Motivation vs. Removing Obstacles
As is clear in his notorious 14-points, Dr. W. E. Deming was adamantly opposed to the use of motivational incentives by management. He saw goals, targets, performance evaluations, and pay-for-performance schemes as destroyers of the system of people. He said the correct function of management is to “remove obstacles to joy and pride in workmanship”. I have suggested that the very ideas suggested by motivational theory might be best abandoned. My suggestion is one of those ideas that I think of as bordering on the edge of chaos. It challenges conventional thinking and pushes our thinking envelope.
In this post I use an engineering analogy to explain how the idea of motivation may lead us in the wrong direction.
Note: For the sake of continuity, I have created a new category called “Motivation” that gathers my blog posts on the subject so that readers can look back at previous entries on the subject.
I am a great fan of John McPhee, who writes a good deal about the contradictions produced by the hubris of technologists who push buttons, pull levers, drive bulldozers, and otherwise bully our environment by “motivating” it to fit our needs and desires. The following analogy was inspired by the essays included in his book, “The Control of Nature“, which I commend to your attention.
Analogical argument in favor of repurposing organizational management
Imagine that there two engineers who have been tasked to come up with a plan for getting water to a location called B from its current location called A.
Remove obstacles to the flow
Engineer 1 is an ambitious fellow. He draws up a plan to move the water in a straight line by motivating it up and over mountains using pumps and siphons. He argues in favor of his plan by saying that by “motivating” the water he can direct it along the shortest and most reliable path to point B.
Engineer 2 is an older and wiser fellow. He proposes a much longer path that follows a gravity line from A to B. His plan does not require pumps or siphons. He argues that, by understanding the behavior of water, he can gently channel it to point B. He has no need to “motivate” the water. He only needs to understand how it behaves and REMOVE OBSTACLES to the flow.
The designs of both engineers will likely achieve the target outcome (RFP specs) in the short run but, keeping in mind that neither will be perfect, which theory — to motivate the water or to let water’s inherent behavior do the work — will set in motion the fewest contradictions (problems) in the longer run?
Of course, people are not water. People flow uphill!
