The main disadvantage of extrinsic rewards is that their effects are only temporary. However, if our intrinsic drivers align with our role, we attain job satisfaction with less need for extrinsic reward. We feel understood as individuals and our work is something that we truly care about. As a result, we are more motivated toward obtaining good outcomes at work and likely to do a much better job. 

As employers, we are more likely to get better results if our people are happy in their work, feel trusted, and are able to do the best job they can. The additional benefit is that satisfied employees are less likely to be on an insatiable quest for rewards. Therefore, they are less inclined to seek increasing compensation for being in an unsatisfactory role or, worse still, go elsewhere.

As an industry, we're starting to tap into mastery and autonomy reasonably well, providing professional development and environments that encourage individual thinking and contribution. However, if we were able to align an individual's purpose with an organization's purpose, there'd be a collaboration of like-minded people at every level of your business. That's a powerful thing indeed.

In Chapter 9, Seeking Value – How to Deliver Better Software Sooner, we looked at how setting objectives to match our organizational purpose would help our team carry out its mission.

One of the things that I learned early on in my career was that the more we can align our purpose with that of the organization we work for, the more likely we are to feel fulfilled. 

Ask any group of knowledge workers why they do what they do and you'll get a wide range of general answers. Anything from "I'm in it for the money" to "I love solving problems" and "It makes me happy when I build something that other people find useful."

But dig a little deeper and some of us might be surprised to find out why we do this work. For me, it was because I saw opportunities for technology to be used for social good. Not surprisingly, I chose to work for organizations that shared my values and purpose.

The deeper why is what makes us tick when everything else (money, food, shelter, and love) is off the table.

We'll discover this through the application/problem domain; for example, if you're a software developer passionate about music, you'll find work in the music industry. If money is your thing, you'll work in financial services.

Or for you it might be through the solution domain, the technologies that you use to solve the problems of the application domain, and your real why is in taking these solutions to the next level. 

Or it may be because of the company culture, and how you align with it. For example, a company such as Zappos, an online shoe retail company, values teamwork and focuses on how its teams work well together. 

Hopefully, you find work in an organization where you can align with all three.

Finding your why is an important first step, and the subject of two books written by author Simon Sinek—Starting With Why and Finding Your Why. 

He describes it as akin to finding our piece in the jigsaw puzzle. The more our piece fits, the more of ourselves we give to our company, its products, or its problems, and the more likely we are to find something that excites us at work. We do spend half of our waking lives at work; isn't it only right that we're passionate about what we do?