In this animated video of his talk, Dan Pink claims performance incentives do not work, and can actually lead to worse performance.
In summary, he quotes two studies (which he unfortunately does not name) where people are asked to do a task, and receive a higher bonus if they do it better. What they both find is that as long as the task requires at least rudimentary cognitive skill, the bonus does not lead to improved results. In fact, if the bonus is high enough, it actually leads to people performing worse.
Does this view present the current scientific consensus? Does anyone have any links to good studies (preferably meta-studies) on this subject?
