Upwards of 70% of employee’s are very dissatisfied with their jobs. Like this silent majority many of us feel under appreciated and exploited. Surprisingly these are common emotions at all levels of an organization. We generally ascribe this sentiment to cubicle dwelling middle management-like the Scranton crew - but I have witnessed this sentiment among all levels of management, including other senior executives.
It would likely take a several PhD’s to fully outline why people hate their employment, but some simple principles might assist you in understanding your circumstance.
Leadership is imperfect
Leadership is no science, rather an art. Leadership skills are the most significant capabilities gap in organizations today. Today, employee’s expectations of leaders is very high, thankfully the commitment of senior management is also high. Management’s emotional commitment to leadership development is often not realized given the clinical realities of revenue and profit growth. Most companies have various commitment statements on the importance of leadership; however most don’t have management metrics that reward this. In the quarterly parade of earnings I never heard a single analyst question the state of leadership. Management bonuses are aligned to the perceived underpinnings of stock valuation, revenue growth balanced against cost management. The desire to develop great leadership is simply not supported by current governance.
No one will come down from on high to resolve the leadership imperfections around you; employees and managers must accept that leadership will come down to the skills in your immediate team.
Resolution 1: Be an agent of leadership you want.
Act in the leadership style consistent with your ideals. You have surely developed opinions about team work, coaching, mentorship and training - demonstrate this style. (Caution don’t use this advice as an excuse usurp your manager)
Moving away for cultural norms will take courage; but allows you to determine, express and maintain your authentic style. One member of a team can completely change the leadership approach around them. Leadership is recognized as a unique skill and exercising your authentic style increases the likelihood of being positively regarded.
Living in a ‘I’ Centred universe
Most of the frustrations with a job or career are a matter of perspective; and, well…one’s perspective generally revolves around themselves. Unfortunately not all matters of the world, country or your company revolve around you - while this seems obvious - most of us are programmed not to recognize the personal centricity of our daily judgements.
Your world view is generated by the great adjudicator ‘your mind’- the mind is very accomplished in its role as the judger of perspective. The more significant the ego need of the decision the more ego centric the mind becomes. Unfortunately we do not live in a ‘I’ centred universe.
Work is a big ego driver, so the natural instinct is to define what happens at work at as ‘me centric’. This strong ego centric thinking and ego driven protection leads to misjudging both colleagues and organizational motives. The result is unnecessary interpersonal and inner personal conflicts.
Resolution 2: Two: move away from ego driven thinking or actions.
Start improving your awareness :
✓ How you are processing the world around you?
✓ How often do you say ‘I’? - ‘I’ did …, I know…. , I am responsible for…. etc.
✓ How often do you interpret a discussion or email as directly linked to something you did or said?
✓ Do you find yourself getting defensive/territorial?
✓ Do you often find the need to aggressively defend yourself?
Spend at least one week improving your self awareness. Pay careful attention to your mood/emotions and your natural reactions. Make notes in meetings or afterwards to explore what is behind your actions.
Once you have a greater self understanding to pay attention to your reactions. Modify your behaviour with the recognition that most items in life are not me centric.
If you have trouble and fall into habitual behaviour, simply stay silent for a minute or two. It is surprising how legitimate concerns will quickly be picked up by someone else and resolved, and non- issues have a tendency to float way as the regular flow of the meeting/discussion moves on.
Work is your key learning mechanism
People have great expectations for jobs. A job should be your key passion, were you gain sustenance and show success to the world. Often a man’s self worth is completely wrapped up in a career. This perspective leads to great personal dissatisfaction. To create a parallel, marriage is often portrayed as bliss on earth - sunshine champagne and roses. If you expect marriage to provide this paradise, you will quickly become depressed as the regular discourse of life carries on.
Your expectations for work need to align to its realities; to prevent the inevitable routine of work from sucking the life out of you. The routine of work is marked by interpersonal challenges, expectation issues, and stress management. All can cause to low level anxiety.
Reframe work, it is not something that gives to you but is a platform for learning.
Resolution 3: What am I here to learn?
Commit that your work will be the key place of learning in your life.
Conceptually, this seems straightforward we often start new roles learning new information or approaches to the business. These skills or competencies are considered functional expertise, (eg. strategic analysis or cash flow management strategies) We need to consider leadership development in this same context.
Your job is were you will learn things about your self, how you react, how others deal with issues and more. Building on resolutions 1 and 2 , increase your self awareness and model your behaviour to affect the style you choose. Use the various power struggles, interpersonal conflicts, team failures as fodder to understand your style and how it supports (or detracts) from achievement.
You are the goal
Don’t complain your job is not giving you enough; focus on how you will use it to develop strong leadership skills and self understanding.
Your work is an important input to your life, not an output. The key output to your life is you - money, toys and prestigious are the competitive playing field, but victory is determined not by the prize but the quality of play.
