On the quest to find our work meaning that will fit our identity
Do you know the story about Sisyphus? I am sure you do. Just like him, you wake up every day and you push “your rock” up the steep hill for 8 hours, just so you can do it again tomorrow and you will do this for foooorty years, or even more. So, what’s the thought that appears when you wake up and helps you go through the day? Do you feel an existential dread in the Sunday afternoon, just as Monday approaches? Do you see yourself as a small tooth of a large gear or as a part of a puzzle? What does it mean to give meaning and make your job meaningful?
There is a popular anecdote about John F. Kennedy visiting NASA and asking a janitor why he was working late. “I’m helping put a man on the Moon” — he famously said. It is our right to build meaning around our work and with that, to build a huge part of our identity. An HBR article mentions the hard job of sewage workers and how they persist in the toughness of the work conditions because they find purpose in it. The article asks a resonating question “Why is it that some people can be extraordinarily well-paid and work in pampered settings but feel empty, while others can work in the sewers of New York City and feel fulfilled?”
Have you ever wondered why you almost always include your job position when you are introducing yourself? We build a huge part of our identity around the perceived meaning of our job. The level of meaningfulness in our job is proven to influence our health and the level of objectification can be a predictor of the tendency of the employee to leave or stay within a company (we will talk about objectification a little later on). But how does work become meaningful? What are the mechanisms of meaning and what can HRs do about it?
An overview of the mechanisms of meaning
In an article written in 2010, Rosso et al. talk, among other things, about the mechanisms that bring meaning to our work. We will make a short overview below:
- Authenticity — we find our work meaningful if we feel ourselves in our work, if the job role fits our character and if there is alignment between the behavior expected from us on the job position and our true self, or the perception of our true self. That helps us avoid dissonances and makes us feel congruent and synced with our work environment. For example, people who think that their job is their true calling, find their job meaningful because it helps them connect to their true core. Authenticity will make people intrinsically motivated and they will perceive their work as an expression of their authentic identity.
2. Self-efficacy — people will find their work meaningful if they feel they have the power and ability to make a difference or to do their job properly. Self-efficacy is a huge proven motivator, and nothing can encourage people as feeling in control of their job or competent and able enough to do their job in the first place. Autonomy makes people happy at their job, they stay longer in a company and their productivity is increased. Ironically enough, when you leave competent people to do their job and get out of their way without controlling them, it’s pretty plausible they won’t even need your control to do the job right. If someone sees themselves as growing, learning, and making a difference, it’s obvious they will find their job as meaningful and their impact on the job as more powerful.
3. Self-esteem — the perception of self-worth, something that we both carry in ourselves, but something that it’s also shaped by external experiences. People will find their job meaningful if employers show gratitude and empower employees, if they give positive feedback when it’s deserved, and when they don’t feel invisible. Employees who perceive themselves as a valuable part of the group, team, organization will empower their identity and enhance their self-esteem.
4. Purpose — our direction and intention to do something in our lives. Purpose can help us forget all the difficulties we face on an everyday level. People who see their job as a calling, as something they were meant to do, as something for the greater good, as something significant to serve a purpose greater than themselves will only focus on the goal, no matter how unreachable it seems to be.
5. Belongingness — maintaining positive, valuable, interpersonal relationships. People have the innate need to belong in a group, sharing the same value system or fate with other individuals. Groups will persist in tough work conditions or with extremely difficult customers simply because they share the same fate and will build their individual identity around the one of the groups. It’s not uncommon to hear sentences like “We, sales people”, or “we, recruiters” and so on.
6. Transcendence — “connecting or superseding the ego to an entity greater than the self or beyond the material world”. There was a scene in The Simpsons in which Homer had placed Maggie’s photos over a sign that said, “Don’t forget: you’re here forever” covering certain letters of the sign, which later reads: “Do it for her”. People will find meaning in self-abnegation, deliberately placing themselves as inferior to something greater: a family, a company, a country.
7. Cultural and interpersonal sense-making — that is mostly the meaning we try to construct based on the cultural system or the collective, on the information we gather from observing the external environment.
Objectification makes us feel like resources
Objectification is the negation of our uniqueness and humanness in our work. We are a number without a name and identity. It can be a perception from others, or a self-objectification when an individual feels like a non-person. This can lead to dementalization and instrumentalization, when you feel like a resource, rather than human, like a tool to complete a certain task, something in possession of a company, without subjectivity and any feelings or mental states. Objectification increases the chances of burnout or deteriorating mental health. Finding meaning in your work is proven to reduce the effects of objectification of others, specifically the perception of not feeling like a person.
How can HRs guide people in finding meaning?
The first thing companies and HRs can do is the most obvious one: choose people who are right for the job and would feel authentic in it. Choosing someone who hates calling people on the phone for a sales position isn’t a smart idea. Sure, people can progress and develop, but you want people who are already authentic in the role. Reduce micromanagement, make employees feel empowered and in control of their job. It’s proven that people who are controlled, especially in creative positions, will be less productive and motivated.
Inform your people that you SEE them, that their value and contribution are important, that they are not just a number. Individual care will help people find their meaning and make their potential blossom. Promote warm and accepting work cultures, where people will feel like they belong, like they are a part of the group. Competitiveness between team members will only bring short-term results, but in the long run, will make the culture toxic and will drain your people.
Job crafting is a way to reduce objectification — give your employees enough autonomy to craft their jobs to fit their goals and value systems. In that way, people can inject enough of themselves into the job role, to make it meaningful for them.
Last, but not least, an article by Carton (2018) states that managers can be the architects who motivate employees by providing a “structural blueprint that maps the connections between employees’ everyday work and the organization’s ultimate aspirations”. In other words, make your people see the bigger picture, the long-term objectives, and not only the short-term tasks. Build a long-term strategy, promote it publicly, and help your people build their work identity. Just like the janitor who was mopping the floor.
In the end, we spend a lot of our time, energy, and ourselves on our jobs and will be a waste if you can’t find your meaning, you hate your job and still stay in a certain company or in a job position that simply makes you unhappy.
So, think about it, what makes you push YOUR rock?
