The overjustification effect doesn't occur if the extrinsic reward is a surprise or isn't known/expected in advance. So there are ways to improve it. I'm actu

The overjustification effect doesn't occur if the extrinsic reward is a surprise or isn't known/expected in advance. So there are ways to improve it. I'm actually toying with going back into consulting for fun, in which case I've been thinking of essentially providing clients with payment details to a separately managed account and asking that they pay what they think my services are worth (or what they would have paid a competitor), and directing the management of that account to invest it for retirement. There's value in having people pay for a thing because they then value it more than if it were free, but I don't want to know about it and my not knowing would allow me to take or reject business based on how much I think I'll enjoy the project or not. This only works with it being a side gig for me, but luckily I'd have the freedom to keep it as that. But yes, it's extremely hard in general to avoid the overjustification effect, and it's not very well known at all despite being quite destructive.