June 2007 – Are you happy in your work?

A recent poll by YouGov on behalf of CareerMole.com, a recruitment referal website, suggested that something like 7m people in the UK – a quarter of the working population – are unhappy with their jobs. The same poll found that one in three recruitment companies had placed people in roles for which they were ill-matched, simply to fill a post.

“People who are content in their jobs work harder, do better and feel happier. It’s that simple. You spend a huge chunk of your time at work, so why sit in a job you hate?” said Kristian Hall, chief executive of CareerMole.

The answer to his question is that people prefer a job they hate to no job at all. An analysis of the World Values Survey held on four occasions between 1981 and 2004 and quoted in Lord Leyard’s book, Happiness, Lessons from a New Science, listed work as one of a “Big seven” factors influencing levels of happiness.

On a scale that measured causes of unhappiness, unemployment was ranked in joint second place along with health behind separation in marriage. Job insecurity and a rise in unemployment rates were also factors.

In relative terms unhappiness with your work is nowhere near as significant. This probably explains why so many people are willing to put up with some dissatisfaction, particularly if there is a compensating reward.

The extent to which pay prospects distort career choices is far from clear but the anecdotal evidence would suggest they have a strong influence. I have rarely met anyone in a large accountancy or an investment bank who has described their job as a vocation.

Typically their career choice is explained in what I would describe as a kind of Faustian pact. Some have spoken about parental pressure, some were drawn by the promise of further qualifications funded by the employer, others have mentioned employability. But the underpinning attraction has been the salary and not a few have spoken of making enough by their early forties to give them the freedom to do something new.

I always think this is sad, as if people are prepared to suppress their real leanings for the dream of something better later on. On the other hand my sympathies are qualified because almost every one of those I describe is in a well paid professional career.

The problem is that most of us experience a condition that psychologists refer to as “adaptation” where an increase in our well being is only possible through the achievement of some new stimulus, be it material in a better house or car, or a status change such as a job promotion. Leyard writes about being stuck on what he calls a “hedonic treadmill” where you need to keep running to sustain a certain level of happiness.

Another problem is that certain income and status levels elevate people within the social strata so that they begin to mix with and relate to others on a similar footing. There are different qualifiers here and wealth is only one of them. At a celebrity party a more significant factor would be your fame, hence the concept of A-list and B-list parties. In politics the qualifier is all about power.

It is quite possible, therefore, to be wealthy yet excluded from political power broking. It explains why Davos is so successful and why so many business people crave peerages.

A political career on its own, however, is so brittle that it is difficult to apply the concept of job satisfaction when people may be thrown out of office after five years.

Yet I would imagine that few members of Parliament are unhappy with their jobs, even those who may not have fulfilled all of their political ambitions. While Westminster can induce the “little fish” syndrome for parliamentarians, all they need do is travel back to their constituencies to recharge their levels of esteem as a local “big fish”.

But this kind of behaviour, like that of those who endure a job they dislike on the promise of a golden tomorrow, is something of a patchwork existence. It’s not the complete, self-fulfilled or what Abraham Maslow would have called “self-actualised” career that delivers satisfaction in spades day in and day out.

So what should young people do when considering vocational training or a degree course? My advice is to listen to their instincts more than they listen to parents, teachers or friends of the family.

One of the hardest decisions faces the children of those who run family businesses. Is it healthy for them to assume that one day they will take over the reins? One of my friends has encouraged his children to find careers outside the family business. In the long run he believes they will have more fulfilling work in a profession.

What can never be ignored is the role played by providence – an accidental meeting here, a sudden opportunity there. My own career started in retailing where I was climbing the managerial ladder as an assistant manager in a supermarket (in the days before they were as big as they are now).

Had I not bumped in to an old school friend doing his weekly shopping my career path could have been quite different. But he tipped me off about a reporting vacancy on the local newspaper. A pay cut didn’t matter because I knew it was the job for me and work became a way of life.

In writing these columns I have completed countless psychometric tests and every time they point me towards the kind of work that I have been doing for years. Who is to say how much a career moulds your preferences? I do not subscribe to the idea that there is only one ideal path for everyone. Multiple career paths are growing more common as people swap and change throughout their lives.

A problem arises when debts, mortgages and other financial commitments create a career straightjacket, cutting off the options to retrain or to pursue a less well paid role elswehere. But sometimes you need to step back to move forward. In a world where the internet and new technologies are throwing up so many new opportunities there really can be no excuse for being unhappy at work.

See also: Working at happiness