Work to live or live to work?

In it for?

Beyond sheer necessity, personal passions and anecdotal experiences, what aspirations can we see in and for the workplace? Well a good place to start is whether your job is part of your identity? Is it part of - how you see yourself - and key to who you really are? We might expect this to be an easy tick box for many, not least if you consider that most people will choose around 14 different indicators (out of a possible 20 sample list we regularly test) as part of their identity. Interestingly, in the not so distant past it would have been just 4 – but our appetite for constant upgrade and empowerment across all aspects of life means that identity is no longer a simple matter of where you’ve come from but a whole range of factors that define you - including looks, job, home, leisure and so on. In fact, 44% of the UK working population include their job in their long list of things that make them who they are versus 56% of the working population for whom the opposite is true.

At first glance, it would seem that this dichotomy also follows the work to live or live to work mentality. It is one or the other. If job matters to who you are, so does how you look, where you live – traditional indicators of success in other words. And broadly speaking, success really matters as we see other points such as climbing the corporate ladder a regular priority here too. Conversely, if you’re a work to live person, you’re far more likely to be hardwired to your leisure pursuits with music and sports being a far greater indicator of what defines you.

Is this changing?

Well we don’t have a perfect measure for this but interestingly a study we conducted for Infosys in 2016 with research looking into the emerging global skills gap in the age of automation indicated that not necessarily so. 

While the idea of working for oneself holds huge appeal, the reality remains that working for a large business is more attractive for young people than working for themselves; less than one in 10 want to work for a start up. So here again, we see traditional markers of success driving what people are in it for.

Greater stability, training opportunities, good salary and progression that large businesses can offer underpin their appeal. Fast-paced change and the prospect of future disruption in the labour market are encouraging a more conservative workplace.

What am I in it for?

In a word, freedom. For me, the risk attached to running my own business pales into insignificance against the opportunities that is has laid at my door. Foresight Factory is most definitely a community of individually, brilliantly minded personalities, where self-expression is a given and the trend of ‘Unique Belonging’ holds absolutely true. A strong community, where differences are palpably celebrated. Also, as a working mother, the freedom to adapt and fit work around family life matters hugely and relatively speaking this is something those really dedicated to their careers crave more too.

Always in the having the cake and eating it camp – for me the living to work and working to live are mutually inclusive.

As the job market comes under increasing automated pressure – it will be interesting to watch whether the best of both worlds will be possible for many, or indeed any in the future. 

We are all #InItTogether, but what are you in it for?