In “Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us,” bestselling author Dan Pink tells us to forget everything you thought you knew about how to motivate people — at work, at school, at home. It’s wrong.
The secret to high performance and satisfaction in today’s world is the deeply human need to direct our own lives, to learn and create new things, and to do better by ourselves and our world.
Here’s why
Drawing on four decades of scientific research on human motivation, Pink exposes the mismatch between what science knows and what business does—and how that affects every aspect of our lives.
He demonstrates that while the old-fashioned carrot-and-stick approach worked successfully in the 20th century, it’s precisely the wrong way to motivate people for today’s challenges. In Drive, he reveals the three elements of true motivation:
• Autonomy — The desire to direct our own lives.
• Mastery — The urge to get better and better at something that matters.
• Purpose — The yearning to do what we do in the service of something larger than ourselves.
Along the way, he takes us to companies that are enlisting new approaches to motivation and introduces us to the scientists and entrepreneurs who are pointing a bold way forward.
Here’s a quick video excerpt
Learn the two simple questions that Dan Pink says can change your life in 2010: What’s your sentence? What’s better today than yesterday? Watch the video here..
Here’s what people are saying about “Drive:”
“Management guru Pink, who first made a name for himself with the New York Times best seller A Whole New Mind, elaborates on some decades-old motivational studies indicating that subjects will work more persistently to master an interesting task rather than to gain a reward.
On the basis of these well-known research results, he builds a theory of the ideal organization, one based on autonomy, mastery, and purpose, to which end he offers a “tool kit” of self-tests, suggestions, further readings, discussion questions, aphorisms, and various summaries of the book itself (including a Tweetable version).
Reviews
“Pink’s analysis–and new model–of motivation offers tremendous insight into our deepest nature.” — Publishers Weekly
“Important reading…an integral addition to a growing body of literature that argues for a radical shift in how businesses operate.” — Kirkus
“Drive is the rare book that will get you to think and inspire you to act. Pink makes a strong, science-based case for rethinking motivation–and then provides the tools you need to transform your life.” — Dr. Mehmet Oz, co-author of YOU: The Owners Manual
“Pink . . . continues his engaging exploration of how we work.” — Inc. Magazine
“Pink’s a gifted writer who turns even the heaviest scientific study into something digestible — and often amusing — without losing his intellectual punch.” — New York Post
*To hear Dan talk about his book, log on to his website to view his dates, times and places of his upcoming speaking engagements.
ABOUT DAN PINK
Daniel H. Pink is a former White House speechwriter and the author of the bestseller Free Agent Nation, A contributing editor at Wired magazine, he has written on work, business, and politics for The New York Times, Harvard Business Review, Slate, Salon, Fast Company, and other publications. He has also lectured to corporations, universities, and associations around the world on economic transformation and business strategy, and has analyzed commercial and social trends for dozens of television and radio programs. For more, visit www.danpink.com.
