Why Great Employees Don’t Stop Working Hard – They Stop Believing It Matters
Motivation Is More Fragile Than We Think
For decades, companies have been trying to find a way to get employees to be more motivated.
Some have tried to raise salaries, others have tried bonuses, employee-of-the-month plaques, team-building exercises, pizza Fridays, wellness programs, flexible schedules, or free coffee in the office (and the coffee is the cheapest one imaginable).
Every few years, a new management theory comes along, promising to revolutionize the workplace and unlock the secrets to engaged employees. Despite all this, it seems disengagement is still the norm and burnout is rampant. People are leaving well-paying jobs for seemingly little reason, while at the same time, refusing to budge from lower-paying ones.
What gives? What does it all mean?
The popular answer is simple: money is the most important motivator.
On paper, it makes intuitive sense. People need money to survive, and more money usually means more luxuries. Seems logical, seems good. The problem is it’s only half true!
Money is an important motivator, surely, but it’s a motivator for getting a job, not for doing a good job. This is an outstanding distinction, because most companies don’t have trouble finding people willing to do the work. Getting people through the door is the easy part.
Finding people willing to go above and beyond, solve problems, hone their skills, help out their coworkers, and really care about the job – now there…THERE’s your real challenge. Those things can’t be bought, and no, the old adage of “everyone has their price” doesn’t actually work.
You’ll soon find out that as you increase the salary to keep up the good work & dedication, it goes up and up and up, becoming unsustainable. Then, sensing a shiver down your spine and a feeling of dread, you will quickly realize it was never about the money…but now you’re in the red.
Money Isn’t the Villain, and It Never Was
Before diving into the subject matter, it is important to dispel a common misconception that often surrounds discussions of motivation. In many cases, articles on the topic present the premise as a choice between paying employees well and providing them with motivation at work.
In some cases, they go so far as to list “ways to motivate employees without spending money.” This is not an accurate perspective, however, as fair compensation is a necessity, and not a variable that should be bargained with.
- If someone has to pay rent, cover utilities, feed their children, and buy groceries, motivation is most definitely not a priority.
- If people are aware that they are significantly underpaid in comparison to their peers, motivation is not a priority.
- If salaries barely see an increase from year to year, while workloads and expectations remain steady, motivation is not a priority.
In all of these cases, money is the determining factor in an employee’s attitude and performance. It is an obvious point, but one that is often overlooked by management in favour of other, less effective, motivators.
Money may not solve every problem, but it certainly helps in many cases. Few other motivators hold as much power when it comes to financial concerns. Therefore, it is plain to understand that fair pay is the foundation upon which motivation is built, rather than the other way around.
Or, to put it in less academic terms: you cannot simply replace a raise with a pizza party.
The Difference Between Showing Up and Caring
One reason this myth was born is that compensation really does change behaviours.
Pay someone more, and they will be more inclined to join your company. Offer someone a substantial bonus, and they will be motivated to perform better so that they can receive it. This is known as extrinsic motivation, and it works. Extrinsic motivation is real, and it is important. Without it, few individuals would willingly commit to forty hours of unpaid work each week.
However, once a person’s most basic needs are met, additional increases in compensation motivate them less and less. That’s where intrinsic motivation comes into play.
Think about it:
- Why is it that some people always seem to seek out better ways of doing their jobs while others are quite happy to do the tasks that are simply required of them?
- Why do some teams manage to stay enthusiastic about their work while others burn out at the same salary?
- Why do some talented individuals choose to stay in their current position at a lower wage rather than move to a new company?
- Why do some employees remain deeply committed to an organization despite receiving offers with higher salaries elsewhere?
- Why do people willingly go above and beyond for one manager, yet do only the bare minimum for another?
This is the motivation that comes from within. Once people stop thinking about how money affects them, they start to think about how their work affects them.
People will rarely change their behaviours for a different paycheck if they feel that there is no impact beyond whether or not they can afford the food on the table and a roof over their head.
If they do not feel that their work has meaning, that they are contributing to something bigger than themselves, that they matter, then they are unlikely to put in extra effort.
Motivation Is Not a Transaction
Perhaps the easiest mistake to make when it comes to motivating employees is thinking it can be bought. It can’t.
Companies often act as if motivation is something they can hand out like another type of compensation: raises, bonuses, employee recognition, wellness programs, benefits packages.
Now, to be clear, all of these are important, but none of them are motivation. Motivation comes from somewhere else. It comes from the relationship between what employees put in and what they feel they get out: trust, opportunity, recognition, respect, growth, autonomy, fairness, meaning.
It all adds up when you think about it. When employees feel as if they are no longer getting what they believe they deserve in return for their efforts, it doesn’t just affect their opinions of the company. It has a direct impact on their willingness to put in that effort in the first place.
It happens gradually, almost imperceptibly at first.
- People stop trying to contribute.
- They stop experimenting.
- They stop advocating for their ideas.
- They stop caring.
- They stop advocating for their ideas.
- They stop experimenting.
None of these things occur because they’ve decided the work itself isn’t worth it, but because they no longer feel it is.
That, in the end, is the real reason for any drop in performance: not a change in the work itself, nor a shift in the challenges they face, but a feeling that the effort it takes for the rewards isn’t worth it.
A far easier way to think of it is that people rarely stop working because they’re doing something hard. They stop working because they’ve decided the rewards for getting it done aren’t worth it.
What Actually Keeps People Motivated?
If fair payment is the basis, what else is missing?
This is a question many psychologists and economists have asked for decades. Their main focus has been on finding the correlation between motivation and pay. The different perspectives have led to different conclusions. However, almost every theory boils down to one main idea, which, funnily enough, is also true for almost every aspect of human life:
People will only stay motivated if their work continues to satisfy certain criteria.
One of the theories, which has some strong points, is the Self-Determination Theory, or SDT for short. It focuses a lot on the quality of motivation.
Edward Deci and Richard Ryan, the psychologists who came up with it, believe that researchers should not think about motivation being high or low. Instead, the emphasis should be on the type of motivation a person is showing.
Intrinsic and Extrinsic Motivation Aren’t Opposites
Most people have heard of the concepts of intrinsic and extrinsic motivation.
To keep matters brief, the former refers to one’s inner drive to engage in an activity, whereas the latter is one’s desire to engage in an activity to gain some reward from outside.
While the ideas behind this division are not wrong, they are often misinterpreted since those who promote this view suggest that intrinsic motivation is good and that one should only strive for it. In contrast, extrinsic motivation is presented as bad, and one should even go so far as to actively shun it.
In reality, the truth, like people, is more nuanced and multifaceted. Few people are driven purely by one factor alone, and their motivational factors are usually intertwined and cannot be easily decoupled.
- If one wants to become a competent software developer, one has to study and learn the subject matter regardless of any rewards that society offers. However, most developers choose this career solely because of rewards and benefits, such as high pay, opportunities to work remotely, and job stability.
- Similarly, few nurses engage in their work purely for personal satisfaction, and most are motivated by the desire to help others, coupled with the ability to earn a comfortable income.
- While some salespeople might love what they do and find fulfillment in building relationships with clients, most aim for career growth and the additional income that comes with it.
- Likewise, many teachers enter the profession because they genuinely enjoy educating others and making a difference in young people’s lives, but they also expect stable employment, career progression, and compensation that reflects the importance of their work.
From an employer’s perspective, the best course of action is to make sure that their employees’ extrinsic motivations are well taken care of so that their work does not become a chore and they can continue bringing their best performance on the job.
Autonomy Creates Ownership
One of the most effective ways to predict long-term motivation is surprisingly simple: people want some level of control over how they work.
Autonomy does not mean having no accountability or being completely independent in all aspects of work, but rather, having enough freedom from a controlling force to feel trusted in making decisions without being dictated at every step.
Think about the difference between two contrasting office environments.
- A well-oiled machine; everyone knows their place, what is expected of them, and how to do it.
- A loosey-goosy environment, with laid-back guidelines, but more trust & confidence in their employees to figure out how to get the work done, even in a crisis.
Both have equally competent workers, but which one do you think has the potential to create truly motivated employees?
Well, let’s answer this question by saying ownership breeds motivation. People who have a sense of ownership in their work are more likely to think beyond what is asked of them and how they can make a difference. They see a problem before it is brought to them and take initiative in fixing it. They think beyond their job title and do the work because they want to, not because they are told to.
As can be seen, this has absolutely nothing to do with accountability or lack thereof, but rather the feeling that they have a personal investment in what they do.
Trust fosters a sense of ownership, and that leads to motivation, or in a more modern-worded take: people want to feel that they have a say in how they do their work.
Mastery Makes Improvement Rewarding
Think of any skill that you’ve learned over the past weeks, months, or years: driving, cooking, programming, writing, teaching, or playing an instrument.
At first, you were most likely, probably not very good. You must have made lots of mistakes, and the work was hard, but THEN…then something magical happened. You started to get better. Things that were once hard became easy, and problems that seemed impossible became doable.
This stoked a warm feeling deep inside, and your brain got hit by wave after wave of dopamine as you neared the solution to your challenges. The feeling only got greater as you saw yourself improving. Psychologists call this urge to improve mastery.
Many companies fail to realize how important mastery is. Most people don’t just want a job. Some do, but eventually, after many dreary eves pass, even such individuals crave more.
- They want a career
- They want to learn and grow
- They want to be challenged
- They want to become experts in their field
- They want to get better every day
If you stop challenging your employees, you’ll start to see a drop in curiosity. They’ll still be putting in the hours, but they’ll feel like they aren’t really accomplishing anything, and your ambitious employees will get hit much harder by this than the average staff member.
That’s why companies that invest in making sure their employees are constantly learning and improving usually see much more than just an increase in technical skills. They send a message to their employees that they care about their future.
In other words, employees are much more likely to stick around if they feel like they’re constantly improving.
Purpose Gives Effort a Reason
There is this phrase that most people never actually get to experience and is uttered in almost every mission statement: “Our people are our greatest asset!”
(If good taste would allow it, they’d add 3 !!!, and then the next company would do 4, and soon it would turn into an !-measuring contest)
Purpose, as a concept, has followed suit much in the same way, sadly. It has become one of those hollow words that is overused in the corporate world, to the point it has become a meme.
It is lamentable because a sense of purpose is one of those things that can be incredibly motivating for people. Purpose doesn’t necessarily mean that you’re doing something that will change the world. It just means that you know why you’re doing what you do.
- A customer service rep who helps angry customers return products
- An engineer who makes the widgets that people use every day
- An accountant who keeps the company’s finances in order
- A janitor who ensures that the hospital is a clean environment for its patients
- An IT technician who keeps the systems running so hundreds of colleagues can do their jobs without interruption
- A warehouse worker who ensures that products reach customers accurately and on time
They might not all be earth-shattering jobs, but they all have value, a sense of purpose, meaning, and impact on the world. What’s important is to realize that the thing they’re doing isn’t just something that they do for the sake of it. It needs to be something that they do for a reason, a purpose – that’s when it becomes transactional: do this for me, and I’ll give you that.
It’s not a bad system, and there’s nothing wrong with it. For some people, that’s all they need. For many people, though, eventually, it becomes dissatisfying. They stop caring about doing the thing and start caring about why they should do the thing. That’s when the “I just want more money” becomes a problem. That’s also when people stop thinking about the task at hand and start thinking about why they should even care about it.
It’s much harder to answer that question with a raise because money can’t achieve that. It can’t tell you why you should care about what you do. It can give you a reason to do it, but not a reason to care.
Money talks to your wallet. Purpose talks to your soul.
The Hidden Motivators Organizations Overlook
By now, you should already know that motivation is not produced by a single source. It is generated through a multitude of interactions, and it can be created or destroyed by hundreds of tiny occurrences. Pay and perks matter, as does autonomy, professional development, and purpose.
However, there are additional factors that have a significant impact on an employee’s motivation and engagement in the workplace in the long run. The crucial point is that these factors are rarely mentioned during job interviews: they are usually discussed in exit interviews.
Fairness Builds Trust
Imagine two similar employees: same salary, similar-ish work, equivalent ratings. Yet, out of the two, one always seems to get the plum assignments, public praise, endless cheer, and opportunities for promotion.
Now, the question at hand becomes: how long until the other begins to ask pungent, uncomfortable questions? Not long, I’d wager.
This is due to the fact that one factor stands out as an extremely powerful motivator: the perception of fairness.
Fairness in the workplace goes far beyond pay, as important as that is. It is the great equalizer, and it also entails consistency in how decisions are reached for things such as promotions, assignments, workload, kudos, mistakes, and communication.
People may be willing to accept outcomes they do not like, but they are much less tolerant of confusing circumstances. When it comes to explaining a decision, transparency seems to have an enormous impact on whether people will accept it. Give people enough information that they can understand a choice, even if they are not happy about it, and they will be much more likely to accept it than if they are in the dark and suspect something negative might be lurking.
When employees begin to feel as if they are getting less than they deserve, it is rarely productive to argue the point directly. Compensation issues, for example, are often emotional affairs, in which employees are apt to ask themselves not only how much they are being paid, but whether they are being treated fairly. By that, they often mean, how does my employer feel about my contributions?
Compensation is one of those tell-tale signals of how much value a company feels like it is getting out of its employees. The company is constantly sending out signals via compensation levels, and the truth is often hard to disguise, even when no one is discussing it openly.
Recognition Validates Contribution
Recognition is one of the most misunderstood concepts in modern management.
Many companies have turned it into a token, almost-jokey gesture: a monthly award, a thank-you note, an article in the company newsletter, a gift card.
While all these things may have their value, they fail to address the most important aspect of recognition: the simple fact that people care whether what they do matters. Recognition is valuable because it reassures employees that their work has not been in vain.
It is a response to the question “did what I do actually make a difference?” which is especially important when talking about demanding, difficult jobs.
“If I put my heart and soul into a challenging task and, when it finishes, nothing is said about it, does it mean it was not worth doing? Maybe it does not matter to me, but most likely, it will affect my motivation to do similarly demanding work in the future.”
Recognition is valuable because it reassures employees that someone has noticed and that what they do matters to somebody. It should be noted, however, that recognition, in many ways, is a tool that can only be used effectively in a good workplace.
If the company culture is unhealthy, and employees feel like their work is not valued, recognition gestures will do little to reassure them. They will see them as hollow tokens, attempts to manipulate them.
Recognition cannot fix rotten foundations. It cannot compensate for constant underpayment or lack of appreciation. It should not be used in bad faith, as a way to cover up management’s mistakes.
In simple, clear terms: pizza parties don’t fix broken workplaces.
Progress Is One of Motivation’s Strongest Fuels
Think about the last time you went all out trying really hard on some project. Now imagine there are two possible outcomes:
- You see results. Things are coming together. You are improving. Things are getting done.
- Despite your best efforts, things seem to get nowhere. One week seems much like the next. Problems arise, often in the same places. Goals appear ever distant, and your efforts seem to vanish up the memory hole, never to be remembered again.
Which would make you feel better? Which would make you want to keep working? How do we feel when we are reminded that too many workplaces are inadvertently creating the second situation for their employees?
Too many of us are working without the benefit of seeing the value of our efforts. Studies on worker motivation have shown that a sense of making progress is one of the most important factors in influencing positive emotional reactions toward work. That doesn’t mean we should expect huge leaps forward or giant achievements.
It means that people need to see some form of forward movement to feel good about what they do. It could be small steps. It could be baby steps, but people need reassurance that they’re actually getting somewhere. Some progress makes people feel their work has value. Without it, everything seems pointless.
That’s why effective leaders acknowledge and celebrate progress all the time, not just when people reach the end goal. It’s not that people don’t need goals or don’t care about rewards, but because forward movement answers the silent question, “Are we really getting somewhere?“
As long as the answer is “Yes,” then people can remain motivated. When the answer starts to sound more like “I’m not sure,” then well…that can be demotivating.
People don’t need to finish the race each and every week. They just need to know they are still running towards the finish line.
Burnout Isn’t a Motivation Problem
Burnout is often attributed to something that happens when employees “just lose their motivation.” That’s a reductive view of what it means to experience burnout. It isn’t that sudden; it usually results from a slow process of exertion with decreasing perceived psychological return.
The workload increases, or the rewards for said work decrease, and the worker’s relationship with their work deteriorates. People begin to feel ineffective, powerless, unable to accomplish the things they think are important, even if their work itself doesn’t change.
People who suffer from burnout continue to perform their tasks because they feel like they have to, not because they feel like it has meaning or value. Most people can handle hard projects, long working hours during important periods, unexpected problems, and high levels of responsibility. What they can’t handle is feeling like all of their hard work is wasted, stagnant, irrelevant, or unnoticed.
When companies have people who are burned out, the default question is rarely “how can we incentivize these people to perform better?” but rather “what made them feel so devalued in the first place?” These are two completely different lines of inquiry with very different solutions.
Final Thoughts
This article started with a simple myth: money is the greatest motivator.
Like many myths, this one has a grain of truth. Money does matter – it satisfies basic needs, reduces stress, attracts people to the organization, and indicates whether the company cares about its employees. In other words, ignoring the importance of money would be foolish.
However, it is only one factor influencing workers’ motivation. A more critical source of motivation is an individual’s perception of their work and how they are treated within the workplace.
Employees are more likely to be motivated if they realize their efforts make a difference, they improve themselves, their performance is valued, they can rely on their colleagues, and they are not stuck doing the same tasks. Such motivation is fragile, as it takes care to create the aforementioned circumstances.
Many people think of motivation as a binary indicator: either individuals are motivated to work, or they are not. In reality, motivation is more of a continuum. This is why people need to feel their contributions are worthwhile, and they can rely on their colleagues. Organizations should focus more on nurturing a culture in which employees understand that their work matters. It will enable them to achieve greater productivity as motivated individuals will be more likely to go above and beyond.
In today’s exceptionally modern times, there is no reason organizations shouldn’t strive to make employees feel that both money and non-monetary aspects of work are adequate. After all, people are unlikely to quit doing their tasks because they do not enjoy them. They are more likely to leave if they perceive no value in their efforts. People only experience dissatisfaction when their efforts do not provide them with rewards they want. Therefore, an organization should ensure that employees feel rewarded both intrinsically and extrinsically.
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