Pink is the author of the best-selling book ‘Drive: The Surprising Truth of What Motivates Us’, a study that argues long-held conventional beliefs in human motivation are actually hampering effective, high performance.

This is a continuation on my series of posts that discusses the intrinsic needs of employees in a new social environment that is increasingly connected through digital means and how businesses can relook its stance on employees’ engagement in social media and derive positive branding opportunities along the way. Pink’s works and ideas have been a huge recent inspiration and motivation for me to continue discussing the need of social engagement through digital means, especially within organisations, in achieving business objectives.

Now what exactly does science knows and business is doing wrong?

Monetary Rewards Do Not Guarantee Performance for 21st Century Work

Here’s the gist of Pink’s argument on what really motivates us, based on scientific findings from a Dan Ariely study sanctioned by the Federal Reserve Bank of America :

The Scientific Solution

In brief, Pink argues the solution to better and effective performance from modern employees are rooted, not in increased monetary rewards, but in providing the right conditions for these three intrinsic motivational factors to take shape:

There are a lot more discussions that can be had based on Pink’s arguments and these scientific findings, including parallels that I am developing in my mind for my own arguments that social connectivity through digital means will aid in providing these intrinsic motivations for employees (for eg. social media providing us with the control to direct our personal and professional communications (Autonomy) and the abundance of real-time information on social media and on the web that can help all of us get better at our work (Mastery)).  But let’s keep that for later.

For now, what better way than to have Pink explains his argument to you in person. Here’s Pink’s hilarious talk at TEDGlobal fully discussing the inspiration behind Drive with case studies and anecdotes.

This next video is a helpful rendering of the same motivation argument made by Pink. Using ‘on point’ caricatures, this visualisation is a great tool to easily understand and absorb Pink’s refreshing perspective on what motivates us.

Connect with Pink on social media via Twitter