. Where IS money in all this talk about motivation? Isn’t that why people do anything?
In a word … no.
Daniel Pink will tell you that once someone meets a certain life standard — secure housing, sufficient food, other miscellaneous amenities that we consider “basic” in our culture, money loses its attractiveness. In fact, he found that money can be a de-motivator.
Other studies bear this out. In a class on philanthropy that I teach at Eastern University I have my students read “The High Price of Materialism” by Timothy Kasser. Kasser cites a number of studies that say the exact same thing. Once people reach a threshold of a “livable wage” in their society, getting “stuff” starts to become irrelevant.
Pink goes on to say that money is remarkably misapplied when it comes to motivating behavior. In basic terms, he points out something that each of us may have tried, either as an “employee” or “employer”: paying a child to take out the trash. In the beginning, whatever you pay is like manna from heaven. The job gets done right and early. Life is good.
After a while, something happens and getting junior to roll that garbage can to the curb is a struggle. (Maybe the can gained weight?) Pretty soon, it’s actually MORE difficult to get junior to take out the trash than when you weren’t paying. The solution? Pay more, right?
Wrong … it’s a temporary fix. The motivation goes up briefly, then sinks again.
Pink’s lesson in this is that money should be used judiciously … and in his book he makes some great suggestions on how to actually make money work for you. (By the way, the only way he found that money motivates long term is with very rote, non-thinking work, like paying more for jobs where the task is much proscribed.)
Your career move this week? Consider the above in your work. Would money motivate you long term or would getting more be a temporary fix to more systemic issues in your life? I’m not suggesting that you forgo a raise or not ask for the promotion, but I am suggesting that you examine money as a factor in your career and motivation. At some level, you might find that having more and more money is a “perk” and less a prime motivator.
