Daniel Pink

It's saying, you probably want to be innovative, so let me just get out of your way and let you be innovative.

That's a very different approach to motivation.

I think that's true at one level, but I also think that human beings... Listen, human beings are complex.

We're motivated.

We have biological motivations, okay?

We drink when we're thirsty and we eat when we're hungry.

That's a motivation.

Human beings also have a reward and punishment motivation.

So if you say to me, Dan, I'm going to go pay you $100 to go stand out in the street corner and tap your head, I'm going out the door right now.

We respond well to rewards and punishments.

But human beings also have other motivations.

The drive to do things because they're interesting.

The drive to do things because they matter.

The drive to do things because we get better at them.

The drive to do things because they contribute to the world.

And what the science shows is that you've got to pay people enough.

You've got to pay people enough.

If you don't pay people enough, you're not going to have any realistic motivation.

But once you pay people enough, external rewards like that, contingent rewards, if-then rewards, don't play that big of a role in high performance.

What really plays a role in high performance, once you pay people enough, is giving them freedom,