Getting a Good Job

I read a new Gallup Poll the other day which showed that 70% of US employees hate their jobs. The poll asked random workers how engaged or disengaged they were in the workplace and 70% were disengaged strongly indicating that they had low involvement with their job, were not enthusiastic, and were not committed to the work they did or to the company they worked for.

When I was a college student,  I was engrossed with the writings of Psychologist Abraham Maslow who said that to love your work is of utmost importance. He said that it is imperative that the job we accept and the work we do are in alignment with what we value and what we really want to do.

I took Maslow’s writings to heart and I made a point of being very discriminating about the jobs I applied for. If the person interviewing me for a job was not to my liking and I did not have a good feeling about the company, I graciously left the interview and did not accept the job even if it was offered to me.

I remember going on a job interview at a psychiatric facility when I was 23 and being called by the director the next day to hire me for the position of Activities Therapist. I asked her what the starting pay was and when she told me I responded that that was the same pay I was making in my current job. I really wanted the position and I really liked the facility but I was not going to make a big move if she couldn’t offer me more hours and better pay. She told me she would get back to me. The next day she offered me the position with more hours and higher pay. Within a month, she unexpectedly left her director’s position there and I was given the task of keeping the entire program going until the medical director found her replacement. Since I loved working there so much I decided to apply for the open position myself and somehow miraculously was hired as the new Program Director for a very well respected 80 bed psychiatric institute.

Psychologist Shawn Achor wrote, “If you get a good job you will want to get a better job. By raising your positivity in the present, your brain can experience the ‘happiness advantage.’ This means your brain is finely attuned to positivity rather than negativity.”

Enthusiasm has amazing power to effect change and influence people. It is the quality that separates people who are simply doing their job from those who bring creativity, passion and excitement into the workplace. If a job allows you to use your talents and strengths and you feel good about getting up in the morning and going to work, then it is the right place to be. If the opposite occurs, namely that you wish you could stay in bed for a few hours longer and you have to drag your comb across your hair and drag your feet out the door, then like the 70% in the Gallop Poll, think about making a change. You owe it to yourself.