Dan Pink is, to say the least, slightly insane when it comes to public speaking. He shows emotions in a very dramatic and sometimes over-hyped way. By using this technique, there is no possible way for the audience to stop paying attention to what he is saying and doing. Pink not only verbally addressed the audience but he also showed pictures and diagrams that backed up what he was saying. For example: When he was telling of a puzzle called “The Candle Problem”, he posted pictures on the giant screen in order to better the understanding of the audience.
In “The Candle Problem”, the puzzle solver must find a way to attach the candle to the wall (given tacks, matches, and a candle) without getting any wax on the table. For a while, the solver does not see the box as a material. Eventually, they figure out that they can put the candle in the box and tack the box to the wall.
Throughout his TED talk, Dan Pink tries to explain a new kind of motivation. Research has found that if people are given a reward (i.e. money) to solve things like the above puzzle, it takes them longer for them to complete it and the task is done with less creativity and more closed-mindedness. In a short amount of time, monetary rewards can be helpful in getting a simple task completed. However, in the long run, this could ruin a person’s actual want to accomplish different tasks. Look at today’s school systems. The grading system is just like payday in the real world. Students are graded on literally everything. This will most likely cause them to wonder why in the world they are working on something for which they are not being graded. They will not know how to work in this situation and therefore will not really try. If students are just told that they are at schools in order to better themselves and grades were not given for literally everything, then maybe, just maybe, they would have a greater appreciation for learning.
This has lead me to wonder about some things. What motivates me? Well, I think that it is a combination of many things. First, there is motivation for rewards. Grades, which I mentioned above, help me to want to finish my schoolwork. Why don’t I just do the bare minimum? Once in a while, I try extremely hard to go above and beyond. This is mostly because the teacher wants it that way. Sometimes, I do this because it feels extraordinary to turn in something that I am proud of. I can’t explain the sense of relief and serenity I get when I finish something that took lots of difficult work. That has nothing to do with wanting the teacher’s acceptance. Another term that goes with motivation is mastery or the desire to be great at what you do. I have always been interested in getting to the highest level of mastery in almost everything I do. Take the game, “Angry Birds”, for example. There is literally no reward to winning this game besides the satisfaction you get when beating it. Why do you think I practice my saxophone so much? I’m probably not going to get a job with it in the future and yet I continue to play away on the darn thing! That’s where the mastery comes in again. In order to be great, you have to woodshed the music over and over and over again, and when it finally clicks…it doesn’t get much better than that. Everyone has a drive to do something that matters to them. The only tricky part is finding what it is that matters.
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