Continual Improvement through Intrinsic Motivation

Unlocking Intrinsic Motivation to Achieve Continual Improvement

Abstract

Building a culture of continual improvement must include intrinsic motivation of employees, which is difficult to accomplish. Most motivational tools given to managers inspire extrinsic motivation, and in fact, extrinsic motivation can actually decrease intrinsic motivation, so these measures can be counterproductive when continual improvement is the strategy. Toyota has been widely recognized as one of the closest examples to continual improvement. As it nears its 30th anniversary with its unprecedented track recordof box office hits, one can argue for Pixar to join those ranks. Pixar co-founder, Ed Catmull’s, recent book Creativity, Inc.: Overcoming the Unseen Forces That Stand in the Way of True Inspiration offers insights into how he was able to inspire intrinsic motivation to form the culture of continual improvement at Pixar.

Article

I once had a frustrated client who had to delay the commercial launch of his product because he was unable to manufacture quality parts. When I asked why, he explained that the people assembling the product did not care about how well they performed and did not even remain in the job long enough to actually learn how to do it the right way. This is any manager’s worst nightmare. It was a great example of why intrinsically motivated individuals are so crucial to quality. So how can a company achieve a state where people are intrinsically motivated to produce quality output?

We can look to successful examples of what has worked and why. The production company, Pixar, has a perfect track record, having released 14 films with all becoming number one hits. Quality enthusiasts might be surprised to discover that W. Edwards Deming (the man who taught the Japanese about quality) played a significant role in Pixar’s success. Pixar’s replication of the success of Japanese manufacturing in the most unlikely of industries provides valuable insights for champions of quality cultures.

In his new book Creativity, Inc.: Overcoming the Unseen Forces That Stand in the Way of True Inspiration Ed Catmull, the President of both Disney Animation and Pixar Animation, mentions the profound influence Deming had on him as he cofounded Pixar in the 1980’s.After growing frustrated that applying one popular management theory after another produced no good results for him, Catmull finally found practical success when he discovered Deming1. Catmull’s book is worth a read by managers interested in building a culture of quality.

By now anyone with a child under twelve has most likely been exposed to Disney’s most recent animated hit, Frozen. One could even make the case that Deming’s philosophy of quality actually made its way into the recent film. Like the best kids’ movies, Frozen operates on multiple levels. The opening sequence provides an honest display of curiosity, intrinsic motivation, problem solving, and self-motivated improvement. Ice harvesters labor together to cut, stack, and transport blocks of ice while an 8-year-old boy watches. The boy soon joins them by struggling to figure out how to harvest his own small ice block. When he finally accomplishes his task, he smiles with pride. Later, the boy grows up to become an ice harvester with a passion for all things ice.

Catmull mentions the story of how Japanese companies adopted Deming’s philosophy to continuously improve which he then adopted to create the problem solving culture at Pixar and later at Disney Animation2. To achieve continual improvement, a company must practice continual learning. Cole found that Japanese auto companies gained significant US market share in part by successfully translating individual learning into organizational learning to continually improve their products3. To truly be a learning organization, everyone in the organization must practice lifelong learning4, which requires intrinsically motivated individuals. The key is to spark intrinsically motivated problem solving throughout the organization. Catmull gives useful insights into what worked starting with his time as a postgraduate student when his own intrinsic motivation really took off thanks in part to the organizational culture5.

Steininger found that part of the failure of executives to develop organizational cultures of quality stems from the focus on extrinsic motivators with insufficient attention on intrinsic motivators6. Ryan and Deci summarized extrinsic motivation as activity performed for external outcomes, while intrinsically motivated activity is performed for the sake of the activity itself7.

Much research is available on intrinsic motivation in children. Observation, self determination, and storytelling stand out as key drivers. The principles that drive intrinsic motivation in children are not turned off as we become adults8, so what works in sparking intrinsic motivation in children deserves attention by managers.

Observation

The young ice harvester in Frozen observes and then imitates the adults. Deming suggested that education be supplemented with work under a master9. Catmull found observation of masters to be effective in developing problem solvers. John Lasseter was Pixar’s master director, and other directors honed their craft by working for years by his side7. Later when Catmull was also in charge of Disney Animation, he invited the Disney team to observe the Pixar team during a problem solving session, so they could understand the problem solving culture, and improvements at Disney started happening very quickly afterwards10.

Children learn through observation11, which is the most important form of learning12. Imitation is often the natural next step after observation in part because of the desire to belong13, and the benefit is that they practice through play to develop the new skills14.Like many children with older siblings, my son learns things earlier because he watches and imitates his older sister. Stories abound of successful individuals whose intrinsic motivation was sparked in childhood through observation of adults. Young Benjamin Franklin was impressed with Spectator articles and imitated them to improve his own writing skills15. In the panic of 1819 at age six Thomas Mellon witnessed firsthand his family’s financial challenge and participated in the struggle to save the farm over the next four years16. As a child, Donald Trump watched his father negotiate at construction sites. As a result his play involved both negotiating and making buildings with blocks17. As an infant, Tiger Woods observed his father practicing golf and was practicing with his own club as a seven-month-old18.

The observation lesson comes down to this: the power of observing positive examples in action is that it very naturally leads to intrinsic motivation for the observer to practice the right way. My third intern took half the time to come up to speed because he could watch and learn from the other interns. To apply the concept on a practical level, managers should provide their employees opportunities to observe their situations, their decision-making struggles and processes, and how they take action. The truth is that problem solving is a skill, and it has to be developed, so the real challenge is for leaders to feel comfortable sharing their vulnerable moments with their team. Revealing problems, challenges, and mistakes is especially uncomfortable for a leader who is also under pressure to present an aura of confidence and authority.

Self Determination

I was once surprised to learn that some of our young engineers were calling each other late at night to tackle some problems for work. This was not a particularly critical project. Nobody was demanding they finish by an imminent deadline. They just enjoyed the challenge. One of them was not even assigned to the project but wanted to help. This was an eye-opener for me because I had no idea they were the least bit motivated to work after hours. The fact that they were the ones who chose that particular project is significant.

In the Frozen sequence, none of the adults instruct the boy on what to do or how to do it. Thanks in part to this freedom, he chooses to work as they do. A recurring theme in Catmull’s book is about sparking intrinsic motivation in his employees by giving freedom to smart workers. He experienced this autonomy and trust at the University of Utah19 and replicated it at Pixar20. Deming saw the role of the manager as removing barriers to quality, but more commonly they inadvertently create such barriers21 by over-controlling their people22.

Increasing the sense of autonomy has been correlated with increasing intrinsic motivation. Zuckerman, Porac, Lathin, Smith, & Deci found that people devote more time and efforts to tasks when they have control over selecting their activities23. Ryan & Deci found that removing self-determination diminishes intrinsic motivation24. Patall, Cooper, & Robinson found that when given freedom of choice, people’s intrinsic motivation along with effort and performance will tend to increase25. Thomas found that a sense of choice brings a sense of ownership which increases the motivation for people to find better ways of doing things26. Managers who view their responsibilities as command and control over their employees unknowingly sabotage the goal of continual improvement by driving out the key ingredient of intrinsic motivation.

Autonomy should be combined with decision-making opportunities, intellectual stimulation, and the right level of guidance. Colvin suggests that companies develop people by placing them in stretch job assignments so they grow by struggling with real decisions27. This creates a more intellectually stimulating work environment, which is important for personal development28.

This also means that successful managers in a continual improvement organization should have high levels of self-discipline. Liker and Franz give an example of a Toyota employee who struggled over the course of months to present solutions for a problem to a company veteran who would simply say either, “No good” or “Continue”29. The veteran may have known the solution but had the self-discipline to allow the employee to figure it out for himself and provided guidance rather than answers. This approach accomplishes both learning as well as development of the intrinsic motivation in the solving of company problems. The actual solving of the problem becomes a secondary priority to the development of the problem solver.

Storytelling

The opening sequence of Frozen is actually a musical number where the men tell the story through song of how and why they harvest ice. Story is everywhere. Story is king at Pixar, which is how the company sought to differentiate itself. When Toy Story 2 was already a year into production, rather than accept a mediocre story, Pixar decided to rework the entire story, even though Disney executives insisted it was good enough and the deadline for release was less than a year away30. Deming’s writings are peppered with true stories of good and bad examples of quality in business. The movie Frozen is used as a story to help illustrate the key points in this article.

Throughout human history, direct observation in real time was not always feasible, so storytelling emerged as the means to transfer knowledge across generations. Storytelling is our oldest form of education31 and possibly our only source of knowledge32. Storytelling is powerful enough to change beliefs and behaviors the more listeners identify with the characters of the narrative33. Steve Jobs, Catmull’s boss for most of his career, compiled case studies (stories) at Apple to transfer relevant problem solving skills to new employees34. Napoleon drew on stories of past generals to achieve his successes35.

Organizational leaders should look at storytelling as a key skill of leadership. To be most effective toward a culture of continual improvement, this requires impactful stories combined with expert storytelling. They should share stories with their teams of decisions or challenges faced in the past and how people acted in relevant situations. Important organizational stories geared toward organizational learning should be told, retold, written, and recorded. The documentation of specific lessons learned, postmortems, and procedures should be recorded as compelling stories to transfer the knowledge to the next generation to increase their intrinsic motivation toward achieving that aim.

Catmull applied Deming’s quality philosophy from manufacturing to achieve continual improvement in filmmaking, and now manufacturing can learn from what worked in filmmaking. The principles of autonomy, observation, and storytelling can help in the building of a culture of quality by removing the practices that stamp out intrinsic motivation and making the nurturing of intrinsic motivation of others a cultivated skill in the organization’s managers.

This article was originally published here by The Deming Collaboration.

References
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Author – DAVID KACHOUI is the director of business development for Natech Plastics Inc. in Ronkonkoma, NY. He holds an MBA from Columbia University in New York City. Kachoui is an ASQ member and a Project Management Institute-certified project management professional.