Drive – The Surprising truth about what Motivates us

Carrot and stick – reward and punishment- is an age old technique for getting things done by others. The corporate world has adopted this mantra almost as the panacea for employee motivation. But Daniel Pink tells us a different story.  He says, carrot and stick works well only when the task is algorithmic (well defined steps), it loses its effectiveness for tasks that requires even little bit of thinking and creativity.

In today’s world most high-tech jobs have lots of ambiguity and demand lots of creativity in order to perform them well. According to Pink, the employers need to start thinking different ways for motivating these knowledge workers. When an employee gets sufficiently enough money to take care of their lives, additional money (reward) doesn’t help increase the performance. Then what does? Autonomy, Mastery and Contributing to a bigger purpose are the three factors motivate human beings to do their best. Autonomy is the sense that I have control over my work. Mastery means I am learning new things; I am gaining expertise. Contributing to bigger purpose gives people the fulfillment that I am being part of something much more significant, something that makes a difference in the bigger community.

Daniel Pink also sheds some light on why the bi-annual review system doesn’t work as expected – It’s not frequent enough, it talks about the past and it’s not driven by the employee. What is the solution? Give the ownership to the employee. Let them find out how they want to grow (gain mastery); give them autonomy on their performance measurement. If the companies and the employees become too myopic and tie the sense of growth only with promotion and bigger salaries then they will be missing a whole lot of smarter solutions for intrinsic motivation and higher performance!

Here is a link to Daniel Pink’s
Video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9j2aTwNor5k (51 min) and
Book: http://www.amazon.com/Drive-Surprising-Truth-About-Motivates/dp/1594488843

Questions for YOU -What are you taking away from this post? How will you apply this in your life? [please feel free to write that in the comments section.]

 

 

 

The Silly Brain that makes hasty decisions

Monday morning @8:35AM: My daughter Farheen is supposed to be at her breakfast table 5 minutes ago. She comes downstairs with a long face, “Mommy, my bracelet is missing”. My tension rises, if she doesn’t head out in 10 minutes she will be late for school. My voice is about to go up…, just in time another thought stops me - if I do this now she may be in school on time but I will feel miserable the entire day.  I take a deep breath and assure her that I will see about it if she eats first. As she starts the reluctant bites I tell her a little story that goes like this:

There is a part of our brain called “Amygdala”.  Amygdala is pretty quick in making decisions; it’s all about emergency situations. With very little information it can call an emergency and shuts down everything else so that the person can handle the situation immediately. Its very vital for us when there is a real emergency. Only down side is, many times it’s a false alarm; since the other brain parts like “Hippocampus” is not allowed to think, the person won’t be able to realize that it is not such a big deal. A perfect example is this bracelet situation; just not seeing it in its usual place has made the amygdala jump into the conclusion that the bracelet is lost forever! And hence anything else including getting ready for school has to be postponed before this is resolved.

I take a pause to check on her. Having some food in the stomach, a  sweet, shy smile appears on that little face! Phew, the morning emergency is handled gracefully.

Later in the night Farheen finds a brain sketch in the book by my nightstand and spots the word amygdala. “Hah ha Mommy, it’s that silly brain”, becomes her takeaway of the day (and mine too)!

PS: In the evening when in a much relaxed mood, Farheen actually found the bracelet in another drawer.

Reference: Emotional Intelligence – Why it can matter more than IQ

Already off track for your New Year’s Resolution? Find out how to do better

Found this statistics – almost all Americans make a new year’s resolution. The bad news is that half of them break their new year’s resolution by January 2 and more than 90% of those resolutions are forgotten by April 1.

So if you are having hard time keeping your resolution you are in the majority group. If you want it otherwise here is some food for thought.

Take a look at the bigger purpose you had for your New Year’s resolution or goal. Purpose is the soul of goals and goals are the means by which you express your purpose in the world. If your goal is to go to the gym 3- times a week, find the bigger purpose that lead you to this particular goal. Here is how you can do it:

Find some quite time and think through these questions. Write down the answers in a good place for you to revisit from time to time.

1.  What is that I want to achieve by getting to this goal? (Setting the Intention)
2.  When I achieve this (Intention) what will be different for me?
3. How will it be if I don’t achieve the desired Intention?
4. What are some possible ways to achieve this Intention? (Hint:There is always more than one solution!)
5. Which ones are closer to my natural ways? Pick one or two.
6. What would be a baby step to get started? Example: I will take a 15 min walk during lunch time tomorrow.
7. What do I need to sacrifice to implement the baby step? Example: (Have courage to) Say “no” to any work during the lunch time.
8. Evaluate: Did I take the baby step? What worked? What blocked? How I felt afterwards? What do I know about me now? What is my next baby step?

When setting the Intention (#1 above) keep in mind that motivation depends on 3 things: Autonomy, Mastery and Bigger sense of Purpose. You are more motivated when one or more of these elements are present and vice versa. If you have a bigger problem than getting physically fit, you may need to address that one first before making a futile attempt of going to the gym. Have the courage to be honest with yourself, and the resolution will naturally follow!

 

Read more:

Business on purpose: The soul-goal connection
Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us

Why does it bother Me?

Few years ago I volunteered as a treasurer in an organization. My motivation was to build some skill in accounting work and to get engaged with the leadership team. It was going well for the most part. The reason I say “most part” because from time to time one particular member was giving me unsolicited advice on how to do my job. At first I tried to ignore her, but eventually, it pushed me over the edge.  I needed to do something about it! Being relatively new to the team I decided to talk to someone I trusted.

Fortunately this trusted member was a coach. She agreed with me that the other member wasn’t particularly demonstrating a high standard. Then she asked, “Why does it bother you so much”?  I felt indignant, “What do you mean!  She is constantly advising me on how to do my job and you are telling me that it’s wrong to feel bothered!”  This was my immediate reaction.  I didn’t say it out loud though.  I brought that feeling and the question home.  I vented with a friend and got some empathy.  As my emotions calmed down, I started thinking about this question, “Why did it bother me so much?”

Someone did something, and it was my choice to bring it to close to my heart.  Question is why I brought it to my heart … unless I had provided a place for it. Being a treasurer I was stretching myself to prove my competence. May be I was implicitly seeking approval from others about my performance.  When I got advice instead, I immediately concluded, I was not doing a good job.  Since I was not considering myself to be good enough, I was highly sensitive to any external sign supporting that belief!

What a discovery!  It bothered because I actually had the critic inside me. Now I have something to work on. Thank you my friend for asking the hard question — “Why does it bother you?” Since then it has become an essential tool for me to dig out the root cause of my feelings whenever someone’s behavior affects me significantly.

There is always more than one solution!

We are having a record amount of snow fall here in Seattle. My little girl is having the fun of her lifetime, snowball fight, making snowman, sledding, you name it! Though I was little lazy initially, now I am enjoying it too. Even shoveling seems to be fun. This afternoon when I was trying to clean up the driveway my daughter wanted to do it too. With having only one shovel, taking turns seemed to be the only choice we had.

My daughter busy with shoveling

But I was getting little nervous as it would be hard to finish the work before evening. At first I thought I will just be the parent and ask her to play instead. Seeing her so engaged with the shoveling work made me pause and think. I decided to borrow another shovel from one of my neighbors, and thus made it a mother-daughter “shovel-the-driveway” fun activity!

It made me think, how hard was it to go for the other solution? Not much, when I had the focus on having a fun family time and not just on the task at hand. Thanks to the rare Seattle snow to make me remember this little thing – there is always more than one solution, getting too attached to only one may give us a less-than-optimal outcome!

Empowering Language – Lighten up your life with this simple technique

 

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Language is power.  When we speak, we exercise the power of language to transform reality. —Julia Penelope

What we say and how we say it impacts our own experience and the experience we have of other people in our life.  Our communication has an impact not only on a cognizant, mental level, but also at many subtle levels.  Words convey underlying messages to our subconscious mind, evoking physical, emotional, mental and spiritual meaning for others and for us.

Some words and phrases are less empowering (or effective) than others.  For example, say the following phrase to yourself: "I have to stop at the bank on my way home".  Pay particular attention to the phrase "have to", which is a way of saying that you have no choice. 

Now, try saying this instead:  "It’s important for me to stop at the bank on my way home".  Notice that changing ‘have to’ to ‘It’s important for me to’ feels more powerful and/or more inviting for you.

Any word or phrase that implies lack of freedom tends to feel disempowering or ineffective.  That perspective invites a feeling of victimization, which is then reinforced by a cycle of more disempowering or ineffective language.

Here are some tips for Empowering Language:

Instead of saying this…	Empower yourself and others by saying…
I should…	I choose, I want, I could…
I need to, I must, or I have to..	It’s important to me to…
I can’t …	I choose not to, I’m unwilling to, what works for me is to…
Absolutes like always, everybody, and never	Sometimes, often, seldom, some people, many
But (I see what you mean, but I don’t agree.)	And (I see what you mean, AND I don’t agree.)
I’ll try…	I will, I intend, I’m aiming for…
Yeah, uh-huh, or nah, nope, unh-unh	Yes or no (be direct)

 

 Start using these in your daily conversation and see the difference it creates in your life!

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Courtesy: Invite Change

 

 

Live a Creative Life

[I have recently read this book, The Power of TED* The Empowerment Dynamic. I am writing a synopsis to share the wonderful concepts with my readers. This is the second and last part of my write up. This adresses the "Creator Orientation and The Empowerment Dynamic (TED)". Part 1-Victim Orientation and Dreaded Drama Triangle(DDT) can be found here. ]

My friend once wrote in her facebook status “I know what I don’t want but I don’t know what I DO want”.

 She spoke for many.  Most of the times we know what we don’t want, what we want to avoid and what problems are causing us troubles. How about having shift from this and focus into “what we want” instead? According to the book, The Power of TED* the empowerment dynamic, this mindset is called the Creator orientation.  Creator orientation is a refreshingly positive shift from the very well known Victim orientation. A Creator focuses on the result and the end goal – they are motivated by their inner passion to achieve their goal. They design their path and take baby steps towards it. Even though they encounter problems on their way, their true focus towards a greater goal empowers them to face those “problems” as positive challenges to overcome and at the same time utilize them as learning experiences.

The TED model describes two other roles, a Challenger and a Coach. A Challenger is the TED counterpart of Persecutor and a Coach is that of the Rescuer from the DDT model. A Challenger, as the name suggests is someone or some situation that prompts the Creator to act. A Challenger can be either a constructive or a deconstructive force. For example: if your workplace is going through a downsizing, exerting pressure on the employees to perform more and more, this might serve you a wakeup call to check in if you are really committed to this job and lets you do some serious thought on your passion and priorities. In this example the particular situation of downsizing may seem to be negative but still may work as a powerful influencer for a Creator. All the life’s experiences are teachers in some sense, challenging us to grow and evolve. Although the Persecutor certainly provokes a reaction, the Challenger elicits a response by encouraging a Creator to acquire new knowledge, skill or insight. Both roles initiate change, but in different ways.

A Coach helps the Creator to attain their goal; the main difference of a Coach with a Rescuer is that a Coach, unlike the Rescuer, treats others as Creators and thinks them as whole, capable and resourceful. A Coach supports and empowers the Creator and sometimes may offer few suggestions but doesn’t get upset if the suggestion is not taken. A Coach doesn’t tell the Creator what she should or shouldn’t do. Instead he asks a lot of good questions and listens deeply to what a Creator is saying as she thinks, probes and explores. A Coach is constantly alert to possibilities that may be invisible to the client. They say “I am going to stand beside you, no matter what”, they don’t say, “Let me fix it for you” which is the approach of a Rescuer.

Living as a Creator is not at all easy, people can easily fall back to their familiar life thinking it is hard, but only those who can “see” the significant  difference of being in charge of own life(what I DO want) vs. falling victim of outside circumstances can have the rare experience of the exciting ride of a creative life.