warns that those bonuses, bribes, and rewards might be a big mistake at your office—and at home! Plus,
. And check out these
Occasionally when reading a new book, I’ll look for the most interesting chapter title and read that chapter first. If it’s unrewarding, I’ll set the book aside.
So how ironic it would be if a chapter from the new book, The Reward Trap
, was unrewarding. Trust me on this—you’ll change your thinking about rewards when you read Chapter 9, “How Do Rewards Affect Creativity?”
I love this book! In just eight pages, I found myself in the front row of a master class—learning how students (and your coworkers) approach achievement, motivation, and rewards (and maybe bribes!). Psychologists have identified two groups: those who are all about “performance orientation” and those who focus on “learning or mastery orientation.”
GROUP 1: PERFORMANCE ORIENTATION. The goals of these students “are to get high marks, to prove themselves, to outperform others, and to demonstrate their skill, ability, and intelligence. Success, for them, is about comparison, standing out, winning, or proving themselves.”
GROUP 2: MASTERING ORIENTATION. This group is “driven by something different. These students aim to understand the material deeply, stretch their thinking, and improve over time. They aren’t primarily concerned with how they rank compared to others.
They’re more interested in how much they’ve grown compared to who they were yesterday.”
And here…with all the books I’ve read (and workshops attended) I thought I knew a thing or two (or three) about motivating team members, volunteers, board members, donors, our son, our five grandchildren, and others. And…I thought I knew when reward systems work—and when they don’t.
(Oops! Back to the drawing board—and this book!)MISTAKE-MAKING! According to the author, Dr. Özgür Bolat (Harvard Fulbright Scholar and Cambridge Ph.D.), the two groups approach mistake-making from different perspectives.
• The performance-oriented group believes “a mistake is a cause for concern. They tend to hide their mistakes.”
• The mastery-oriented group sees “any mistake as an opportunity to learn and to grow.”
ASKING QUESTIONS. Did you know this? • The performance-oriented group will generally ask a question to demonstrate their intelligence to the class and make judgments or ‘show off’ their knowledge.”
• The mastery-oriented group “will ask questions to learn.”
“Regardless of whether the first group learns or not, they are happy when they receive the approval of the teacher or get high marks, especially when those marks are higher than another student. The second group, on the other hand, is disappointed if they don’t learn anything.”
Gut check! After that new info, Dr. Bolat then coaxed me into reading this entire book (fascinating!) with this question:
“Which orientation serves our children best?”WAIT…WHAT? While much of the book’s research on the efficacy of rewards are from the classroom and from parenting (all ages through college), there’s a ton of practical information and insights applicable to your workplace. Example:
THE BRIBE EFFECT! The author posits two workplace scenarios. “Your manager calls you with an offer.” Which one would you take?
•
Scenario 1: “We have an important project on the horizon at work. I think you would be a great fit with your experience and skills. Are you interested?”
•
Scenario 2: “We have an important project on the horizon at work.
I plan to give a bonus to the one who agrees to work on the project and I think you would be a great fit. Are you interested?”
Noting that Scenario 2 is a big mistake managers make, the author explains: “Most people would choose the first option. Why?
The bonus offered in the second proposal gives the hidden message that the project is negative in some way and requires the extra financial incentive to compensate for its unattractiveness. It might even mean that the proposal the manager is offering brings more value to the company that it does to you.”Dr. Bolat explains with this classroom example: “…children are offered rewards for the books they read.
Those rewards give the message that reading is not fun in and of itself. We see this same pattern not just in schools and offices, but also in entire societies. Even governments have unintentionally proven how offering rewards can backfire.”
Hilarious! Dr. Bolat visited a classroom where a “well-meaning teacher” had created a reading incentive program. Each book read = one sticker. Ten stickers = a toy.
Yet one boy starting gaming the system and “read” only picture books! “Another stopped mid-novel when he realized he had already reached his sticker quota. Finally, one bold child asked,
‘If we’re not getting stickers anymore, do we still have to read?’” Dr. Bolat: “The reward had become a trap.”
(Did I mention? This is a fascinating book.)FAVORITE CHAPTER: “How Do Rewards Affect Creativity?” (Chapter 9). The author believes that
“Creativity is one of the most important twenty-first century skills. Most managers want employees in their organizations who are creative thinkers, and most teachers want creative students. What we see, however, is that although children may be encouraged to be creative in school, we do not generally raise creative children.”
This reminded me of the statement from Sir Ken Robinson in the book,
Little Bets: How Breakthrough Ideas Emerge From Small Discoveries (
read my review):
“We are educating people
out of their creativity.”
Yikes! Dr. Bolat’s research notes this: “Most teachers claim they want creative students in their classrooms, but it turns out those creative children are not their favorite students. On the contrary,
the creative students are usually the least favorite students. They're the ones who get labeled as disruptive, hard to manage, or ‘too much.’”
Really? “In an effort to preserve classroom order, many teachers, often unconsciously, reinforce compliance and obedience over creativity. One of their primary tools for this is reward. And get this: Harvard professor Teresa Amabile, “a leading expert on creativity,” has concluded that
“children offered rewards tend to show less creativity in their work.”Reward Warnings! Prof Amabile also notes, “…children are more likely to describe a task as ‘work’ if they are offered reward, and more likely to label it as ‘play’ if no reward is offered.” (Attn: Parents, Teachers, and Managers: read this book!)
THERE’S MORE: • Performance-oriented children “are more likely to experience anxiety, avoid asking for help, rely on surface-level study strategies, and even engage in self-sabotaging behaviors.”
• “Their fear of failure can also lead to increased test anxiety and a higher risk of academic dishonesty.”
• But
only mastery-orientation “supports both well-being and long-term success.”
LOL! My unresearched suggestion: “Thanks for your interest in applying for our office accounting position. Here’s my first question: Did your second grade teacher offer you rewards for reading books?”
DON’T SKIP: • Why performance-oriented students pick the easy jobs.
• Why rewards contribute to “
cognitive tunneling” or “
inattentional blindness.”
• This metaphor: “Rewards act like a flashlight…” but “creativity needs a lantern…”
• The emotional side of creativity: “
broadening” and “
narrowing.”
• The research results with college students working on creative tasks—such as producing drawings or ad slogans.
Per the expert judges, “…the non-rewarded group consistently outperformed the rewarded group.” • How the theory of “
cognitive dissonance” relates to a study called “the worm-eating experiment”—when rewards send the wrong message.
I hope you’ll read this book and—NO—I’m not going to give you a reward sticker for reading it! This new book reminded me of some old friends (books) on creativity, including
Little Bets,
Creators, and
Entrepreneurial StrengthsFinder.
TO ORDER FROM AMAZON, click on the title for
The Reward Trap: Why Rewards Backfire and the Real Science of Motivating Kids, by Özgür Bolat. And thanks to the publisher for sending me a review copy.
YOUR WEEKLY STAFF MEETING QUESTIONS:
1) Dr. Bolat says he wrote The Reward Trap “because I want children to grow up feeling loved without needing to earn it. I want parents to know there’s another way.” Yikes! Would it be prudent for our organization to review our bonuses, “bribes,” and other rewards and incentives currently in place?
2) "When Could Rewarding Be Appropriate?" In Chapter 16, the author mentions he suggested to a governor that instead of offering a computer or a tablet as prizes for a story-writing contest, they consider a shift. "Instead of gadgets, maybe you can offer all three winners access to different prestigious writing courses in the UK or the USA." Does that give us any ideas for our "rewards" system in our organization?
SECOND READS: Fresh Solutions From Classic BooksYou have changed—and your problems have changed—since you read this the first time!Book #62 of 99: Tribes: We Need You to Lead UsFor your team meeting this week, inspire a team member to lead your “10 Minutes for Lifelong Learning” session by featuring Book #62 of 99 in our series, “Second Reads.” The big idea:
REREAD TO LEAD! Discover how your favorite books (and articles) still have more to teach you and the people you’re coaching and mentoring.
Tribes:
We Need You to Lead Us
by Seth Godin (Oct. 16, 2008)
Seth Godin, bestselling author of
Poke the Box,
This Is Marketing, and other books, says there are three steps in tribe work: motivating, connecting and leveraging. His real-life examples: adrenalin-starters! His pithy bursts of wisdom: memorable.
“My friend Fred has a new book coming out and he was trolling around for marketing ideas. I think he’d be surprised at this one: Sell one.”
•
Read my review (Issue No. 127, Feb. 16, 2009).
• Order from
Amazon.
• Management Bucket #2 of 20:
The Customer Bucket.
Oh, my! One word, one paragraph, not even one page can adequately describe Seth Godin’s epistle on leadership—because it’s more about marketing. No, it’s about tribes. No it’s about the Internet and factories.
No, it’s about how leaders build communities (tribes, again) and focus on true fans versus thousands. Well, actually it’s about heretics, nonprofits, faith, religion, Steve Jobs, unicorns, and the
Printing Bucket—and how movements are looking for leaders—and how you can lead your tribe (I think).
Aw…forget it. I can’t really explain this book, but I’m going to read it at least twice. You should too.
CLICK HERE FOR BOOKS BY JOHN
View the video summary (9 minutes) of “Mistake #6: Prioritizing Convenience Over Generosity. I failed to inspire and give permission for the staff to call audibles.” See the workbook, Mastering Mistake Making: My 25 Memorable Mistakes—and What I Learned (10 Minutes for Lifelong Learning Workbook), by John Pearson with Jason Pearson.
NOTICE! Issues No. 1 to 657 of Your Weekly Staff Meeting (2006 to 2025), previously archived on Typepad.com are slowly (!) being moved to this new blogsite: John Pearson's Buckets Blog.
