I would agree: when the employee gets to the point where, "It's about the money" I would guess that it's probably not. In addition to not finding fulfillment

I would agree: when the employee gets to the point where, "It's about the money" I would guess that it's probably not. In addition to not finding fulfillment (edw519's list of motivating factors), I'd say there's a list of demotivating factors too: * Having your feedback or objections being ignored by management * "... I'm gonna need you to come in on Sunday..." once too often * Not being able to do your best work (because of schedule, or other, pressures) * Too many meetings / status checks * Greener pastures, technology stack wise, "Wow, here I am doing Java, but hot darn does Scala look cool, I wish we could use some Java version later than this Java version from 1999" * too much drama With enough of these conditions too often, it doesn't matter how good the money is. Having said that, if your current salary is around the amount you need to survive, then these worries come into place. If you're worried about losing your house because your salary is too low, then you're at a different place on the Maslow's pyramid and then it might really be about the money. ("Wow, this job is actually going to pay me, vs working for equity. I should take it")