3. A practical approach for managers

"Nothing is more practical than a good theory", as Kurt Lewin, the American founder of social psychology, liked to say. The trouble with motivation, as the previous paragraph has shown, is that there are too many theories. Today, there is no general theory describing the mechanism of motivation in a quasi-exhaustive way, but a plurality of "local" theories, each based on a partial paradigm and validated on a particular field of observations. Should we choose one at the expense of the others - a risky attitude, but one that some people nevertheless adopt? Or should we seek a new, more general theory that would render all the others obsolete? Unnecessary questions, since such choices are almost certainly doomed to failure.

The path we propose is to refuse to choose between these theories - or rather, to choose them all! In short, to work with them... in action, making...