Review: Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us

This book has been sizzling on the world’s bestseller charts for the better part of a year and a half now. It’s highly likely that it’s continued success points to the fact that people are really interested to know what drives successful and highly motivated individuals—and are willing to become more like them.

Daniel Pink, who scored with his previous effort A Whole New Mind, delivers a well-researched and easy-to-understand thesis with this slim volume. He pinpoints three key areas— “Autonomy”, where you’re given free rein to choose what you’d like to work on and how you’d like to go about doing it; “Mastery”, where your constant devotion to your work/task improves your skills and you derive satisfaction and enormous pleasure from them; and “Purpose”, where your job or passion gives you meaning in life—as vital sources for motivation.  

Elsewhere in the book, one of the more interesting findings of Pink’s research is the fact that rewards can be counterproductive. He comes up with several novel suggestions on more suitable ways for incentivizing tasks and methods, emphasising the fact the 20^th century carrot-and-stick approach is both outdated and irrelevant in this age.

All in all, this is a pretty interesting read. It’s suitable both as a business guide for corporate makeovers and as a self-help title for individuals seeking a jumpstart. Pink’s accessible language and engaging style, in addition to the substance found his book, makes this a must-read—one that is breezy and whose lessons can be learnt in a matter of days.