Chapter Title
Work Motivation: Directing, Energizing, and Maintaining Effort (and Research)
Authors’ Names
Adam M. Grant and Jihae Shin
grantad@wharton.upenn.edu and jihaes@wharton.upenn.edu
Authors’ Affiliation
The Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania
Abstract
This chapter provides an overview of contemporary research on work motivation. We start by
identifying the central premises, controversies, and unanswered questions related to five core
theoretical perspectives on work motivation: expectancy theory, equity theory, goal-setting
theory, job design, and self-determination theory. We then discuss four current topics and new
directions: collective motivation and organizing, temporal dynamics, creativity, and the effects of
rewards.
Keywords
Work motivation, expectancy theory, equity theory, goal-setting, job design, self-determination
theory, organizing, creativity, rewards
Citation:
Grant, A. M., & Shin, J. 2011. Work motivation: Directing, energizing, and maintaining effort
(and research). Forthcoming in R. M. Ryan (Ed.), Oxford handbook of motivation. Oxford
University Press.
Work Motivation 2
Introduction
Work motivation is an important phenomenon for both scholars and practitioners to
understand. It helps to explain what drove Thomas Edison to invent the first light bulb, Florence
Nightingale to improve nursing practices, Nelson Mandela to become the president of South
Africa, Benjamin Franklin to create fire and police departments, Maya Angelou to write poetry,
and Michelangelo to paint the Sistine Chapel. Knowledge of work motivation also has the
potential to shed light on major collective accomplishments such as discovering flight, landing
on the moon, curing river blindness, and inventing the telephone and the computer. Underlying
all of these accomplishments is a desire to take action.
Work motivation is described as the psychological processes that direct, energize, and
maintain action toward a job, task,...