The Hindu Business Line : Telltale signs of a miserable job

The question elicits no reaction. “People just looked at one another as though Brian had asked the question in Russian. ‘Come on now, everybody. Show of hands. How many like your jobs?’ Slowly, every hand in the room went up, but wit h no conviction.”

Thus goes a new business fable from Patrick Lencioni: The Three Signs of a Miserable Job ( www.josseybass.com).

“Brian smiled. ‘Okay, let me be clearer. I’m not asking how many of you want to keep your jobs…” He then rephrases the question: ‘How about this? How many people here get excited about coming to work? How many of you are in a really good mood when you’re driving here?’

Brian might as well have asked them if they liked being beaten with a stick, observes the author. “No one raised their hand, and more than a few of them actually laughed out loud.”

Alas, miserable jobs are no laughing matter; they can kill. They can be worse than bad jobs. The misery has a staggering cost, both in economic and human terms, laments Lencioni.

But what is a miserable job? “It’s the one you dread going to and can’t wait to leave. It’s the one that saps your energy even when you’re not busy. It’s the one that makes you go home at the end of the day with less enthusiasm and more cynicism than you had when you left in the morning.”

Being miserable has nothing to do with the actual work a job involves, the author explains.

“A professional basketball player can be miserable in his job while the janitor cleaning the locker room behind him finds fulfilment in his work. A marketing executive can be miserable making a quarter of a million dollars a year while the waitress who serves her lunch derives meaning and satisfaction from her job.”

Not to be missed!

D. Murali

http://BookPeek.blogspot.com