My leadership journey started when I was four years old and
I told my parents that I wanted a baby sister. About a year
later, my twin brothers were born. They worshipped me from
day one, so at first, leading them was pretty easy. They
would run to get things for me, do things so I wouldn’t have
to, and just generally made my life easier. But as they got
older and more independent I had to get a little more
creative about getting them to obey me.
This is my brothers and I. I think I was around eight in
this picture, making them around three.
Eight year old Emma figured out pretty quickly that for
whatever reason, if I made a convincing case that I was
enjoying doing whatever chore I didn’t want to do, one of my
brothers would leap into doing it. There was a lot of, “Oh
you wouldn’t want to sweep the floor, it’s a big kid job.”
And “I’m not going to let you put away the toys because it’s
too much fun.” Little did I know that this injection of
intrinsic motivation was pretty much genius on my part. It
also has a name: “The Sawyer Effect.”
In the book Tom Sawyer, young Tom skips class one day and is
punished by being forced to whitewash his Aunt Polly’s
fence. As he is completing the task, boys his age are
mulling around. When they ask Tom what he is doing, he tells
them that he’s having a great time whitewashing the
fence, and it’s the most he’s enjoyed anything
in a long time. Eventually, Tom has the boys trading him
items for the “privilege” of getting a turn to
whitewash the fence. Behavioral economists call this tactic,
“The Sawyer Effect.”
Scientists have known about the value of intrinsic
motivation for quite some time. In the 1970s, Mark Lepper,
David Greene and Richard Nisbett
did an experiment on a bunch of preschoolers who liked to
draw. They broke them into three groups. They told the first
group of kids that if they continued to draw they would get
a reward–a blue ribbon. They didn’t tell the
second or third group anything about any rewards, but they
gave the second group a reward for drawing anyway.
The group that got the unexpected reward and the group that
got no reward kept their love of drawing. When observed a
couple weeks later in free play, both groups were observed
drawing. The first group, however, stayed far from the
coloring utensils. The scientists, by rewarding their
drawing, had made it seem more like work. They sucked all
the fun out of drawing.
If this concept seems familiar, it’s because my group
presented on a very similar point for our chapter on leading
with energy. Cashman makes a similar point that without
passion, we are not motivated to get anything done. As
leaders, we must be sure to explain to our team that what we
are doing matters.
In his book, Drive, by Daniel Pink, Pink adds that there are
basically three main intrinsic motivators. Autonomy: doing
something because you are choosing to do it. Mastery: doing
something because you want to prove that you have the
ability to figure it out. And purpose: doing something
because you believe in the bigger reason behind doing it.
(Think blood drives.)
So I think most of these intuitively make sense to us. The
only one that’s a little weird is mastery. Why would
you do something just to do it?
In 1949, Harry Harlow did an experiment with some monkeys
that did not involve teasing them with a fake cloth mother.
He gave them little puzzles and just left them alone.
They expected that the monkeys may try to play with the
puzzles, or try to to eat the puzzles. They figured that
without any reward there was no way they would try to solve
them. But they were wrong. Most of the monkeys had the
puzzles solved in less than 60 seconds. The scientists were
astounded but the point was made. Intrinsic motivation
prompts us to do things just because we can.
Still not convinced? I don’t blame you. Our society
stubbornly clings to a system of carrots and sticks. And
that’s because in some contexts, carrots and sticks do
work. But basically what scientists have found is that
rewards narrow our focus. If we are working on a task with
one clear solution and an easy path to get there then a
reward will speed up the process. But if we are working on
anything with any level of outside the box thinking
needed–a reward will slow us down. Daniel Pink
explains this concept really well in his Ted Talk.
Let’s take an example. Does anyone remember Microsoft
Encarta? Basically Microsoft, a big and well-established
company, decided they wanted to make an encyclopedia. They
hired a huge team of accomplished writers to write the
entries and a team of managers to make sure everything got
done. And it did. Unfortunately, nobody really used it.
Wikipedia, an encyclopedia made up of entirely
voluntary contributions, is the most widely used
encyclopedia in existence today and caused
Encarta to go under in 2009.
Even Google understands the value of intrinsic motivation
and giving its employees autonomy. At Google, every Friday
is given to workers to work on anything they choose. The
company gives its employees complete control of 20% of their
time. And from that 20% has come Gmail, Google News,
AdSense, and much more.
So for me, this journey has meant that I, as a leader, need
to pay much more attention to how I am inspiring my team to
do things. In the past, I have always stepped into a
leadership role in group projects and activities, but
I’ve mostly just delegated responsibilities. In the
future I will try to get to know every group member and give
them a task that is meaningful to them and has purpose.
One Comment on ““Say, Tom, let me whitewash a
little.””
This whole post really resonates in me. We really do
live in a society that rewards EVERYTHING. At my
parents home I have boxes and BOXES of trophies that
ultimately mean nothing because they’re
“participation” trophies (translation: I
showed up to more than half the time). I know you have
to tread much more lightly with children (their
fragile self esteem blah blah blah) but yeah, even in
my own life I see myself expecting rewards for normal
or mediocre things.
Take the ASU grade system. if you do the homework
correctly, you expect an A, right? FALSE, merely
completing the assignment “satisfactorily”
is actually “C” level work. To get an
“A” under the original system takes
outstanding effort and performance.” One of my
professors stuck to this old system and it almost
killed all the “A” students in the class
(including me)!
This whole post really resonates in me. We really do live in a society that rewards EVERYTHING. At my parents home I have boxes and BOXES of trophies that ultimately mean nothing because they’re “participation” trophies (translation: I showed up to more than half the time). I know you have to tread much more lightly with children (their fragile self esteem blah blah blah) but yeah, even in my own life I see myself expecting rewards for normal or mediocre things.
Take the ASU grade system. if you do the homework correctly, you expect an A, right? FALSE, merely completing the assignment “satisfactorily” is actually “C” level work. To get an “A” under the original system takes outstanding effort and performance.” One of my professors stuck to this old system and it almost killed all the “A” students in the class (including me)!
Lesson learned!