How to Get Hooked on Making an Effort

The trick is to refrain from seeing effort as a cause or as a consequence, but rather as both. By seeing it this way, we can organize performance over the long term and generate an "addictive loop"—meaning a drive to repeat behaviors that are pleasurable by themselves.

This approach counters the tendency to overestimate our ability to both make an undesired effort as well as resist the temptation of alternative pleasurable activities. An addictive loop approach avoids those two obstacles by aiming for activities that generate pleasure—hence our desire to make an effort, hence more activities.

The role of leaders is to put in place a system of efforts-as-consequences, generating a spiral where outcomes get bigger and better as time goes on.

• Don’t neglect indirect activities that create pleasure, like giving feedback and offering training sessions.
• Avoid a “no pain, no gain” mentality. 
• Grant people autonomy. 
• Leverage psychological drivers. For instance, the Pygmalion effect - people perform better just by feeling that their leader believes in them.
• Orient discreetly through a gentle nudge. 
• Use social validation. 

Individuals can consciously organize themselves into performance-effort loops.

• Build an identity. Our actions tend to align with how we perceive ourselves and how others perceive us. 
• Make it a habit. Your brain is a creature of habit, and science has therefore identified habit formation as a key for success.
• Be playful. Pleasure and play are linked—and if we frame something as a game, it can be more engaging and less depleting.
• Break it down. If a large, long-term project is too overwhelming, break it into smaller tasks.

Such extrinsic motivation schemes—where effort is forced by external rewards—have been shown to lead generally to undesirable outcomes.

While we can’t ignore them as short-term tactics, they only work in limited contexts, and only if properly inserted in a scheme balanced with intrinsic motivations.