The surprising truth about what motivates us

It's really interesting to understand what drives people to do wonderful stuff. Take a look at this animated video adapted from Dan Pink's talk at the RSA 1).

The conclusion by Dan Pink is that as long as you pay people enough salary to keep the topic of money off the table, there are 3 things that REALLY drive people to innovate and come up with new ideas;
- Autonomy - give people a frame and a goal to work towards - don't micro-manage
- Mastery - people wants to get better at stuff and master new disciplines
- Purpose - people wants to make the world a little better place to live in
Unless those 3 things are in place, it doesn't matter how much bonus you throw at people...

So, what can you do after listening to this talk?

Well, make a new start at your own  company today.
Present the concept for your group or department. Make sure you have your clear goals of what you want to achieve. Target the broken down goals for your specific department. What is your group supposed to aim at in order to support the overall top company goals?. If you're in R&D it could be to lower the cost of goods sold, improve the performance of the product, or to reduce the manufacturing time or lead time etc.. If you're in an economy function it can be about how you can improve your most important financial KPIs. Everybody can do this.
Start with a 1-day workshop, and repeat that every 3rd month. Increase it to a 2-day workshop if that workds better for your kind of work. Let people work on and present new ideas and concepts on whatever they think is interesting during 24-48 hours. Then invite sales and management when the group is presenting all their new ideas; each group has 15 minutes and a 5 minute session for questions. Make it a party! Celebrate! Afterwards, go through and analyze all new ideas and put the best ones into the plan or road map. It's amazing what people can come up with. I tried this concept.Not only does it works, it's big fun too!

Here are some suggestions when discussing with your group what could be good to keep in mind when coming up with new ideas or trying to improve on already existing methods;
- Consider with new (unprecedented) connections between cause and effect - ask stupid questions!
- Simplify!
- Experiment and do simple prototypes; there's nothing like trying out things in practice.
- Re-use or re-visit earlier failures; sometimes a new approach under new conditions can change things.
- Have patience!

Here is the book by Dan Pink: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Drive-Surprising-Truth-About-Motivates/dp/184767769X/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1337465566&sr=1-1

 

And, here is the link to the full presentation by Dan Pink at RSA. Enjoy!

1) The RSA (Royal Society for the encouragement of Arts, Manufactures and Commerce) is an enlightenment organisation committed to finding innovative practical solutions to today’s social challenges.