Employee motivation: the levers to activate

All too often, the levers of employee motivation are summed up as material rewards and remuneration. While these levers are indeed very effective, we mustn't forget that human psychology is far more subtle.

Other levers do exist, giving companies and managers room to maneuver to boost motivation and results, while promoting genuine team spirit.

This comprehensive article provides a theoretical basis for understanding the different motivational levers. It then provides an outline of a guide to using each lever to encourage teams' operational results.

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The traditional motivational lever: reward

Extrinsic motivation: material and financial rewards

Traditional motivation is based on what is known as "extrinsic" motivation. This type of motivation encourages the individual to take action by promising a reward. The action is taken because the individual knows he or she has something to gain: salary in particular. It is not the task itself that interests the employee, but a benefit "external" to it, hence the use of the term "extrinsic motivation".

The mechanism can be explained by the Action → Reward → Extrinsic Motivation commitment loop, diagrammed below:

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All employees work first and foremost for their salary. To understand motivation at work, it is therefore important to note that it is primarily based on extrinsic motivation.

Sales force motivation: a special case

Salespeople have always been used to extrinsic motivators. Indeed, in addition to their salary, their remuneration is often supplemented by a variable component, bonuses and even gifts to be won in the context of challenges. These motivational tools are generally referred to as incentives.

The challenge mechanism helps to further reinforce the role of rewards in team commitment.

Extrinsic motivators: some examples of rewards

In this section, we review the best-known rewards to identify their impact on employee commitment and motivation over time.

• Salary

This is the most extrinsic of motivational levers. Nobody wants to work without pay, and many people are prepared to accept a less interesting job for a higher salary. However, if I agree to make a concession on the interest of the mission in order to obtain a more advantageous salary, then I run the risk of being less motivated once I'm on the job. This is the limit of salary, which has difficulty in creating genuine motivation and meaning in everyday life.

• Bonus and variable compensation

Well-known to salespeople, these are rewards conditional on performance. These levers are not exclusively extrinsic, as the quest for performance implies another type of motivation linked to personal achievement (see next section). The aim is to push people to surpass themselves.

• Gifts and gift vouchers

Mainly offered as part of challenges, their effect varies according to two factors: the value of the gift and the frequency of winning. Winning a trip as a reward for a year's effort does not have the same effect as winning a gift voucher following a one-off challenge lasting a month. The main advantage of gifts and gift vouchers is that, through the organization of challenges, they can be used to boost team motivation from time to time, in order to steer sales strategy (seasonality or late achievement of targets, for example).

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Intrinsic motivation: the "real" motivation

Interest in the activity: "pure" motivation

Intrinsic motivation is the "purest" form of motivation. When you're intrinsically motivated, you do an activity for its own sake, not for the benefits it brings.

There are two important conditions for defining intrinsic motivation: interest in the activity on the one hand, and the principle of autonomy on the other.

• First condition: interest in the activity

You could say that a passionate person is intrinsically motivated. For example, if you're passionate about tennis, you don't really need any external motivation to get you to come and hit the ball, even on a bad weather day. The activity itself is motivating enough to make us brave the rain.

• Second condition: autonomy

An intrinsically motivated person chooses to engage in a particular activity. The action is not the result of a constraint, but of an autonomous decision. In a professional context, autonomy can be characterized by an employee's ability to set his or her own objectives.

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Benefits and limits of intrinsic motivation for companies

Using the levers of intrinsic motivation gives companies clear comparative advantages. However, there are also certain limitations.

• The benefits of intrinsic motivators: Pascal's wager

First and most importantly, intrinsic motivation is more powerful and enables a consistent level of commitment over the long term.

Secondly, intrinsic levers provide an additional motivational reserve that can be tapped at any time. Indeed, intrinsic motivation is not opposed to extrinsic motivation (which is not the case, cf. part 3 of this article). So, adding intrinsic motivation levers to your managerial practice is akin to Pascal's wager: big potential performance gains for zero risk.

Finally, intrinsic motivation is "free", unlike extrinsic motivation, which requires a budget to reward.

• The limits of intrinsic motivation at work

The first limitation of intrinsic motivation in a professional context is that the relationship to motivation is "biased" by salary. Employees are used to being financially rewarded, which makes intrinsic levers less effective.

Moreover, as we have already seen, intrinsic motivation stems first and foremost from an interest in the activity. However, professional activity is often interesting, but inevitably involves a proportion of tedious tasks. In this context, this type of motivation may seem difficult to implement.

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6 levers of intrinsic motivation: a multitude of possibilities for maximum performance

There are a large number of levers which, compared with the reward lever, offer much more intrinsic motivation. These are the levers that companies can use to achieve greater commitment and results.

• Lever 1: Competition

The effectiveness of competition is based on the need for certain individuals to be the best. It creates emulation between employees and between teams to encourage performance.

• Lever 2: Cooperation

For cooperation, it's the need to help and feel useful that motivates. The pursuit of common goals and performance is encouraged.

• Lever 3: Progression

Progression is a very intrinsic lever. All individuals continue to practice an activity if they feel they are constantly progressing.

• Lever 4: Adding value

This motivation is linked to the need to belong. Valor and recognition validate that what we're doing makes sense, because it's accepted, or even applauded, by the community.

• Lever 5: Autonomy

As we saw earlier, autonomy is one of the conditions for intrinsic motivation. It is therefore one of the most powerful levers to activate in order to engage employees. In concrete terms, for managers, this means co-fixing objectives with employees.

• Lever 6: Mission

If the employee adheres to the company's or organization's mission, then it constitutes a powerful lever of intrinsic motivation. The company defines its mission and the associated storytelling to capitalize on this lever.

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Boosting intrinsic motivation: concrete examples

In this section, we propose a method for activating the lever of intrinsic motivation in concrete terms. We start by simply replacing the reward with feedback. In this way, the "traditional" commitment loop becomes Action → Feedback → Intrinsic Motivation :

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Feedback is based on the levers defined in the previous section. Here are a few examples.

Statistics

All performance data can be transformed into feedback. For example, the number of sales made by a team can be used to activate the cooperation lever. By the same token, the number of individual sales will activate the competition lever. Choosing which statistics to promote, and the associated storytelling, gives managers numerous possibilities for motivating.

• Ranking

Setting up a ranking system activates the lever of competition. It is widely used by sales teams.

• Challenge

The challenge activates different motivational levers, depending on the mechanics used. Competitive challenge rewarding the X best, competitive challenge between teams, cooperative challenge in which the whole team strives to achieve a common goal, individual achievement challenge in which each participant has a personal goal to reach. For all these challenges, different motivational levers are at work.

• Objective

Monitoring a goal activates the levers of achievement (for individual goals) and cooperation (for team goals). What's important here is the frequency of feedback. To be effective, goal data should be updated weekly, and ideally daily.

• Virtual reward (badge)

The virtual reward (or badge or virtual trophy) symbolizes an achievement. Its impact is similar to the medal you get for finishing a marathon. Here again, all levers can be activated, depending on the conditions to be met to win the reward. For example, if to win the virtual trophy, you need to sell the most products by the end of the month, then you activate the competition lever.

• Symbolic material reward

The symbolic material award works on the same principle as the virtual trophy. It brings more symbolism through its tangible quality. For example, the best salesperson of the month receives a "best salesperson" cap, rather than a simple virtual badge. The award has no value in itself, but it has greater symbolic value thanks to its tangible aspect and the associated storytelling.

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Repositioning the motivation cursor

In this final section, we'll look at why (and how) companies can rethink their motivation model to balance the use of intrinsic (feedback) and extrinsic (reward) levers.

The limits of "traditional" motivation

There are three main limits to "traditional" motivation (Action → Reward).

• Reward reduces intrinsic motivation

As we saw above, intrinsic motivation is the most enduring. Unfortunately, scientific studies show that the use of a reward decreases subjects' intrinsic motivation (Deci, E. L., (1971), "Effects of externally mediated rewards on intrinsic motivation", Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 18, 105-115.). Rewarding an employee could thus diminish his intrinsic motivation for his work.

• The need to increase rewards to compensate for reduced motivation

The consequence of the previous point is that, to compensate for the drop in intrinsic motivation, companies are encouraged to increase rewards. This can lead to a vicious circle in which reward becomes the only lever available.

In our guide to the 2024 sales challenge, we showed that only 18% of employees said that more substantial challenge winnings would motivate them more; a sign that extrinsic levers are probably reaching a plateau of effectiveness.

• Reward is expensive

Unlike feedback, reward has a significant financial cost. All the more so if the motivation model is 100% reward-based.

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Repositioning the motivation cursor

We can represent employee and team motivation on a continuum, with highly extrinsic, traditional, reward-based motivation on the one hand, and highly intrinsic motivation based on autonomy and feedback on the other.

Here's a diagram to illustrate the continuum.

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In this context, it's up to the company and its managers to position the cursor to maximize team commitment.

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In practice: define a motivational model for your company

Defining a motivation model for the company means placing the cursor on the extrinsic-intrinsic continuum.

First and foremost, it should be remembered that this choice is the result of two contradictory forces: on the one hand, the desire to make the most of the reserve of intrinsic motivation, and on the other, the need to retain the reward in the professional context (whose initial motivation is salary).

Here are a few questions to ask, to help companies and managers make the right choice.

• What place does reward currently occupy in the motivation model?

For this analysis, we need to define the role of compensation in the motivation model. Compensation includes salary, variable pay, bonuses and any gifts that the employee may earn. The larger the compensation package (excluding salary), the more the cursor swings to the extrinsic side of the continuum. In such a context, the introduction of feedback will have to be gradual, and will take longer. Indeed, it will be difficult to substitute feedback for gifts. Conversely, the effectiveness of feedback will be felt more quickly if the motivation model incorporates salary alone. In all cases, the first step is to avoid adding another type of reward: there's no point in adding gifts to a reward model based solely on salary.

• What is the reward budget?

The budget is particularly important and constraining in defining the motivation model.

If the budget is small, the reward may not be motivating, as the employee compares its value to his or her salary. In this case, it's better to refocus the model on symbolic rewards accessible to as many people as possible (team lunches, for example), rather than offering a substantial reward reserved for the best.

If, on the other hand, the budget is substantial, then we'll make sure to spread it over different levers (and not just competitive ones). Rewards will be awarded for team performance (cooperation) or for achieving individual objectives (progression).

• Are intrinsic levers sufficiently exploited?

Whatever the motivation model in force in the company, the introduction of intrinsic levers is always a winner. Managers need to ask themselves how they can use feedback to activate the levers of competition, cooperation, progression, recognition and autonomy. The only parameter to take into account is the speed at which feedback can replace reward.

Conclusion

In short, employee motivation cannot be reduced to a simple question of material reward. While extrinsic levers such as salary and bonuses remain essential, companies would do well to explore and integrate intrinsic motivation levers. Intrinsic motivators are less costly and can stimulate a more lasting commitment. By intelligently balancing these two approaches, companies can reinvent their motivation model to optimize performance and foster a fulfilling work climate.

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