The Motivation Multiplier: Why Meaning Beats Money
Bonuses, perks, and pressure only go so far. Here’s a framework to unlock performance through purpose—and avoid accidentally undoing your team’s motivation.
In Season 5 of Parks and Recreation, Ron Swanson and April Ludgate find themselves in Chris Traeger's management seminar. As the discussion turns to motivation and productivity, distinct positions are taken between the three characters:
Ron: "There are only three ways to motivate people: money, fear, and hunger."
Chris: "Oh, I disagree. What about encouragement, appreciation, and smiles? When people feel supported, they literally explode with productivity!"
April: "Can you guys just figure out which is better and tell me so we can leave?"
Regardless of your familiarity with these characters, I bet you can relate to at least one of their approaches. The carrot vs. stick debate plays out in workplaces everywhere. And like April, many of us are just trying to get through it without arguing management theory.
But what if the debate misses the point entirely? What if something essential has been left out - a single missing piece? One that could just click into place.
Let Go of My LEGOs
Imagine someone offered to pay you to build LEGO models. Not a lot, mind you - a few dollars for the first one and a little less for each subsequent unit - but hey, you've played with LEGOs as a kid for free so you're certainly moving up in the world.
After meeting with the researcher, you take your LEGO kit and get to work. It's not too complicated - it takes you about ten minutes to build the 40 piece set. Once you're done, you hand the completed model to the researcher, who then asks if you'd like to build another. Sure, why not? Each time you agree to build one more, you're given an identical new LEGO model to build. If you're anything like the average Harvard undergrad who participated in this study, 11 models have accumulated on the desk before you decided to take your money and leave.
Score one for Ron Swanson. Here‘s a job to be done, and you pay someone to do it for you. Money talks, right?
Imagine the same scenario with one slight twist. After you complete the first model and tell the researcher you'll do another, you take your new LEGO set to your desk, and that's when you notice that the researcher is disassembling what you just built. When you're done and offer to do a third, the researcher hands you the box with your first model. As you return to your seat, the researcher deconstructs your second LEGO set to be ready for you should you do a fourth. When you finally call it quits, the researcher's desk is clear of all but the last model you completed, which she begins to deconstruct.
Piece. By. Piece.
So what? LEGOs aren't intended to survive the test of time. Surely, you went into this knowing your hard work wouldn't be preserved in the university trophy case for all to see. The endgame is the same, with the second scenario being far more practical for the poor researcher who had to watch you play with LEGOs.
Here's the thing - that slight twist makes a world of difference. If you were put into the second scenario (the Sisyphus condition), you would have built 32% fewer LEGO models, and your payout would be 20% less than your peers in the first (the Meaningful condition). This is striking. The study described above was conducted with Harvard undergraduates, individuals who, presumably, are smart enough to know that the LEGO models would return to the box. Yet the Sisyphus participants were less productive and, therefore, earned less than their statistically identical peers whose only distinction was being spared observing the deconstruction of their work.
If money talks, it was merely a whisper in this case. Meaning, or the lack of it, spoke louder.
The pointlessness of the task sapped the students' motivation, causing them to disregard the earning opportunity afforded them by the incentive structure. As intuitive as they are, the productivity theories posed by Ron and Chris fail to explain this.
Meaning, it turns out, matters deeply.
If removing meaning can crush motivation this dramatically, what happens when we add it? For answers, let's look at one of the most metrics-driven environments possible: call centers.
Call Me, Maybe?
There are a lot of thankless jobs out there, but that of the university development fundraiser has to be near the top of the list. Cold-calling alumni and asking for donations can be a grueling task. Most calls will go straight to voicemail, and when they don’t, more often than not, you probably wish they did.
Metrics matter, particularly how much money you bring in. The industry has an abundance of Chris Traegers, with their relentless attempts to boost employee satisfaction, and Ron Swansons, with their laser-like focus on incentives and performance minimums. For managers, it can be challenging to cut through the noise as the sheer volume of rewards and punishments can crowd out any other motivation. How can meaning possibly make a difference in an environment like this?
Adam Grant, now of the Wharton School, designed an experiment to find out. A sample of thirty-nine fundraiser callers was split into three groups:
The Interpersonal Contact Condition, who spent five minutes interacting with a student who benefited from the scholarships their work funded
The Letter Control Condition, who read a letter from such a student and discussed it within the team for five minutes
The Control Condition, who received no interaction with the scholarship beneficiaries
I'm sure you can guess where this is going. Those in the first condition vastly outperformed the other two. Here's what you probably didn't expect: the productivity gained from that five-minute conversation had a lasting impact. A month after the interaction, students in the Interpersonal Contact Condition were bringing in 2.71 times more money than what they had brought in before the intervention. Five minutes of meaning equated to productivity lifts for a month. That‘s one hell of an ROI.
Dismissing this as purely academic would be a mistake. Results like those above have been replicated elsewhere (see further reading), but the signs that meaning matters extend beyond university research labs. The business benefits, but so do the employees. In a 2018 survey, 80% of respondents reported they would rather have a boss who cared about them finding meaning and success in work than receive a 20% pay increase. I wouldn't recommend such a pitch in the next annual review, but it gives you a sense of how critical this is.
Money talks, but meaning motivates.
Meaning Makes It Work
Chris and Ron devise an experiment to decide whose management theory is best. The rules are simple: each has a stack of folders to be filed and go about putting their techniques to work on the hapless Jerry Gergich. Chris uses inspiration, and Ron uses intimidation. The results are unsurprising: more of Ron's folders were put away, but most were filed incorrectly. It's ultimately declared a draw, with the real winner being April, who pitted the two against each other while she achieved her goal of leaving the seminar altogether.
After what we've discussed above, a draw feels appropriate. The task was pointless, and the techniques employed were attempts to externally influence rather than internally motivate. None of this is to say that carrots and sticks don't work - they do. But like any good LEGO set, it's not how many pieces you have but how they fit together.
There's an old story about three bricklayers working on a cathedral. When asked what they're doing, the first says "I'm laying bricks." The second replies "I'm building a wall." But the third looks up with pride and declares "I'm building a cathedral that will lift people's spirits for generations."
Same task, different meanings. And as our LEGO builders and call center workers showed us, that difference transforms everything about how people approach their work.
This insight runs counter to our intuition. Left to our own devices, we'll default to carrots and sticks because the theories are more pervasive, which in turn makes it easier. Less risky. What manager would want to be left holding the bag because they shifted from PIPs to customer meet and greets? But that's a false choice. Meaning doesn't replace other motivators—it amplifies them. The challenge is helping every builder—whether working with plastic bricks or stone ones—see their own cathedral taking shape.
So how do leaders put this insight into practice without seeming manipulative or naive? The key is understanding that meaning isn't about grand missions or inspirational speeches.
As leaders, we can help our teams find meaning by:
Connect work to impact: Create opportunities, even brief ones, for employees to see how their work affects others. This could be as simple as sharing customer testimonials or having team members from different departments explain how they use each other's work. Help them see how their bricks form the cathedral.
Protect meaning: Be vigilant about practices that inadvertently strip meaning from work. When projects change direction or get cancelled, take time to explain why the work still mattered and what was learned.
Let meaning multiply: Don't abandon traditional motivators—enhance them. Use meaning as the foundation that makes your incentives, recognition, and feedback more effective.
The debate between carrots and sticks misses the point entirely. You can't motivate someone to care. You can only help them understand why they should.
That's the true power of meaning. It doesn't add to motivation—it transforms the very nature of work itself. When people understand why their effort matters, they don't need to be pushed or pulled. The joy of building something that matters is motivation enough.
Further Reading
Predictably Irrational: The Hidden Forces That Shape Our Decisions
Written by the lead researcher of the LEGO study (Dan Ariely), this book covers his vast research on how we behave doesn't often jive with our intuition.
Give and Take: Why Helping Others Drives Our Success
Written by the lead researcher of the Call Center study (Adam Grant), this book compiles his research on the success of those who focus on others.