Thursday, April 12, 2007

How's work?

Of late I have run across a lot of people at various states of disenchantment and disgruntlement with their jobs. The reasons have been many right from never wanting to do what they find themselves doing, to not feeling challenged enough, to being unhappy with the respect they are getting, to simply wishing they would be doing something more instrumental to the end product their job is producing. When we are growing up most of us run through different phases when depending of who we might have met recently or what our impressionable minds tend to absorb from the different media sources feed us about what exactly we want to do when we grow up. Pilots and joining the army seem like popular options for guys while girls more often than not swear by doctors, nurses and movie stars. As we grow up things however fall into perspective and we don't see India clamoring up with a billion pilots or movie stars. Our career paths are charted as we go through school and we get into our jobs with a certain set of expectations, slightly hesitant knowing that this might very well be what we will be doing for the rest of our lives. We wish to be instrumental tools doing something significant at work and bringing about significant changes. I think that's when most of us hit a real roadblock when we find out that initially we are just a small fish in a big ocean where most big decisions are already made for us. Some of us struggle for respect stemming from our lack of experience while other get disenchanted finding out that what they are meant to be doing is quite different from what they had envisioned they would be doing. This post is exactly about all those people who are at these stages in their nascent career. The problem is not with asking the world of their jobs but the problem lies with expecting everything. We need to realize that not all of us work dream jobs or not at dream salaries or not at dream work hours anyways. We have to realistically lower our expectations slightly of course never to an extent where it starts interfering with your ambitions. All I am saying is that not all of us wake up everyday wanting to go to our jobs, all of us have moments when in the middle of a board room discussion or conference call we just think that what the hell are we doing at this time and place, all of us have times when we get frustrated with trying to meet crazy deadlines built of unreasonable expectations. But the key is to see if there are any moments of magic when you realize how much more fortunate to doing something you have studied to be doing, or moments when you feel a rush hearing a new idea or at a new brain wave at something you want to do based on your own acquired skills, or any other moments of magic when you think to yourself that Wow do I love my job because it is moments like these which will make you realize whether your job is really worth it. If not wait till pay day to see if it is ;)

9 comments:

totti said...

the statistical ensemble(err..) is white noise...some people like..some people don't..some find somethings interesting..you can't bin these things..you see what i am saying? that reminds me of AOL's principle..expectation reduces joy :p

Anonymous said...

Pay day is the only saving grace ;)

M (tread softly upon) said...

Funny that you'd do a post like this because I have been thinking about similar things a lot recently. Unrealistic expectations, broken dreams, ambitions and falling flat on my face. There's a time in life when you are in college or just out of it when you feel you are on top of the world. The sky's the limit and you go as far as your ambition takes you. And then again, there comes a time when you see that may be all that you thought, hoped and dreamed for wasn't all that easy to achieve. And you go as far as you are allowed to go. It's called reality check and that is where you have a major crisis in life.
The sad part is sometimes even pay day cannot make up for it. Because for one, money cannot buy you happiness, fix broken dreams and restore self esteem. And second on pay day,esp on pay day, you realize the pay does not even come close to making up for all your efforts. At least not after 2 prof degrees and tons of blood, sweat and tears. Not even close.
I'm sorry I sound cynical but guess I had to let off steam. Do forgive :)

Prerona said...

I am v hapy with my jodlessness ;)

Fatima said...

Sorry for this random comment. But how many people actually get to do what they want. I mean I look at all these desi parents and all they want their children to be are doctors and engineers. I know I am being forced into a major I am not interested in.And the worst part is I have no way to get out of it. Nice blog by the way. It helped me through my boredom. Thanks!

Point 5 said...

There is probably only 1% of the world which are in a occupation they love....All jobs are equally important and its upto the person to like it...

Dude, you met Hayden...did u ask him why he is batting so well ?

Rohan Kumar said...

@totti I dotn know if this is AOL messing with your mind or what, all i can say is that I am glad you werent at VTech coz all this talk wud be considered scary right now over there :)

@Ad How come you never end up saving any of the saving grace then ;)

@M Well if this job thing is giving you so much unhappiness I dont think you can achieve anything productively with respect to your career by sticking to it, no job's worth all of that

@Ricercar Of course life at school rocks, alternately so does having rich parents :)

@Jouty Random or not all comments are welcome here, eventually its always your choice. So dont get into a situation when at 30 you look back at realize that you made soem bad choices in life

@Point Very well said exactly what I was trying to say in this post. Saw Haydos at the boundary rope abt 20 feet away from us, we heckled him with the Sachinnn Sachinnn chant too :) and but of course he is aweeeeeeeesome batting form right now

totti said...

don't u dare agree with that aussie sob!! i meant pointy..did you see they dropped sachin and lara for the bangladesh trip :P

Anonymous said...

bad work man blames his tools ......