Intrinsic motivation refers to that motivation that comes from within an individual and is not due to the expectation of any rewards or incentive due to the individual doing that work. In simple words, if an individual is doing some work or task not because of monetary reward but because of love or passion regarding the work then it is a case of intrinsic motivation. Hence for example employees in a company doing activities or work apart from their regular assigned work is their intrinsic motivation for that additional work as there is no reward or incentive associated with that additional work. In order to get a better idea about this concept, one should look at some of the advantages and disadvantages of intrinsic motivation –
Advantages of Intrinsic Motivation
Work for Long Hours
The first and foremost advantage of intrinsic motivation is that employees having intrinsic motivation can work for long hours because they are passionate about working on a particular task and where passion is involved time loses importance. Hence such employees do not need any biometric attendance or any time schedule or attendance registers as they are motivated to complete the task at any cost which makes the task of the company very easy.
No Risk of Losing Employees
In the business, world employees tend to switch jobs and go to other companies moment they get a good salary package but in the case of intrinsic motivative employees there is no such risk because such employees are not working for rewards or money rather they are working for their passion and where passion is involved no price tag can allure the employees towards the competitor companies and hence there is no risk of the company losing its employees to other companies in the industry.
No need for Control
All companies whether is small or big spend quite a lot of resources whether its money, time, or people on ensuring that employees of the company work efficiently and effectively, and that is the reason why you have so many hierarchies in the company where the upper hierarchy overlooks the lower hierarchy so that workers are in control and keep doing their work. However, in the case of intrinsic motivation, no such need is there as employees themselves are motivated and do not require any special attention to do their work which saves a lot of resources as far as the company is concerned.
Disadvantages of Intrinsic Motivation
Limited Use
The biggest disadvantage of intrinsic motivation is that it is very difficult to find an employee who is intrinsically motivated because the majority of employees work in the company in anticipation of rewards and financial incentives and hence if the company depend on only intrinsic motivation as a way of doing the work then it will find itself in a situation where no work will be completed on time resulting in financial loss as well as loss of reputation of the company in the market.
No Solo Use
In this materialistic world where everything is related to money to expect that employees will be intrinsically motivated all the time is a bit too much as extrinsic motivation is required from time to time to motivate employees at the workplace. In simple words intrinsic motivation has no solo use rather it requires the help of extrinsic motivation to achieve the desired result as far as working of the company is concerned.
Accountability and Responsibility
In the case of extrinsic motivation since employees are rewarded for good work they can also be held accountable and responsible for bad work which is a difficult thing to do in the case of intrinsic motivation. Hence for example suppose your kid is reading a book because of his love for his books and he after reading half the book says that he or she does not want to read the whole book then you cannot pressurize him to read the whole book but if those books are from his school syllabus than he will have to complete the whole book no matter he likes or dislike that book same thing applies to companies as in case of extrinsic motivation they can pressurize the employees to complete the work in a give time frame whether they like or dislike the work which will not be the case if the employee is doing work because of intrinsic motivation.
As one can see from the above that intrinsic motivation has pros as well as cons and that is the reason why companies looking for only intrinsic motivation in the employees and not using extrinsic motivation should carefully read the above points as intrinsic motivation only cannot guarantee success as far as companies are concerned.