Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us

The most important central idea of Drive is that human beings are most effectively motivated not by external rewards and punishments but by their intrinsic need for autonomy, mastery, and purpose. The earliest economic systems relied on basic biological drives to motivate work—people needed food and shelter to survive, and they had to work to get those things. As societies became more prosperous and survival less precarious, that “Motivation 1.0” system evolved into one of largely monetary rewards and punishments—“Motivation 2.0.” Pink argues that this system, too, is becoming obsolete, and that the economic system of the future must rely on intrinsic motivations, or what Pink labels the “Third Drive.” When we are driven by intrinsic motivations, we do not need to be bribed by rewards or threatened by punishments because the task itself is inherently interesting and rewarding. This same motivation drives children to experiment and explore, artists to create, athletes to exercise, and software engineers to devote hours of time to creating new projects for free. Pink spends the first section of Drive proving the existence and effectiveness of intrinsic motivation, and the second section breaking down what elements are needed to help intrinsic motivation thrive.