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Essay on Intrinsic versus Extrinsic Motivation

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Intrinsic versus Extrinsic Motivation
Introduction
The success of any business depends on the productivity and satisfaction of its employees. Employees need to be motivated to work. Motivation can be defined as the inner force that drives individuals to accomplish personal and organizational goals. Motivation can be either intrinsic or extrinsic. For an individual to be motivated in a work situation there must be a need, which the individual would have to perceive a possibility of satisfying through some reward. Intrinsic motivation stems from motivations that are inherent and arise from performing the task of the job itself, which the individual gets a feeling of either positive or negative motivation as a result of …show more content…

Those that are intrinsically motivated have a bit of advantages over workers who are more predominantly extrinsically motivated. For instance, intrinsically motivated people work on job tasks because they find them enjoyable and interesting. Additionally, there is evidence showing that intrinsic motivation is positively correlated with learning, achievement, perception of competence and self-efficacy. At the same time, it is negatively correlated with anxiety, depression, and frustration. An intrinsically motivated individual will be committed to his or her work to the extent to which the job inherently contains tasks that are inherently rewarding to him or her (Lei, 2010).
Drawbacks of Intrinsic Motivation Although intrinsic motivation has numerous benefits, few drawbacks of intrinsic motivation should also be considered as well. An intense form of intrinsic motivation can reach to the point that employees can completely lose track of time and space, completely ignore authority and other important tasks, as well as not having enough time to learn or perform other essential tasks while learning and enjoying a particular academic activity. When performing an enjoyable task, a person can lose track of space or self-awareness. Individuals motivated by intrinsic gratification seek an experience for itself, rather than for anticipated rewards. The process is considerably more important to them than the resulting product or outcome, which has them working often

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