A new way of thinking is coming from a surprising source. And it could help to eliminate risky behaviour.
Common reward strategies can create a culture of risk taking and questionable ethics, but a new way of thinking is coming from a surprising source. John Hilton interviews motivation expert Dr Jason Fox for his insights.
MPA: Why are the classic strategies of rewards and fist-pumping not as effective in motivating employees as they used to be?
Jason Fox: The trouble with rewards is that they are effective at generating motivation for specific behaviours. Rewards work, tremendously well. And that’s the problem.
You see, rewards can work so well that other activities unrelated to the reward become overlooked. Sometimes, these are the things that are far more important – yet harder to measure, quantify and track. And so what we see is the downfall of creativity, collaboration and organic communication. We see narrowed focus, more risk taking and a higher likelihood of unethical behaviour.
And this, in turn, can breed a culture of entitlement. Take the rewards away, and you’ll often remove the motivation too. What’s better? Just remove money from the equation. Pay well above average, and focus your efforts on making the work inherently motivating. As for fist-pumping? Hey, whatever floats your boat. Just don’t confuse excitement with motivation.
MPA: How did you arrive at the conclusion that the workplace can learn something from online gaming?
JF: The big online game developers invest millions of dollars into game design. They build these games to be engaging – their business model is served by having more people spending more time playing their games. There’s a lot we can learn from this.
This all struck me whilst in the midst of my PhD research in motivation and behaviour. Even though I was lecturing on the topic of motivation at multiple universities, and even though I had a heap of important goals… I found myself playing a lot of video games. It was ridiculously ironic: “Motivation expert addicted to video games.” One game in particular had me making potions for strangers. It was highly repetitive work, and yet for some reason I persisted through it. There were also periods of intense challenge – we’d strategise for days in the lead up to them, and I’d be on the edge of my seat during them, and we’d debrief in detail after them.
It was only when I was moving house and away from the internet for a while that I realised the grip this game had on me. And from that day onwards I’ve been taking what works from game design and combining it with motivation science and agile leadership to make progress happen in the real world.
MPA: Why do people have more focus, creativity and engagement with online gaming than they do in the workplace?
JF: It’s not just online gaming. It’s all gaming. Board games, sport games, roleplaying games – have you seen how obsessed people are with sport? The strategy, the planning, the focus and engagement… it’s immense.
But the thing that unites all games is a clear sense of progress. This is the very same factor that was recognised as the number one breakthrough idea from the Harvard Business Review in 2010. A clear sense of progress correlates with the highest levels of motivation at work (which makes a lot of sense – we’re more inclined to invest our effort into things that contribute to a clear sense of progress).
In games, the latency between effort and meaningful feedback is low. Feedback loops are tight, and so we have a clear sense of progress.
The biggest thing we can do to enhance motivation in the real world is to make progress visible. De-emphasise the focus on goals and success, and instead focus more on systems and progress.
MPA: Do you have any key tips for brokers looking to increase motivation and progress at work?
JF: Yes, too many for this short piece. But if you’ve made the effort to make progress visible (a Gantt Chart or sequenced checklist is a great place to start) the key tips are:
JF: I wouldn’t say it is necessarily superior – but it certainly is more future-proof. Innovation is usually progressed and strengthened from a diversity of inputs. Innovation thrives in collaborative cultures, where the focus is on what’s good for the team, group or company.
But, having said that, performance can thrive within competitive environments. It’s just that we need to be very careful that performance doesn’t get in the way of progress. The key is getting the motivation design right.
Ideally we’d foster a forward-thinking, collaborative work culture where ideas are shared freely. This would then nest elements of fierce competition, and yet the boundaries would be clear – people aren’t competing against each other, but against themselves, or their team’s previous performance. This then taps into our sense of mastery – a powerful driver of intrinsic motivation.
MPA: Why are the classic strategies of rewards and fist-pumping not as effective in motivating employees as they used to be?
Jason Fox: The trouble with rewards is that they are effective at generating motivation for specific behaviours. Rewards work, tremendously well. And that’s the problem.
You see, rewards can work so well that other activities unrelated to the reward become overlooked. Sometimes, these are the things that are far more important – yet harder to measure, quantify and track. And so what we see is the downfall of creativity, collaboration and organic communication. We see narrowed focus, more risk taking and a higher likelihood of unethical behaviour.
And this, in turn, can breed a culture of entitlement. Take the rewards away, and you’ll often remove the motivation too. What’s better? Just remove money from the equation. Pay well above average, and focus your efforts on making the work inherently motivating. As for fist-pumping? Hey, whatever floats your boat. Just don’t confuse excitement with motivation.
MPA: How did you arrive at the conclusion that the workplace can learn something from online gaming?
JF: The big online game developers invest millions of dollars into game design. They build these games to be engaging – their business model is served by having more people spending more time playing their games. There’s a lot we can learn from this.
This all struck me whilst in the midst of my PhD research in motivation and behaviour. Even though I was lecturing on the topic of motivation at multiple universities, and even though I had a heap of important goals… I found myself playing a lot of video games. It was ridiculously ironic: “Motivation expert addicted to video games.” One game in particular had me making potions for strangers. It was highly repetitive work, and yet for some reason I persisted through it. There were also periods of intense challenge – we’d strategise for days in the lead up to them, and I’d be on the edge of my seat during them, and we’d debrief in detail after them.
It was only when I was moving house and away from the internet for a while that I realised the grip this game had on me. And from that day onwards I’ve been taking what works from game design and combining it with motivation science and agile leadership to make progress happen in the real world.
MPA: Why do people have more focus, creativity and engagement with online gaming than they do in the workplace?
JF: It’s not just online gaming. It’s all gaming. Board games, sport games, roleplaying games – have you seen how obsessed people are with sport? The strategy, the planning, the focus and engagement… it’s immense.
But the thing that unites all games is a clear sense of progress. This is the very same factor that was recognised as the number one breakthrough idea from the Harvard Business Review in 2010. A clear sense of progress correlates with the highest levels of motivation at work (which makes a lot of sense – we’re more inclined to invest our effort into things that contribute to a clear sense of progress).
In games, the latency between effort and meaningful feedback is low. Feedback loops are tight, and so we have a clear sense of progress.
The biggest thing we can do to enhance motivation in the real world is to make progress visible. De-emphasise the focus on goals and success, and instead focus more on systems and progress.
MPA: Do you have any key tips for brokers looking to increase motivation and progress at work?
JF: Yes, too many for this short piece. But if you’ve made the effort to make progress visible (a Gantt Chart or sequenced checklist is a great place to start) the key tips are:
- Develop and maintain good rituals around progress: These sacred routines are what keep you on track.
- Tackle projects in sprints: Work cannot be infinite, and we work better in bursts of productivity rather than long marathons with no pause.
- Seek rules and constraints: Contrary to the popular fluff and folklore around positive thinking, if you get deliberate about understanding the barriers and obstacles aged, you’ll be better equipped to deal with them when they arise. This will result in more motivational ‘reserve’ to get you through.
- Calibrate challenge: If you’re avoiding a task, chances are it’s so challenging that it’s making you anxious. Take this opportunity to recalibrate your approach by reducing the challenge (or the friction between you and the challenge) somehow.
- Compress challenge: Some tasks are so mundane and boring that they don’t get done. In this instance, compress the amount of time allocated to them, and set yourself a challenge of completing these tasks within a given time frame. (I tackle my email this way).
- Remove the friction: Between where anyone is and where we want them to be, there is a whole heap of friction: things that get in the way. Wherever possible, we need to reduce complexity, and make activities conducive to progress easier to engage in.
- If in doubt, bring it back to progress: It’s the key element that sustains motivation. If your motivation is lagging, step back and find the sense of progress in the bigger picture, and then zoom in and work up a simple list of actions for the day.
JF: I wouldn’t say it is necessarily superior – but it certainly is more future-proof. Innovation is usually progressed and strengthened from a diversity of inputs. Innovation thrives in collaborative cultures, where the focus is on what’s good for the team, group or company.
But, having said that, performance can thrive within competitive environments. It’s just that we need to be very careful that performance doesn’t get in the way of progress. The key is getting the motivation design right.
Ideally we’d foster a forward-thinking, collaborative work culture where ideas are shared freely. This would then nest elements of fierce competition, and yet the boundaries would be clear – people aren’t competing against each other, but against themselves, or their team’s previous performance. This then taps into our sense of mastery – a powerful driver of intrinsic motivation.
Dr Jason Fox is a motivation strategy and design expert who works with senior executives and boards to make clever happen. He is the author of The Game Changer – learn more at www.drjasonfox.com
