Concept
Motivation 3.0
Motivation 3.0 is Daniel H. Pink's name for an approach to work built on the inner drive to direct our own lives, get better at things that matter and serve a purpose, rather than on the rewards and punishments of what he calls Motivation 2.0.
In Drive, Pink compares a society's assumptions about motivation to a computer's operating system. Motivation 1.0 was survival. Motivation 2.0 added the drive to seek reward and avoid punishment, and it still runs most workplaces through targets, bonuses and penalties. Pink argues that this fits routine work with clear steps reasonably well, but fits poorly with work that needs judgement and creativity. Drawing on decades of research, notably Edward Deci and Richard Ryan's self-determination theory, he describes a third drive and builds Motivation 3.0 around its three elements: autonomy, mastery and purpose. He contrasts Type X behaviour, fuelled mainly by external rewards, with Type I behaviour, fuelled by the satisfaction of the work, and argues that Type I can be learned. Motivation 3.0 does not mean ignoring pay: fair base pay comes first, so that money stops being the issue. The size and reach of some of the research findings are still debated, so the framework is best treated as a strong tendency to test in your own team, not as a law.
A real-life example
The head of a logistics start-up in Mersin noticed that her dispatchers worked hard on new routing problems but slowly on anything tied to a bonus target. She kept pay as it was, removed the per-route bonus, and let the dispatchers choose which routing problems to tackle each week, as long as delivery times held. Delivery times improved in the following quarter.
How to use it
- 1List what drives the work you manage and mark which items are rewards for targets and which come from the work itself.
- 2Check that base pay is fair before changing anything else, so that money stops being the topic.
- 3Ask, for each key task, whether it has known steps or needs judgement, and design incentives accordingly.