The following is a brief introduction to job satisfaction. Click here if you would like to proceed directly to the job satisfaction quiz.
Terry fulfilled her father’s dream and became a lawyer. Unfortunately, she found being a lawyer tiresome. Long hours, tremendous pressure, and many tedious details proved to be very little fun. “The job is fairly lucrative,” Terry rationalized. “I work hard, I’m well paid, so what if I’m not entirely satisfied?”
So What if I’m not Completely Satisfied?
Work can consume eighty percent of our waking hours. People who don’t enjoy their work drain vital energy from their lives. Besides, trading your aliveness for a paycheck can also hurt your long-term earnings as well. If you don’t like your work, you are bound to develop a poor attitude. You’ll spend part of your energy working, while part is fighting negative feelings.
You won’t be a star performer; you might not even be seen as a positive contributor! You probably won’t get a good raise or a promotion. Then, a vicious cycle begins. You get discouraged, your attitude gets worse, and your performance suffers. Getting stuck in this cycle spirals your career downward.
Getting better money on the job begins with job satisfaction. Duds don’t get good raises. In our twenty plus collective years of career consulting, we’ve worked with thousands of individuals and compared their job satisfaction with their incomes. Those with high job satisfaction always earn more, often fifty or even one hundred percent more!
Solution
There are two ways to increase your satisfaction (you can do both if you like). First, work on the communications and relationships at work to make the environment satisfying. Be responsible for creating the satisfaction you want. Second, make sure that you spend your day on tasks you perform well. Get rid of the ones you don’t, or, if that’s impossible, then get a transfer or get a new job.