Week Four: Resources Reflection
Readings:
The Role of Work in Psychological Health and Well-Being (Blustein)
Quote: “Individuals often dream about having a work life that will be rewarding and meaningful; at the same time, people have to struggle with disappointment in their work lives as they seek to adapt to situations in which they often have little control or autonomy” (Blustein, 2006).
Reflection: This is a broad, generalized statement of course, but it reminded me of this wonderful exchange between British comedian and expert storyteller Kenneth Williams, and chat show host Michael Parkinson from the 1970s, where the two clash about the value of wanting to do a good day’s work versus actually being able to find fulfillment in one’s career: https://youtu.be/X0cRolJ_hIw?feature=shared&t=211. Autonomy at work has been an important theme for me during my career, and the capacity to drive my own schedule is something which I have become very protective of. It shows up as large periods of time blocking, being protective of lunch, and deliberately carving out the time to be able to sit in a problem or piece of work for an extended period of time (for example I am writing performance reviews this week and giving them the time they deserve).
Job Demands–Resources Theory: Taking Stock and Looking Forward (Bakker & Demerouti)
Quote: ”Wrzesniewski and Dutton (2001) coined the term job crafting to refer to proactive changes employees make in their work tasks (task crafting), the type of relationships engaged in at work (relationship crafting; frequency and duration of social interaction with clients, colleagues, and providers), and in the appraisal of their work (cognitive crafting; referring to the subjective meaning ascribed to the work).”
Reflection: I have direct experience of implementing the job crafting framework for myself over the past few years, and I am a strong believer in its benefits. I took the positive organizational scholarship class at Penn, where this exercise was one of the assignments, and it was transformative in being able to not only carve out time to do more of what I wanted, but also to delegate opportunities to others in pushing off the things I no longer wanted to do. As a direct result, I am much happier and healthier at work, and I’ve been able to do it by giving others the chance to grow. You can see this work online at: https://www.academicmatt.com/apop200-positive-psychology-at-work.
Life Design Counseling: Theory,Methodology, Challenges, and Future Trends (Wen, Li, Chen & Liu)
Quote: “Personal future work and employment are becoming more and more unstable in this world dominated by Volatility, Uncertainty, Complexity, and Ambiguity (VUCA)”
Reflection: This is one of those phrases which articulates something I’ve felt for a long time, but not really been able to put into words. But I don’t think this is isolated to just work. It’s everything. VUCA is pervasive in almost all aspects of our lives as polarized politics and more extreme populist sentiment continues to rise. And while such an environment demands a growth mindset, there is also an exhaustion which comes from simply living in it. We see this with the fatigue which comes from news consumption. More people are simply tuning out the news because of the feeling that everything everywhere is awful. And the result of turning to alternative and more niche news sources with less regulatory oversight and lower journalistic standards is incredibly dangerous.
Designing Your Life Podcast (Galloway)
Quote: “Psychologists have this concept of the hedonic treadmill. I got some money and now I have to have some more. Maybe meaning is the new money.”
Reflection: I feel that only after working for almost thirty years, and especially after I turned fifty, did I make the conscious decision to step off the hedonic treadmill. I’ve never really pursued money, but I have absolutely pursued meaning in my work, and it’s been important for me to work for mission-driven organizations like The New York Times. The sense of being part of an organization where great things happen is incredibly motivating, and can often replace financial compensation as a source of wellbeing at work. I feel it less in my current role at NBC, but it doesn’t mean I don’t have meaning ‘in’ work. It’s just that the work which is most meaningful is the wok outside of what I get paid for. It’s the work of being a student at Penn, the work I do as a parent, and the work I do creatively for pleasure. As Galloway mentions, it’s not the same thing as ‘fun’, and very often the work at Penn has been incredibly challenging and stressful, but I find a depth of meaning in it which I have found less in my professional life the older I get.
