Optimal Levels of Drive

By: Dr. Bill Anton

One of the few relationships in the psychological literature that is reliable enough over a broad range of performance to be labeled a law. The Yerkes-Dodson Law relates a broad range of performance to the general concept of arousal or drive. To simplify, almost any type of performance can relate to arousal, as shown on the curve above.

This relationship is important to business leaders because it shows that performance is optimal at moderate levels of drive. For many, this concept might seem counterintuitive. If a person’s performance does not meet expectation, we generally assume that he or she is unmotivated and that, if we could simply light a fire under him or her, performance would improve.

As shown on the chart above, this is not necessarily true. The fact is that many underperformers are conscientious, often perfectionistic, and even anxious about doing a good job and are overly focused on how their performance is perceived. Rather than being unmotivated, their arousal lies somewhere between modest and high on the curve shown above.