Why can't work be fun?

Why can't work be fun? Science shows humans are more motivated by solving puzzles than they are by carrot-and-stick models.

Humans are like rhesus monkeys, we will actually work pretty hard to solve a puzzle. Something psychology researchers call “intrinsic reward”.

Photo by Karla Hernandez on Unsplash

“The performance of the task provided intrinsic reward.” – Harlan Harlow

What is fun work?

Research into the science of human motivation has shown that people are more likely to perform when they are solving puzzles. Turns out we ARE like monkeys. Rewards like money, and threats like unemployment are less effective at getting us to perform than curiosity and the sheer pleasure of figuring something out. As psychology researcher Harlan Harlow learned studying rhesus monkeys in 1949, the drive to solve a problem can be stronger and more motivating than biological drives for food.

Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi is a researcher who studies “flow” states. He describes losing yourself in meaningful work as a way to achieve happiness and “optimal experience”.

How can we make work fun?

Corporate anthropologists study ways to systematize positive work culture.

Ari Nave explains that while up to one third of initiatives for corporate culture change fail, programs such as culture pods have the potential to achieve positive transformation through cultural seeding and lateral transmission.

Conclusion, work CAN be fun.

Delinquent savants NEED their work to be fun. Just like high-IQ children, high-IQ adults get bored easier, and can struggle with finding motivation in routine tasks.

But this does not mean they are not equipped or interested in hard work. It just means they need challenging and creative work.

If you have a puzzle, and you need a Delinquent Savant™ to solve it, let us know!

We are all different but equal. High-IQ individuals need to solve hard cognitive problems. That does not make them better people, but it does mean they are different and they need different work.

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