I like what Dan Pink is introducing here. It awakened up an old saying I’ve once heard: “A work crew is clearing a trail. The crew boss and workers hear a lone voice from above. A crew member in a tree top is yelling ‘You are going in the wrong direction’.”

Motivating people is a crucial activity on all levels of an organization(s). I realized long ago that being a boss is not necessarily being a good leader or motivator. I have met and had several bosses. They were both good and troublesome. The last ones from time to time got on my nerves. It is not a criticism! I don’t blame them or even take offense. Yet several times I was annoyed because they could not motivate me with their behavior, albeit they were supposed to. Instead, I was demotivated by their injustices, emptiness of demands, inconsistencies, lack of transparency, self-importance, arrogance, superiority, miscommunication, or even management incompetence. Sometimes they were afraid of me; on other occasions they did not allow me to give my professional opinion. Nevertheless, they taught me a lot and gave me good examples of leadership strategies that usually do not work and how to do better.

On the surface leadership is about getting everybody doing the right things in the right ways. Internally it is more than a position, or having the right tools and knowledge; it is about the very fibre of the person, engaged in realization and learning, and it is not just for the person at the top of the tree. It is all the way down the pyramid to fix “the puzzle of motivation or how today we run our business”.

Jaro Berce author of “Leadership by Virtue”
http://leadershipbyvirtue.blogspot.com/

Video: Bidding adieu to his last “real job” as Al Gore’s speechwriter, Dan Pink went freelance to spark a right-brain revolution in the career marketplace. Career analyst Dan Pink examines the puzzle of motivation, starting with a fact that social scientists know but most managers don’t: Traditional rewards aren’t always as effective as we think. Listen for illuminating stories — and maybe, a way forward.

Video Source: http://www.ted.com/talks/dan_pink_on_motivation.html