What Motivates People?

I just listened to a really interesting TED talk called, "The Surprising Science of Motivation" by Dan Pink (former Al Gore speech writer).  It's well worth checking out here. 

Here were some of the big ideas I took from the video.

• There is a mismatch between what science knows and what business does
• Rewards and incentives do not work for complex tasks. 
• Rewards narrow your focus and destroy creativity (this is scientifically proven)
• For complex situations rewards actually become an hindrance
• Rewards/incentives work for very simple tasks, but that is it. 
• People work better if they have self-direction rather than management 
• "20 Percent Time"--some companies are allowing their employees to work on whatever they want for 20% of their time.
• One such company is Google and it works so well that about half of Google's new products each year get birthed out this autonomous time people have to work (Gmail being one such product). 

This makes me wonder....What would it be like if I allowed my students to have more autonomy over their learning?  What if I was able to use 20% of my time to work on whatever I would like?  I think being an educator I do have quite a bit of autonomy but at the same time my ever growing "to-do" list keeps me from being able to explore new ideas and creative pursuits.  

Is there a mismatch between science and modern education?