Grim Reapers

This is a verbose and long delayed response to Gerald Tan Zi Ping 's post on a survey 3 months ago of how Singaporeans view work-life balance. You can see his post here:

https://www.dhirubhai.net/posts/geraldtanzp_careercoaching-careercounselling-careerdevelopment-activity-7114912326478155777-aX_z?utm_source=share&utm_medium=member_desktop

Hi Gerald Tan Zi Ping ,

[Whilst housekeeping, I realised that I haven't responded to your tag. Sorry that it has turned out to be so long!]

Yes, it is heartbreaking to read how so many find their jobs so grim.

Part of the reason for the discontentment is, I think, unrealistic expectations of paid work. Too many companies and coaches have oversold the promise of purpose and fun at work. Until the recent tech sector retrenchments, many have been too preoccupied with Zumba sessions or high-intensity interval training (HIIT) during lunch, free massages or nap chairs, free ice-cream or snacks.

The increasingly popularized approach of using commencement speeches to urge graduates to ‘find your passion’ or ‘follow your dreams’ or ‘keep failing’ ala Steve Job’s exhortation of ‘not settling’ and ‘keep looking’ may has contributed to a discontentment void that may not be filled. As one keeps changing after a short time of trying, one may despair of whether there will ever be ‘the one’. Companies also end up with serial job hoppers who hop at the slightest hint of unhappiness.

The kernel of truth in many of those speeches obscure two realities. ?

First, some of us may have greater constraints or fewer resources compared to others. Some may have more immediate financial constraints such as supporting family needs. Some don’t have much choice in our job selection, at least for a season. Others may not have as large a network to know what is possible. Unlike others who grew up in a rural area or a small town with just one main employer, Singaporeans are fortunate to grow up in a city-state, where there is a variety of jobs and publicly funded reskilling opportunities. Nonetheless, there may still be some of us who may be stuck in a particular job due to circumstances not entirely of our own making.

While these challenges may not be insurmountable, they sometimes require external (to the individual) help such as capacity to navigate community or government social assistance schemes or to have employers take a chance on us whether in giving us time or opening doors. What this means for all of us, not just career practitioners or social workers but as human beings, is a reminder to ‘pay it forward’ in setting aside some time to lend a helping hand or listening ear or speak an encouraging word or even open doors for others.

Second, no single job can carry the weight of our need of fulfilment and purpose. Our need for meaning and purpose needs to rest on a broader and arguably, a transcendent, understanding of what humans ultimately need or what work is. This need for meaning and purpose can only be more obtained through the entire package of work (i.e. including unpaid ones such as in our roles as friends, spouses, parents and children) we do. It is the package not the individual pieces of work we do that often matter. It’s similar to a tapestry- the individual threads matter but it’s how they are weaved together that makes up the picture. Unhappiness at work may be a symptom of a wider malaise or agony in another part of one’s life. ?

What does this mean for career development professionals? Career development professionals generally are already aware of the need to go beyond immediate career placement to helping their clients understand their values, interests, skills and personality.

But it’s not enough.

First, career development professionals need to probe deeper into not just the values of the individuals but also the wider ecosystem that the individual is situated, which often place demands (time or financial or mental) on the individual. Coaching that is overly focused on me, myself and I is not always helpful. This is not to discount the importance of one's agency and self-care. However, such advice misses broader communal or relational aspects of the different work we all do i.e. a dissatisfied employee might be unhappy because of the stresses arising from the distribution of time and resources in other areas of the person’s life; likewise a person 'successful' in his/her current job may be laying the foundation for longer term challenges with key relationships in other spheres of the person’s life (e.g. family and friends).?

Second, career practitioners should pay more attention to developments in the workplace. For instance, career development professionals need to step up to help talent development professionals and managers in companies help their staff mange these competing demands. A height-adjustable table or fancy pantry may make for good publicity but they are also superficial to the needs of those who prefer greater flexibility in their work or more supportive team mates who will journey with them in a difficult season of life or a supervisor who will help them reframe challenges and hold them accountable not just to the outcomes but the way in which the outcomes were achieved.

Career development professionals cannot be satisfied with simply focusing on the narrow area of job placement and neglect the broader objective of career longevity, a topic that bears a separate discussion. Suffice to say that given that Singapore can only depend on the ingenuity and creativity of our people to survive (we don’t have any other natural resources), career development professionals need to work with other talent professionals and leaders of organisations to do better in creating environment for humans to thrive.

I have been blessed to be in organisations which invest in expertise such as organisation development, talent development and learning and development. They also provide resources to professionals with such expertise to improve organisational culture. Often this means helping to help staff remain employable (not just within the organisation but more broadly upskill and reskill) as well as nurture supportive relationships within and across work teams. By supportive relationships, I don’t mean colleagues whom you can grumble to or have lunch with but also colleagues who are willing to push you to be better versions of yourselves.

We need more of such organisations.

Career longevity is not an individual thing. It is a broader national imperative. It is also an area that career development professionals have input on.

Third, career development professionals need to educate clients that our perspectives of our passions and talents are often shaped by our experiences. Very often, challenging (or boring) assignments for a season are the ones that force us to examine our own values and assumptions. When we persevere, we emerge stronger and surer of our abilities and even purpose. These ‘crucible experiences’ require us to stay just a bit longer in our discomfort zone.

This is not to say that there is no case for switching jobs or career exploration. Instead, what I am saying is that career development professionals also need to help their clients gain new perspectives and draw out their learning.

Last, career development professionals need to be more vocal about the use and misuse of assessment tools especially those that purport to tell us definitively which job or career we were meant to go for. Many tools may give us some insights about the type of work we prefer (e.g. some of us may prefer more ‘hands-on’ work whilst others may prefer more intellectual pursuits in research institutes).

Most jobs, especially professional ones, tend to be a package of tasks, some of which may be what we like and others not. Take, for instance, the work of a teacher. If one were to choose teaching as a job because he/she wants to instruct and inspire the next generation, he/she may quickly run up the reality that there is a significant amount of time spent on administration (i.e. completing risk assessment forms for co-curricular activities or camps), marking and managing parents’ incessant questions.

What this means for career development professionals is the need to upskill themselves to better understand and use a range of informal and formal assessment tools to help their clients understand themselves (and in turn, better understand the people around). Companies should also be prepared to invest in providing access to some of these tools to their staff to help them better understand themselves (and their team members), and align their interest and work. Many of these tools are often helpful in building teams as members better understand one another’s preferences and perspectives. In so doing, the members are better able to create acceptable work styles to reduce workplace tension and enhance performance.

I had focused more on what career development professionals could do since they are likely to be the ones reading. Yet there are roles for human resource practitioners, educators, middle managers, leaders of organisation and, of course, the government.

What I am concerned about is the impoverished preoccupation of helping individuals to be better at navigating the start of the employment lifecycle, neglecting the need to enhance the ecosystem (i.e. managers, talent development professionals) to help individuals stay gainfully employed in an engaged manner over a longer lifespan.

On a more personal note, I wonder if we, as individuals, are too preoccupied in trying to find meaning and purpose in our work as opposed to creating those meaning and purpose in our work and workplace. [I certainly am!] The former is concerned about how the work makes us happy whereas the latter sees work our work as opportunities for us to exercise our gifts or talents to build thriving communities (i.e. ‘how can I encourage or use this gift to help my colleague today’). Even if we cannot or should not create heaven on earth [utopian projects invariably degenerate into totalitarian hell], we may at least provide glimpses in the midst of daily struggles. Or put it another way, our work on earth over 4,000 weeks may ultimately be grim but we need not be grim reapers.