Motivation at work can be increased by focusing on autonomy, purpose and competence. Autonomy allows employees to feel in control of their work. Having purpose means employees understand how their work helps others. Competence involves providing training and supporting employees' learning goals. Choice architecture and reducing queues also impact motivation. To stay motivated, individuals should identify the parts of their work they love, or "red threads", and spend 20% of their time on these activities. Regular check-ins with employees help them incorporate red threads into their daily work.

1. Workplace Motivation: People, Process & Products
Influencing Positive Behavior Change with
Psychology + Technology
- Matt LeVeque, KF Fall ’22

2. Leadership Topic: Workplace Motivation
Let’s put a little put a little 'MOJO’ back into your work experience!
Motivational Drivers
Motivational Work Design
Motivation + You

3. Workplace
Motivation:
Motivational Drivers

4. mo·ti·va·tion Defined
mo·ti·va·tion
/ˌmōdəˈvāSH(ə)n/
1. the reason or reasons one has for acting
or behaving in a particular way.
2. the general desire or willingness of
someone to do something… (they love). Intrinsic Motivation refers
to the act of doing
something that does not
have an obvious external
reward.

5. Stages of Motivation
Humans have an innate drive to be autonomous, self-determined and connected.

6. 01
02
06
03
05
04
What Drives Motivation?
Underlying drivers and concepts that influence Motivation.
Areas of Focus
• Self-Determination Theory
• Autonomy
• Purpose
• Competence
• BJ Fogg Model
• Habits + Prompts
• Choice Architecture
• Product Queues
Motivational
Drivers

7. Self-Determination Theory
‘When people can determine how they work, the means to judge their progress and the feeling that their work helps
other people, they can’t help but be motivated to get to work.’ – David Burkus
Psychologists Richard Ryan and Edward Deci, developed the Self-Determination Theory (SDT) of motivation, which toppled the dominant belief that
the best way to get human beings to perform tasks is to reinforce their behavior with rewards.
Autonomy
Purpose
Competence

8. People are Motivated by Autonomy
People like to be self-sufficient, to feel that they are doing things on their own with minimal help
from others.
Autonomy motivates people because it makes them feel in control.
TIP: If you’re often giving
advice or telling people how
to do something, you could
be diminishing their sense
of autonomy.

9. Design for Workplace Well-Being. On Purpose…
Encouraging purpose in work is much more effective,
not only for staff well-being, but also for productivity,
health, and reducing absenteeism—all things that
companies would care about.
‘Purposeful and meaningful work improves other peoples
lives in some way’. – Barry Schwartz
Reputation
I am proud to work
here!
Connection
I enjoy the work!
Purpose
My job has
special meaning!
Lower employee turnover by satisfying these
top needs of workplace well-being.
Being a part of something bigger than oneself…
TIP: To increase purpose at work, give
people very timely and salient
feedback that what they are doing is
important and tell them why.

10. Competence: Motivation-Achievement Cycle
Reciprocal relation between learning (competence) and motivation – not too easy, not too hard
Workplace Competence
Do I have the training to do my job
well?
Do I have the confidence and ability
to complete the assigned tasks?
Do I have learning goals?
Does my manager support those
goals?

11. The Paradox of Choice (Architecture)
Don’t be Salad Dressing*
‘Some choice is better than no choice, but more choice is not necessarily better than some…’ – Barry Schwartz
TIP: When developing backlogs, surveys, drop-
downs lists, etc. with multiple items, limit the
number of choices to help users feel less
overwhelmed and make the best choice.
Leverage Choice Architecture!
*Paradox of Choice TedTalk

12. Persuasive Technology + Developing Habits
Designing for Behavior Change
TIP: Use Prompts to influence
behavior change to:
#1 Help people do what they
already want to do
#2 Help people feel successful
TPX Research: Flex Activation Failures
by Theresa Murzyn uses the Fogg
Behavior Model in her analysis.

13. Death by Queues…
Eliminate product development queues
When engineers and developers can complete work quickly and pass tasks on to the next waiting process,
they are motivated, feel a sense of urgency and accomplishment.
1. Queues increase cycle
time and delay costs.
2. Product Development
risk increases as Queue
Size increases.
3. Product development
process become a lot
more variable as queue
sizes get larger.
4. Queues increase
process costs.
5. Queues reduce
quality. They delay
feedback from the
downstream
processes.
6. Queues are
demoralizing and
demotivating.
TIP: Where avoidable, don’t create long demotivating queues!

14. Motivational Drivers Take-aways
Activity + Refection for Everyone…
Autonomy
How much autonomy do
you provide your team
with:
ü Their tasks?
ü Their time?
ü Their techniques?
ü Their ability to make
decisions?
Purpose
What is your purpose?
Do you contribute to
achieving your purpose?
Does the work you or your
team do improve the
lives of people in some
way?
Do you connect with your
team in meaningful
ways?
Competence
Do you know what it is
that each of your team
members wants to
learn?
Do you recognize them
for achieving learning
goals?
Do you provide
continuous learning
opportunities?
Choice
Limit choice to help
teams feel less
overwhelmed.
Are choices presented in a
way that impact
decision making?
Work with defaults to
influence response
quality.
Don’t be salad dressing!
Habits
What opportunities are
there to create habit's an
nudges into products
and processes?
Are you helping people do
what they already want
to do?
Do you make people feel
successful?
Is your product designed
for success?
Queues
Can you reduce the
amount of work in
backlogs?
Recall the negative
effects queues have on
teams:
üIncreased cycle time
üDelayed cost
üHigher variability
üLower quality
üLess motivation

15. Workplace
Motivation:
Motivational Work
Design

16. How good is your job?

17. Herzberg’s Two-Factor Theory
The Two-Factory theory proposes that work must be enriched to successfully utilize,
or motivate, personnel.

18. Job Characteristic Model (JCM)
The J. Richard Hackman & Greg R. Oldham job
characteristics model helps make the jobs at any
organization more varied, challenging, and
motivating.
It consists of five job dimensions:
• Skill variety
• Task identity
• Task significance
• Autonomy
• Feedback
The core job dimensions are linked directly to the
critical psychological states and desirable
outcomes.
Designed to improve Intrinsic Motivation

19. JCM: Motivating Potential Score
How to measure the greatness of a job…

20. What Makes a Good Job?
https://mymojo.works/survey/

21. MOJO Survey Example
https://mymojo.works/survey/

22. A Good Job Defined…
“A good job is one where you feel seen for being the best version of
yourself; you sense that your colleagues have your back; you don’t
feel discriminated against based on your gender, race, or sexual
orientation; you feel your position is secure; and you have
confidence that you’ll get help navigating constant changes in the
working world.” – Marcus Buckingham
https://hbr.org/2022/09/what-is-a-good-job

23. Workplace
Motivation:
Motivation + You

24. Motivation + You
Do I feel like someone cares about me at work?
Do I have a chance to do something I love everyday at work?
I am at my best when…
You can rely on me most for…
What do you love to do?
What are your red threads?
Things to consider…

25. 28
PODCAST: LOVE+WORK Launch with Marcus
Buckingham and Harvard Business Review
• R I C K R I O B O L I Q 2 P E O P L E L E A D E R S M E E T I N G
Engagement & Retention
• Only 18% of people are engaged at work …compensation only explains 2% lack of engagement
• Two most powerful questions that relate to engagement, collaboration, and innovation
• Do I feel like someone cares about me at work?
• Do I have a chance to do something I love everyday at work?
• Life is not something to get through…life comes at you everyday. Life is a fabric of multiple
colors…. and some are red threads …. that you love to do.
• When people are doing the work they love at least 20% of every day, they are 10x more likely to
be engaged and 17x more resilient at work
• 73% of people say they have freedom in their job, but 23% use it. The highly engaged people
take that freedom to do what they love with 20% of their time
• Think of career as scavenger hunt for loves (not a ladder or lattice) … it’s not about climbing, it’s
about finding the work you love

26. 29
PODCAST: LOVE+WORK Launch with Marcus
Buckingham and Harvard Business Review
• R I C K R I O B O L I Q 2 P E O P L E L E A D E R S M E E T I N G
Engagement & Retention
Help Yourself
• Identify your red threads ... for 1 week make a list of the parts of your work day you love and the
parts you loathe
• Red threads are powerful because they bring you energy. Start your morning focusing on red thread
items…brings enough energy to work on other colors
• Lean into your red threads
Help Your Teammates
• Weekly 1:1 check-ins less than every 11 days … 67% reduction in turnover, 77% increase in employee
engagement
• Use check-ins to help your teammates incorporate 20% red threads every day
• Fundamental design principle – people love different things, each learns and contributes differently.
As team leader you need to be curious about the loves of each person. That is what drives
excellence.

27. Motivation + You… Love + Work

28. Workplace
Motivation:
Thank You!