locus of control theory, a subfield of personality psychology that argues that motivation is closely connected to whether people feel like they have … - Cal Newport

To remain valuable in our economy, therefore, you must master the art of quickly learning complicated things. This task requires deep work. If you don’t cultivate this ability, you’re likely to fall behind as technology advances.

… a better objective for support units would be the following: to effectively fulfill their administrative duties with as small an impact as possible on the specialists’ main work obligations. If taken seriously this metric might mean a given support unit needs to make its own work less efficient to better serve the organization.

In one such study, mentioned in Pink’s book, researchers at Cornell followed over three hundred small businesses, half of which focused on giving control to their employees and half of which did not. The control-centric businesses grew at four times the rate of their counterparts. In another study, which I found during my own research, giving autonomy to middle school teachers in a struggling school district not only increased the rate at which the teachers were promoted, but also, to the surprise of the researchers, reversed the downward performance trend of their students.