The happiness conveyor belt
I’m Scottish, and my parent’s mindset was that if you,
work hard = become successful = happiness
My father was a lathe turner, not a job that you see frequently advertised these days. As a child I loved what he did, not because I knew what his work involved, but he’d usually be at home when I came back from school. At work, his nickname was ‘The Bear’, I never really asked him what his work was like, why he was called ‘The Bear’ or if it made him happy. I guess he would have seen happiness at his work as irrelevant chat.
BUT you could easily spend 92,000 + hours at work, that’s a heck of amount of time, so let’s make sure that you are doing everything that you can to have happiness at the heart of it.
Happiness doesn’t have a finish line, there isn’t a destination that you can head towards and then say,
“GREAT, that’s me sorted - I’m now happy.”
Don’t WonderIf and wait for happiness to arrive by thinking,
When I graduate from…
When I land this dream job…
When I get this promotion….
….THEN, I WILL BE HAPPY
Although there isn’t a formula to career happiness, you can start to see where your pinch points are -
(Autonomy + Stretch + Equilibrium – Stress) x Purpose = Career happiness
Autonomy+
ASK YOURSELF THESE 3 QUESTIONS
What freedom do you have to design your job so that the majority of the work that you do plays to your strengths?
Do you have a say in how you manage your working week. Can you decide what work you do and when you do this by or are you restricted by the demands of those around you? With some of the medics that I work with the working pattern doesn’t lend itself well to having the autonomy that you may want to focus on patient or cultivate areas of interest in medical leadership, research or education.
Do you have trust & self-belief in yourself and from others that you can, will, and are motivated to work in a way that you choose?
Stretch +
So too little stretch can lead to a lack of motivation and boredom known as rust-out. Research on this suggests that one of the biggest stressors for people at work is not knowing what is expected of them. Charles Handy’s doughnut principle can be useful to think about here. The gorgeous sugary part of it that you can eat, this is your core responsibilities. Here you can use your own judgement and knowledge to experiment and be creative - your left to your own devices to do your own thing and will talk to your boss but only if you need to. The hole in the middle - the part you can’t eat, that is outside your responsibilities, so try to relax and chill out about won’t you don’t need to focus on.
You can though have too much stretch though and this can lead to stress and potential burnout.
Imagine, Goldilocks and the 3 Bears for the moment, it is the JUST RIGHT FACTOR. BUT, the right amount of stretch, combined with a sense of competence to allows you to perform at your best is an amazing feeling.
Equilibrium +
At the moment it can be hard to separate our ‘work’ from our ‘life’ as many of are working from home. As lock-down eases and a semblance of normality returns then those of you who have been furloughed, or working from home, may start to travel back to your office again. I have a great Career balance activity that will help you to reflect on what balance means to you so that you can think about shaping and taking control of your career and having a good work / life equilibrium is key to career happiness.
Delineate work and life by making time to connect with the people you love, engage in creative pursuits that you have been putting on the back burner or put on those trainers for a run or put on your yoga pants to get that endorphin hit from exercise. If you can find a way to ‘shut’ your office door at home, it can bring a tremendous sense of relief to have a physical switch off and distance. If there isn’t a door then get creative and use a table cloth or material to hide your laptop out of your eye!
- Stress
Positive and Negative
Stress can help your brain to focus by narrowing your attention so that you are concentrating on the task at hand. Stress can help increase memory and recall – so a little stress, that increases your cortisone levels, can provide you with the motivation to meet a challenge at work whether that be related to a project, presentation or exam that you are working towards. Short periods of stress can increase productivity but our bodies can’t physically tell the difference between a good stress versus being in distress. If you are feeling that you could be in danger of burnout, then take this test. Although targeted at doctors, anyone can access it for free.
x Purpose
Our motivations, are driven by intrinsic and extrinsic factors.
Intrinsic - you do something because it’s fun, enjoyable and internally rewarding. The goals are created from within you, so help to satisfy your psychological needs.
Extrinsic - you do it in order to gain an external reward so it could be financially driven, you don’t want to get in trouble or it helps you to keep your job! They tend to be outcome focused.
Don’t do all this on your own, that’s what I’m here for.