Year 12 IB Extended Essays 2018

3.0 - Introduction

The theory behind motivation has been the pinnacle to numerous innovations and overall business performance. One prime example of this is Tesla Inc. To achieve Tesla’s determined innovation goals, Tesla CEO Musk uses intrinsic motivational theories to enhance maximum creativity and work ethic from employers. This is exemplified by the motivational theories presented by Daniel Pink. Pink suggests that businesses should create settings that allow autonomy, mastery, and purpose, which are the factors to be considered in this essay. This essay will determine the success of Tesla’s motivational theories, and if it fostered positive change, through certain criterion. These criterions are established through different stakeholder perspectives. This essay disregards any other criterions to determine success – such as profitability, as this essay will only label Tesla successful to the extent that its motivational strategies have contributed to innovation outcomes.

3.1 - Significance of Topic - the vision

Tesla’s vision is: “to accelerate the advent of sustainable transport by bringing compelling mass market electric cars to market as soon as possible.”. In other words, Tesla’s vision in the bigger picture is tackling the global-scale carbon problem. To bring this vision to life is challenging, and requires both initiative and innovation. Currently, Tesla is a non-profitable organization. It still has countless investors investing capital into the business, being fully aware of negative cash flow within the company. Investigating what makes Tesla innovative and well-recognized regardless of the negative cash flow company, is worthy of investigation. It is important to understand the theories Tesla swears by, that enables it to be such a well-recognized solution for this world issue. For this reason, the research question is as follows:

“To what extent have Daniel Pink’s motivational strategies contributed to innovation outcomes at Tesla?”

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