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September 14, 1998

Motivation Leads To Innovation

IT professionals who are excited about their jobs will be more creative and productive

By Ralph Katz

otivation is a critical ingredient for high-performing IT departments and technical project teams. Highly motivated people and teams push themselves to overachieve, often accomplishing more than brighter and even more technically competent peers. In fact, as managers gain experience, they realize that to get creative ideas and innovative advances flowing more quickly and successfully, they're often better off having workers with "A-rated" motivation and "B-rated" capabilities than the other way around.

Although the benefits of motivation are clear, motivation is difficult to understand and manage. In 25 years of teaching, researching, and consulting on issues related to innovation and technology, I've found that IT executives usually list the motivation of their personnel as one of the most difficult and perplexing aspects of their jobs.

What's the secret to getting and keeping people motivated? While there's an abundance of motivational theories and models, it's well acknowledged that a person's true calling comes from the nature of the work he or she is asked to do. Put simply, people like to do neat things-to go where no individual has gone before. If they believe the work is challenging, meaningful, and exciting, then no demands or requirements are so difficult that they can't eventually be achieved.

The degree of motivational potential of any specific job, then, is dramatically influenced by how a person views the job he or she is given, including how assignments are organized, structured, and managed. Even in high-pressure situations, IT professionals report that work is exciting when they are having fun doing it. In some sense, then, highly motivating work assignments should be similar to the kinds of activities people might choose to do for fun on their own.

To pursue this analogy, let me argue that many IT professionals like to go bowling (or at least they used to like to go bowling). One reason they might like to bowl is that it's a use of their own skills and abilities. They can set their own target scores and strive to achieve those scores at their own pace without being dependent on others.

IT professionals might also like to bowl because they have a complete understanding of what bowling is and see themselves playing an active and important role during the entire game. They are a significant or equal part of the overall effort. But people wouldn't like to bowl if they were told their score wouldn't count-was going to be canceled or shelved-or if everyone else's score was more critical.

Bowlers are free to develop an individual style, movement, and pace. They know exactly how well they are performing while playing, and how they're doing compared with others in the game. But no one would like to bowl if the alley was draped so they couldn't see the pins, or if they were told to come back in six months for a performance appraisal. Nor would anyone want to bowl if a boss stood by with constant suggestions such as "Move to your left, watch the red line, keep your grip steady." And finally, who'd want to bowl if, as soon as they got a terrific score, the CEO came down and congratulated the boss rather than the bowler?

Motivated By Use Of Skills
If work is to be viewed in the same vein as having fun, the tasks should have some of the same characteristics. People are more motivated when they feel their jobs require them to use a wide variety of skills and abilities. All too often, people who work in IT positions comment that their jobs require them to use only a small portion of their skills and training. Worse, their jobs might involve older, more mundane technologies rather than newer, more exciting ones.

Software designers, for example, are more energized and captivated when they're required to write new programs in Java or C++ than when asked to program with less jazzy languages, such as Cobol. Professionals want not only to use their expertise and knowledge, but to take on assignments that let them grow and develop and learn new skills.

Research shows that the broader the range of skills and abilities tapped early in a person's career, the more likely it is the person will become a better performer later on. The key is not how many different tasks individuals are asked to perform, but whether they are able to develop the knowledge, perspective, and credibility essential for sustained success.

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