Intrinsic motivation and creativity: the role of digital technology and knowledge integration ability in facilitating creativity

Creativity is a psychological phenomenon mainly affected by the motivation of employees. Nonetheless conflicting results can be found in the literature for the link between intrinsic motivation -creativity relationship. The purpose of this research is to reinvestigate this inconsistent relationship. We took a technological perspective to determine whether technology had an answer to this question. We conducted a laboratory experiment with 119 newly hired bankers of the same batch in four different training sessions to generate creative ideas to solve business problems. Here, intrinsic motivation and digital-technology-use were both manipulated, independently. For field study, data was collected from 467 employees and their respective 41 supervisors working at a software house in Pakistan. Using lab and field data in two studies, we analysed data with Mplus for random coefficient models. We also performed a satorra-bentler-difference test, using the log-likelihood method with scaling correction factor. Drawing on the motivation-opportunity-ability framework for intrinsic motivation-creativity relationship, we found that knowledge integration ability enhances the potential of employees to generate creative ideas. Based on a lab experiment and a field study, we found that creativity is contingent upon the technological opportunity provided to employees directly and indirectly by affecting their ability to integrate knowledge. Our research suggests that providing employees with relevant technological tools and ensuring utilisation of these technologies will fuel higher levels of employee creativity. Technological initiatives will help struggling economies to boost their creative potential. This research has made a significant contribution by bringing together creativity and digital technology literature.