Motivational lessons from Betty Crocker, IKEA & the Industrial Revolution

In 1952, the Betty Crocker brand rolled out its Cake Mix.  A powder in a box that housewives were asked to add in water, mix, put it an oven, and voila, they would have cake. This was predicted to be a popular product.  But as it turned out, it wasn’t.

Research was done and findings showed that the problem wasn’t the cost, taste, texture or look of the product.  Also, no problem with the “fresh, home-made” quality, as advertised. The problem, according to the psychologists, were the eggs. They found, that for the housewives, it was too easy a cake to make.  They weren’t putting in enough effort.  It was so easy, that nobody could serve cake to their guests, feel ownership, say “here’s my cake!”  It felt like someone else’s.  So what did Betty Crocker do? They took the eggs out of the powder. The act of breaking eggs & adding them turned sales around dramatically.

It’s like the IKEA effect.  People compliment me on my new bookshelf unit.  I know it’s cheap furniture, and I don’t particularly enjoy putting it together, nor would I give the instructions an A+,  but I am guilty of feeling proud when I hear the compliment.  And I love the unit!  The fact is, I (and you) tend to love stuff more when we put more effort into it. It’s like me with my 16 year old son.  If you asked me how much money I would want in order to agree to sell him to you, I would say you’re crazy.  Not for $100 million! (on a good day).  But if he wasn’t my son, and I had the occasion to meet him, and spend a day with him, and then you offered to sell him to me what price would I pay to be his father? Would $100m reflect the value I believe I would receive? I won’t answer that, but you get the point.

So, what does this mean to us as leaders and managers?  The great economist, Adam Smith, wrote about a pin factory.  He said that it takes 12 steps to make a pin. Smith also said that when one person does all 12 steps, production is low, but if we have an assembly line with 12 experts in a row, production increases by a lot.  Thus the Industrial Revolution was spawned.

However, this situation also produces alienation and disengagement from work, and in the case of the pin factory, the workers eventually don’t care as much about the pin as the craftsman who made a whole pin.  In the 18^th and 19^th centuries, this was a manageable problem. At the end of the production line, there was a quality control guy who threw the rejects into a bin.  My manufacturing and engineering friends – and likely the rest of us – now know this is not the best way to make stuff.

The reality of the 21^st century is that we have switched to a knowledge economy, where meaning may be more important than (or at least equal to) efficiency.  People now have to decide more on their own, and as boundaries between personal and work time blur, how much of our effort, attention, focus and heart go into our work as we live our lives? What helps us stay engaged and motivated?

So, when thinking about motivation, think more than $.  Think meaning, challenge, ownership, identity and pride. From what I’ve seen, when those are in place, you also get more productivity.

For more on this, visit the TED Talk that inspired this post:  Dan Ariely’s TED Talk: What Makes us Feel Good About Our Work.

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