There&#x27;s a lot of studies that show that money is a poor motivator long term once you pass the essentials for life (which admittedly in the Valley is higher than many other places). As important, some of those studies show that especially in roles requiring creativity (like engineering, design, etc) it actually negatively effects motivation and output.<p>See Dan Pink&#x27;s Drive for a good summary of many of this research, which has led to his Autonomy - Mastery - Purpose framework that is part of his more well-known TED Talk on the subject: <a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.ted.com&#x2F;talks&#x2F;dan_pink_on_motivation" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.ted.com&#x2F;talks&#x2F;dan_pink_on_motivation</a><p>Coincidentally, those 3 pieces of his framework hit on many of the aspects of this thread and especially the Gallup research on the desire for goals and growth.