Underestimating the importance of expressing intrinsic motivation in job interviews

Kaitlin Woolley and Ayelet Fishbach

Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 2018, vol. 148, issue C, 1-11

Abstract: Across five studies (N = 1428), we documented an important prediction problem in recruitment: Job candidates mispredicted how much recruiters valued expressions of intrinsic motivation (e.g., learning that a candidate desired meaningful work). In contrast, candidates more accurately predicted how much recruiters valued expressions of extrinsic motivation (e.g., learning that a candidate desired opportunities for career advancement). Social distance produced this discrepancy: People failed to realize others cared about intrinsic motivation as much as they did; therefore, they underestimated how much expressing that they valued intrinsic motivation mattered to others. Indeed, recruiters giving recruitment pitches also mispredicted how much admitted candidates valued learning that a company emphasized intrinsic motivation. As a consequence of the misprediction, candidates chose suboptimal pitches that failed to express their intrinsic motivation during job interviews, unless explicitly encouraged to take the recruiters’ perspective.

Keywords: Goals; Intrinsic/extrinsic motivation; Recruiting decisions; Self-presentation; Misprediction (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2018
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:jobhdp:v:148:y:2018:i:c:p:1-11

DOI: 10.1016/j.obhdp.2018.06.004

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