The Science of Motivation?
My daughter was a Cheerleader all four years of high school. The ongoing debate about Cheerleading is whether or not it is a “sport.” What I know from attending many Cheer competitions is that it is a moving inspiring experience.
The field of personal motivation has endured under the same kind of question. Is motivation anything more that hype? Now researchers have an answer about what motivates people.
Take my real estate client Tom Nothisrealname. Tom is a highly trained technician with a graduate school degree … the kind you think would be fastidious about numbers and detail. In fact, after his analysis of his financial situation he determined that he needed such and such a house in a very specific price range.
After showing many homes I suspected that he had other motivations. I showed him a cute home in location associated with a specific lifestyle for tens of thousands of dollars over his limit. He loved it and put an offer in on it. At first I assumed Tom was motivated by extrinsic values, a “house” within his specific “budget.” In reality his motivation was a “home” that conformed to his “lifestyle.”
This is exactly what the science of motivation reveals. By in large most people are motivated by intrinsic motivations, not extrinsic motivation. In other words they are motivated by that which is meaningful to them rather than materialist incentives. They want a “home” which is intrinsic, not a “house” which is a materialist incentive. They are more concerned about “lifestyle” which in intrinsic, than they are about their “budget” which is extrinsic.
What’s interesting about this is that most businesses and other institution don’t get this. They continue to stress the incentives rather than what is meaningful; “Work hard so you can afford that new car you have pictured in your cubical” rather than “Let work together to and move our team forward.”
Intrinsic and extrinsic motivators give us clues about what drives you and me, too. My wife is a successful productive real estate broker. But what really turns her on is helping people find homes and she loves taking new agents to new levels of mastery in their real estate career. She is intrinsically motivated.
Do you know what motivates you? Are you intrinsically are extrinsically motivated.
There is nothing right or wrong about either, but knowing your motivation will help you take it to new levels. For more about the Science of Motivation see Dan Pink’s TED video at http://www.ted.com/talks/dan_pink_on_motivation.html .
Have a great weekend, See you at church, I love you – Bryan Martin
