Wednesday 29 August 2012

"Drive" by Daniel Pink

This is a fantastic and deeply thought provoking book.


 It is to do with what motivates human beings. Pink describes the two traditional types of motivation as our biological drive (food, sex etc) and externally imposed rewards and punishments. Then he points out that these are simply not enough. Children play. Adults volunteer. Health care workers do more than they are expected to: they talk to patients, they assist nurses. This happens all the time. Clearly there is a third form of motivation. Wikipedia works because of this third form.

Then he asks how we can use this third drive in business and schools. He describes what not to do. He shows how carrots can actually demotivate in the long term. If you start paying your kid to do chores he will (a) only do the chores if he is paid and (b) see chores as inherently unpleasant and lose enjoyment from doing things. Pink says the secret is to turn work into play and suggest that what traditional motivations have done for too long (especially perhaps in schooling) is to turn play into work.  And finally Pink explains how to use drive 3.0: by giving people autonomy and purpose and by encouraging them to seek mastery.
OK, so it's not that easy. But I have made note after note in the margins and I am going to try to adapt these ideas at my school big time.

Brilliant and potentially revolutionary. August 2012; 215 pages.

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