Remember how excited you were when you got your current job? The day you showed up, you couldn’t wait to meet your new colleagues and get started. So, what changed? And is there anything you can do to renew your enthusiasm, or is it just time to move on to something new?
According to a recent survey of 5,000 U.S. households by The Conference Board, only 45% of those polled say they are satisfied with their jobs—down from about 60% in 1987, the first year the survey was conducted.
So, you are not alone.
Perhaps in an ideal world, the person you work with who always finds a way to annoy you would just leave. Or, your irritating boss gets promoted (or demoted).
But it is probably a better strategy to renew our passion for our work. Researchers tell us there are two contradictory perspectives. ‘Fit’ theorists believe that love for work is “achieved through finding the right fit with a line of work”. While ‘develop’ theorists believe that passion is cultivated over time.”
Yale University psychologist Amy Wrzesniewski and University of Michigan professor of business administration and psychology Jane E. Dutton suggest we need to go through an exercise called “job crafting.” It means we need to take more control or reframe our job.
That means we should
1) Refine our jobs to add parts you like and remove parts you don’t.
2) Build better relationships with your colleagues.
3) Reframe your situation to add meaning and purpose.
Consider these ideas:
Train yourself to be grateful for the job you have. There are probably lots of people who would love your job.
Take a creative approach. You may perform the same task over and over. Is there anything you can to be more creative in improving the process?
Make friends at work. Resist the temptation to sit at your desk when you eat your lunch. Do other congregate in a lunchroom? Invite a colleague to join you for lunch or to try that new restaurant you’ve heard about.
Take a vacation. Valerie Streif, senior content manager with Pramp. says, “Being overworked, having stressful projects, and not taking enough time for themselves to rest and recover can quickly lead to feelings of resentment and contempt toward their job.”
https://www.businessnewsdaily.com/11269-rekindle-love-of-work.html
Find a mentor who might be able to give you honest feedback. An outsider you trust might be able to provide you with insights as to whether the problems you perceive are real, or whether you are exaggerating.
Develop outside interests. A person who goes home at night and has too much time to think about their job will lead to concentrating on the little slights you experience on the job.
What if you have tried everything and still are unhappy. That’s the time for you to begin thinking about what you need in your next job to make you happier, knowing that you have done everything you can do to make your current situation better.
An average person spends 90,000 hours at work over a lifetime. You deserve to be happy.
If you are thinking about looking for a new job, I have developed a strategy to make your application stand out from the others. It involves marketing yourself correctly and handling every step of the hiring process with confidence. I’m sharing this information as part of my online course, “Getting The Job You Want.” I know it has helped others, now the course can help you. Check it out.
Dave Edwards Media 