The science of motivation

Written By: - Date published: 5:32 pm, May 30th, 2010 - 16 comments
Categories: Deep stuff, Politics - Tags: , ,

From the RSA, a short video based on a seminar by Dan Pink. Dan was once Al Gore’s speechwriter. Here he “illustrates the hidden truths behind what really motivates us at home and in the workplace”.

16 comments on “The science of motivation ”

  1. ianmac 1

    Tried to access AYB but failed.

  2. felix 2

    A_Y_B

    There are some non unicode quotation marks in the code you’ve pasted – that’s why it’s not showing up.

    Heh: capture = characters

  3. IrishBill 3

    Fixed.

  4. IrishBill 4

    I just watched it. Well worth a look.

  5. just saying 5

    That was interesting. Zimbardo on time perspectives. I enjoyed it but am looking forward to Dan Pink.

    This looks like another brilliant website of the TED ilk. Will look it out in the future.

    edit: I see above this was the video advertised.

  6. IrishBill 6

    Whoops. Embedded the wrong vid. Dan Pink up now.

  7. infused 7

    And that’s why people queue to work for me 😛

  8. Draco T Bastard 8

    Oh, look at that. Research and science proves that we neither want, nor need, leaders. Actually, they just get in the way.

    • infused 8.1

      Well you do, actually. Someone has to carry the vision.

      • Draco T Bastard 8.1.1

        The “vision” is carried by the people who have it and that is almost invariably not the “leaders”. Same as a capitalist is almost invariably not an entrepreneur.

  9. On the one hand, I like its message of individual autonomy, on the other hand it unfortunately makes sense for businesses to work out how to ‘divide the labour’ so that the payment incentive and operational systems are more quantifiable.

    I just had a discussion regarding incentives with a friend who is training to be a manager within the U.K. civil service. She spent six months working with highly trained accountants with an indepth knowledge of the British tax system helping them answer questions to the general public. They are highly qualified – members of the ‘professional’ class if you will. However as their work environment was a call centre, and the jobs were broken down – reduced – to atomistic parts, the individuals became essentially the rote workers as explained in this video. It sounded an awful place to work (from the perspective of a freelance web developer) yet from the businesses perspective they could guarantee a certain level and quality of work.

  10. Rieke 10

    Incentives may be a great motivational instrument.
    Of course we need acknowledgement by other people.
    For me the best motivation is, when at the end of a working day I can say: today I did my best and tomorrow I’ll see and try if I can top it.
    A challenge with myself – because success is made by myself, Motivation has to come out of myself otherwise it’s a flame which will die when lacking incentives coming from 2nd or 3rd parts.

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