Why we ‘reward’ motivated employees with more work

In workplaces everywhere, the most engaged employees often become the go-to for extra work. It feels logical, but management scholar Sangah Bae believes that instinct might be backfiring — a lot. Her recent work shows that intrinsically motivated workers are disproportionately assigned additional tasks, often at a cost to their performance, satisfaction, and long-term retention. The reason isn’t just that they’re capable—it’s that managers assume they’ll actually enjoy the extra work.

You can listen to Why we ‘reward’ motivated employees with more work online on Radio and Podcast. Open the player on this page to stream the available audio.

Why we ‘reward’ motivated employees with more work is an episode from UnDisciplined by UPR Utah Public Radio.

This episode is 25:56 long.

This episode was published on Apr 30, 2026.

Yes. Use the heart button on the episode page to add it to your favorite episodes list.

Yes. This page shows related episodes from UnDisciplined when more episodes are available from the podcast feed.