Motivation maintenanceSeeing the benefits of our work improves our persistence and performance

Paid employees at a university call centre were asked to phone potential donors to raise money for the university

The amount of time they spent on the phone and the donations they brought in were monitored

One group of call centre workers spent five minutes talking with a student who had a scholarship funded by the university

Financial support has been a big help

What do you want to do in the future?

How are your studies going?

A second group of call centre workers had no contact with the beneficiaries of the scholarship fund

A third group read and discussed a letter from a scholarship student who had benefitted from the funds

For a month following the interventions, experimenters measured the amount of time the call centre workers spent on the phone and the amount of money they raised

I’m raising money for…

Do you have 5 minutes free?

I’d like to talk to you about…

0

70

140

210

280

Time on phone Money raised

Met beneficiary Control group

These were the results:

Over the course of a month, call centre workers who had met a beneficiary of their fundraising efforts spent 142% more time on the phone and raised 171% more money

Why?

Contact with beneficiaries helps employees maintain motivation for their work because they are able to see the impact of their work on others

ReferenceImpact and the art of motivation maintenance: The effects of contact with beneficiaries on persistence behaviour Adam M. Grant, Elizabeth M. Campbell, Grace Chen, Keenan Cottone, David Lapedis and Karen Lee 2007 Organisational Behaviour and Human Decision Processes Vol 103, Issue 1, Pages 53-67