Inspirational Summer Reading: Daniel Pink's "Drive"

INSPIRATIONAL SUMMER READING/VIEWING: DANIEL PINK'S "DRIVE"

First off, I apologize for today's Tuesdayedness, I opened my inbox to a barrage of angry emails asking if I knew it was Monday.

This week your recommendation is a strong one. I don't recommend books lightly because reading a book is an investment and you want to hope for the best. This book, "Drive", by Daniel Pink, is one of the best non-fiction I have ever read. I recently finished it for the second time a few weeks ago and it was just as good as the first. The book is about motivation, and what gets people motivated, and under what conditions people give their best performance. The most popular guess (which comes in a tone of "obviously, we all know the answer") is "money". However, the fact that so many people are confident in their wrong answer is largely what makes the book so fascinating. (It's not money)

If you're not actually interested in all the proofs and stories, then I found a really good summary of the "just the facts" version of the book.

If you're REALLY not feeling like reading anything, here's a very well done, condensed version of the entire thing done in a few minutes, with some great cartooning.

The principles in this book are interesting and enlightening. I promise you'll be surprised and there's plenty of evidence so show the proof in the pudding. The ideas you learn will be applicable to any individual, any group of co-workers, and definitely to a classroom. Try it out and see what you learn. 

PS: I did forget to mention above, that one very  big difference between the actual book and the other two things is that Pink provides a list of schools around the country who practice smarter methods of motivation. At least for me, that list was as interesting as the book itself and I spent lots of time looking up each of them reading their home pages and watching their project videos etc.. A lot to learn there as well.