Why People Work

by Leonard R. Sayles

Everyone needs to work but what does work mean to him? In the following essay Leonard R. Sayles explores the relationship between work and human beings' well-being.

Jobs and work do much more than most of us realize to provide happiness and contentment. We're all used to thinking that work provides the material things of life—the goods and services that make possible our version of modern civilization. But we are much less conscious of the extent to which work provides the more intangible, but more crucial, psychological well-being that can make the difference between a full and an empty life.

Why is it that most of us don't put work and human satisfaction together, except when it comes to the end product of work: automobiles and houses and good food?

It's always useful to blame someone else and the Greeks of the ancient world deserve some blame here. At that time work was restricted to slaves and to those few free citizens who had not yet accumulated adequate independent resources. The "real" citizens of Greece—whom Plato and others talked about—expected to spend their time in free discussion and contemplation.

The Middle Ages didn't help the reputation of work. It became more acceptable to engage in work. In fact, it was asserted that man had a religious duty to fulfill his "calling". To fail to work was immoral—worse, work was thought of as a punishment for the sins of man.

It's not difficult to understand the tarnished reputation. Historically, work has been associated with slavery and sin, compulsion and punishment. And in our own day we are used to hearing the traditional complaints: "I can't wait for my vacation." "I wish I could stay home today." "My boss treats me poorly." "I've got too much work to do and not enough time to do it." Against this backdrop, it may well come as a surprise to learn that not only psychologists but other behavioral scientists have come to accept the positive contribution of work to the individual's happiness and sense of personal achievement. Work is more than a necessity for most human beings; it is the focus of their lives, the source of their identity and creativity.

Rather than a punishment or a burden, work is the opportunity to realize one's potential. Many psychiatrists heading mental health clinics have observed its therapeutic effect. A good many patients who languish in clinics, depressed or obsessed, gain renewed self-confidence when gainfully employed and lose some, if not all, of their most acute symptoms. Increasingly, institutions dealing with mental health problems are establishing worships wherein those too sick to get a job in "outside" industry can work, while every effort is exerted to arrange "real" jobs for those well enough to work outside.

And the reverse is true, too. For large numbers of people, the absence of work is debilitating. Retirement often brings many problems surrounding the "What do I do with myself?" question, even though there may be no financial cares. Large numbers of people regularly get headaches and other psychosomatic illnesses on weekends when they don't have their jobs to go to, and must fend for themselves. It has been observed that unemployment, quite aside from exerting financial pressures, brings enormous psychological malaise and that many individuals deteriorate rapidly when jobless.

But why? Why should work be such a significant source of human satisfaction? A good share of the answer rests in the kind of pride that is stimulated by the job, by the activity of accomplishing. After all, large numbers of people continue working when there is no financial or other compulsion. They are independently wealthy; no one would be surprised if they spent their time at leisure. But something inside drives them to work: the unique satisfactions they derive from it.

Pride in Accomplishment

The human being craves a sense of being accomplished, of being able to do things, with his hand, with his mind, with his will. Each of us wants to feel he or she has the ability to do something that is meaningful and that stands outside of us as a tribute to our inherent abilities. This extension of ourselves—in what our hands and minds can do—fills out our personality and expands our ego.

    It is easiest to see this in the craftsman who lovingly shapes some base material into an object that may be either useful or beautiful or both. You can see the carpenter or bricklayer or die-maker stand aside and admire the product of his personal skill.

But even where there is no obvious end product that is solely attributable to one person's skill, researchers have found that employees find pride in accomplishment. Our own research in hospitals suggests that even the housekeeping and laundry staffs take pride in the fact that in their own ways they are helping to cure sick people—and thus accomplishing a good deal.

We've watched programmers and engineers work fifteen and eighteen hours at a stretch, seven days a week, when a job really got tough and they knew that a crucial deadline had to be met, or when a major project would fall unless some tough problem were solved. Certainly some of this is loyalty and identification—giving back to the organization something in return for having provided them with good jobs—but a larger part of it is selfishness, in the good sense of the word. They received a substantial personal payoff from their efforts in the knowledge that they could tackle tough, almost insurmountable problems, yet overcome them.

They enjoyed "making it,"—winning despite difficult odds; proving their capacities against the outsider: nature, a competitor, a complex problem; mastering something new every day.

Even on simple jobs one can observe pride at work. Cleaning men and janitors will tell you that while the job looks uncomplicated, there are countless subtleties one needs to know, whose desk can be dusted and whose can't; how to get the most out of cleaning compounds; the best sequence to handle a variety of jobs; even how to sweep a great deal without getting tired. Machine operators often make comments like this：

"See this machine? Anyone looking at it thinks you can master it in an hour or two; even the foreman does. But every machine has a personality of its own. I know just how fast I can run it on every different kind of material we get around here; what it will take and what it won't take; how to coax it along; how much oil; what every sound means that it makes. You know it actually takes a year before you know everything about a piece of equipment like this—so you feel it is just part of you, of your arms and legs and head."

We're often misled by the gripes and complaints surrounding difficult work; deep down most people regard their own capacity to conquer the tough job the mark of their own unique personality. Grousing is just part of working. After all, how else do you know who you are, except as you can demonstrate the ability of your mind to control your limbs and hands and words? You are, in significant measure, what you can do.

Some are deceived into thinking that people like to store up energy, to rest and save themselves as much as possible. Just the opposite. It is energy expenditure that is satisfying. Expending energy, in a sense, creates its own replacement—there is no reservoir such that the more you use the less you have. The measure of your capability is in being active and being able to control that activity so that it results in a tangible accomplishment you can claim as your own.

Just watch an employee who must deal with countless other people because his or her job is at some central point in a communications network: a salesman at a busy counter, a stock broker on the phone, a customer representative. They will tell you how much skill and experience it takes to field countless questions and handle a welter of diverse personalities every hour of the day. Not everyone can interact with such persistence and over long hours, but those who do, pride themselves in a distinctive ability that contributes mightily to the running of the organization.

But work is more than accomplishment and pride in being able to command the job, because except for a few artisans and artists most work takes place "out in the world," with and through other people.

Esprit de corps

Perhaps an example will make the point:

I remember viewing a half dozen men in a chair factory whose job was to bend several pieces of steel and attach them so that a bridge chair would result. While there were ten or twelve of these "teams" that worked together, one in particular was known for its perfect coordination and lightning-like efforts. The men knew they were good. They would work in spurts for twenty or thirty minutes before taking a break—to show themselves, bystanders and other groups what it was to be superbly skilled and self-controlled, to be the best in the factory.

When I talked with them, each expressed enormous pride in being a part of the fastest, best team. And this sense of belonging to an accomplished work group that both outsiders and insiders recognize can handle itself with extreme virtuosity is one of the distinctive satisfactions of the world of work. It is the same esprit de corps one can see in the military, where men will make enormous sacrifices to help their buddies to whom they have developed strong loyalties and who comprise the best darn outfit in the field.

There is little satisfaction to be derived from being part of the inept, uncoordinated "team" that is always last in the formal or informal competition.

Just as in athletics, a winning team produces a variety of social supports and satisfactions. It is both exciting and reassuring to be caught up in a network of friendships in which people can congratulate each other (and be admired and even a little envied by outsiders) for their competence, know-how and productivity. In a sense success breeds success; the successful group becomes more unified because people want to be associated with it and value their membership in the group. The bonds that hold the individual to the work group also are responsible for its effectiveness: cohesive groups more easily solve the problems of interdependence and cooperation than do the disunited or those which have little hold on their members.

One further word about work group satisfactions. Unlike many other aspects of life, relationships among people at work tend to be simple ,less complicated ,somewhat less emotional. This is not to say there aren't arguments and jealousies, but, on the whole, behavioral research discloses that human relations at work are just easier, perhaps because they are more regular and predictable and thus simpler to adjust to than the sporadic, the more intense and less regular relationships in the community. And the work group also gently pressures its members to learn how to adjust to one another so that the "rough edges" are worked off because people know they must do certain things with and through one another each day.

Beyond the team and the work group, there is the organization, whether it be company or hospital or university. The same pride in being part of a well-coordinated, successful unit is derived from being part of a large collectivity. Working for a company that is thought of as being one of the best in the community (because of its reputation for quality, perhaps, or the technical sophistication of its products, or its working conditions, or its social conscience) can provide employees with both status and self-confidence. They assume, usually with good reason, that others regard them more highly, even envy them, and that they are more astute and competent than the average because of this association with a "winner", a prestigious institution. We in truth bask in the reflected glory of the institution, and we seek ways of asserting our membership so that others will know and can recognize our good fortune.

(2014 words)

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