Jan 31 2010
Daniel Pink on What Drives Us.
Minus a minor snow storm, I gratefully arrived in Washington DC without incidence. 
Gathering with nearly 1000 other US school board members for the Federal Relations Conference, we spent the day listening to a variety of speakers. One I found particulary interesting was author Daniel Pink.
Pink started out his presentation with a simple question, “Who here didn’t have breakfast and is thinking about lunch?” A lady sitting at the table directly behind me raised her hand.
Pink walked over, handed her a bag with a bagel and orange juice, and said “Being hungry is one motivation. We eat when we’re hungry, drink when we’re thirsty, and we have sex to satisfy our carnal needs. But that’s not all we need as humans, except if you’re a man between ages of 15 to 17.”
As an example of a second type of drive, Pink then held a ten dollar bill up over his head and said “I’ll give anyone $10 if they come up here and hold my book up for 30 seconds.” A school board guy from Ohio did just that.
Pink described this as an example of a second drive – how humans respond to rewards and punishments.
But it’s the third drive that Pink spent most of the session discussing with us — the concept that people will do things because it’s interesting, because people want to get better at it, or because people inherently want to make a difference in the world.
According to Pink, the problem with business and schools is that they tend to stop at the second drive. He said too many tend to reward or punish by either offering a carrot or a stick, instead of going on to the third and most important drive.
Pink drove home his point, saying, “If you doubt the importance of the third drive, then let me ask you this: What are you doing here? — Why do you serve on a school board? You do it because it matters — because it contributes to your community.”
Pink said that studies about performance incentives show that:
- Bonuses that reward mechanical skills tend to lead to the desired outcome of increased performance.
- But, once a task calls for even rudimentary cognitive skills, rewards tend to lead to a totally different outcome – reduced performance. For creative or complicated tasks, the reward tends to narrow the focus of the task. This, according to Pink, typically reduces desired outcomes – like performance – instead of increasing it.
To build on the third drive, Pink said organizations need to provide employees time for self-directed work. He gave examples of companies that have devoting time for employee autonomy (self-directed time) and as a result have shown improved productivity. For example, he said Google provides its employees 20% of their time to do anything they want – and that almost all its good ideas have come from its “20% time.”
The session ended with discussion about the implications for education, an especially timely topic since the O’Bama administration is currently advancing teacher performance pay as a consideration for ESEA reauthorization. After listenig to Pink, the idea doesn’t sound too hot. What do you think?
February 1st, 2010 at 7:18 am
I have always in my gut resisted giving rewards for performance. The only rewards I give students I teach are praise and, as I like to tease them, “the inherent satisfaction of knowing stuff.” Mr. Pink makes sense: we see the narrowing of focus even with a rewward as flimsy as grades: students concentrate less on the learning and more on figuring out the specific and minimum actions necessary to obtain the desired grade.
I balk at teacher pay for similar reasons. If you impose a performance pay system, you’ll see a flurry of activity and paperwork, as teachers focus with laser-like intensity on the specific documents and activities they are supposed to produce to demonstrate they are meeting the performance benchmarks set. You’ll get more busy-ness. You’ll get more arguments at the end of the year as teachers argue their “grades” to prove they followed the letter of the performance rubric and “deserve” the extra pay.
You could invest a whole lot of effort in creating an equitable and practical performance pay scheme. You could make your staff jump through hoops in hopes of motivating them to become better teachers. Or you could just hire good people, pay them all a good salary, monitor them closely, and replace the underperforming teachers with better people. Which is easier for a principal and a school board?
February 1st, 2010 at 3:25 pm
I don’t think performance pay for high test scores will work. What do you do for teachers who don’t teach the 4 core classes that this counts for? Why do we want to turn teachers into test taking coaches? It absolutely rewards the wrong type of teaching and learning that should go on in a school. I’d rather see a merit pay system that ALL teachers can work toward that rests itself on the idea of a teacher trying to better themselves and being innovative in the classroom, not test scores…especially state mandated tests scores.
February 3rd, 2010 at 8:40 am
[...] Go read Fred’s whole post for more information. The first two levels are certainly nice, but the third is what pushes me to do my best every day. How about you? How about our kids? As a teacher, don’t you strive to provide learning opportunities to students that are interesting or that help them see their place in the world or that allow them to improve with 21st century skills? Aren’t those the lessons that most “grab” every kid, pushing him to learn more intensely? [...]
February 4th, 2010 at 9:53 pm
I like your thinking and I really enjoyed what I’ve read of Daniel Pink. I think you’re on to something and I’m grateful that you share your thoughts in this blog for other people to read and reflect. That’s a blessing and a gift.