Motivation In Alfie Kohn's Punished By Reward

Motivation is an interesting, challenging, and complex area of Human Resource Management studies which is rapidly changing both in terms of its nature, understanding, functions, purpose, as well as mode of application. It is generally agreed that managers need employees to work with. These employees do not only have to show up at work but more importantly they need to be motivated to perform their duties. Motivation can be defined as a driving force which leads people to want to act, perform, or do something without pressure or undue manipulation.

In his famous book, Punished by Rewards, Alfie Kohn (1993)argued that rewards are not necessary for employee motivation. He noted that manipulating people through the use of incentives and rewards works only on a short term basis, but ultimately fails and can even cause lasting problems in the long run. Drawing on a number of studies, Kohn argues that people end up losing interest in the work they do and rather do inferior work when they are enticed by grades, rewards and incentives. He thus advocated for the total abandonment of the use of rewards and incentives as motivation in organizations.

Despite the above arguments, motivation continues to be an important aspect of every work environment. Managers everywhere want

Money is the ultimate Motivator. This idea of money being the ultimate or sole motivating force was first proposed by Taylor (1911). With such misconception, certain managers either focus or tend to have a bias for monetary rewards. However Shanks notes that monetary ‘compensation motivates only to a point; that is, when compensation isn’t high enough or is considered to be inequitable, it is a de-motivator. In contrast, when it is too high, it also seems to be a de-motivator… and results in individual performance being tempered to protect the higher compensation level’ (2007:32). Further, Atchison argues that ‘as soon as money is predictable, it is an entitlement, not a motivator’