Work is a very emotional experience. We spend most of our waking lives in the workplace. If we are unhappy at work, our lives feel out of balance. Many people develop serious mental and physical health problems because of unhappiness at work.
On the other hand, finding a new job can be a daunting and stressful undertaking. So, if you do find yourself unhappy at work, should you stay or should you go?
Here are 5 questions to ask yourself.
- Is your unhappiness temporary? Minor setback or fundamental flaw?
Ask yourself if your unhappiness today is a sign of a more fundamental problem, or if it is really just right now.
Maybe you feel irritated with a colleague, maybe your project didn’t succeed as well as you hoped, maybe you don’t get along with your new boss.
If the problem is temporary, perhaps you can use it as an opportunity to make a few more minor changes that will increase your work satisfaction and connect you to the up sides of your job. It may really just be ‘small stuff’.
- Is it the people? Group dynamics, bad management, bullying?
One of the most difficult aspects of the work environment is the human factor. How do the group dynamics in your team affect you? How much are you impacted by good or bad management?
When you start a new job, you are thrown into a team and you must adapt to existing dynamics. Maybe you are finding that you are not very compatible with your co-workers, or that your boss is not very good at creating a supportive environment where you can flourish.
Ask yourself if this is a fundamental flaw or if it could be improved? Does the company have strategies in place to deal with team conflicts? Does your boss have a solution?
Long term negative group dynamics create considerable stress and feeling out of place can contribute to symptoms of depression.
If workplace conflicts have escalated to bullying and intimidation and if nobody is doing anything about it, be aware that you may be better off if you leave, even if you are not the main target. Bullying can seriously endanger your health.
- Is it the job? Expectations, limitations, career prospects?
It’s hard to know what the job will really be like when you first sign up.
Ask yourself if this position or this particular company has lived up to your expectations. What limitations have you encountered and where can you go from here if you stay in the same company?
Your unhappiness may be a reasonable response to disappointment.
Again, ask yourself if this situation can be changed and what your strategies would have to be to change it.
You will feel a lot happier if you can discuss your concerns with your manager and do something about them. It would also give you an incentive to stay.
- Is it the passion? What can bring it back?
If you started your job with a lot of passion, where did it go? What disconnected you from your enthusiasm and positive engagement?
There may be many reasons: disappointments, setbacks on the way to implementing your goals, lack of support, or even doubts about the validity of your ‘mission’.
Ask yourself if this is about the job, the environment, or actual practical difficulties in achieving what you want. Or is it perhaps an existential crisis that is less about the job than about you?
In that case, would it be possible to reconnect with your job and find your passion again?
- Is it me? Is this what I want to be doing with my life?
This is the most important question of them all.
Every day you spend at work is a day of your life that will never come again.
Yes, you need to work so that you can live. But, through your work, you also express who you are and through your work, you have an impact on the world around you.
Ask yourself if the real reason you are unhappy at work is the fact that this is not the work you really want to be doing. Perhaps it doesn’t contribute to the world you want to help create, and it isn’t what you want your life to be about.
Maybe you thought it would be, and it turned out not to be what you thought. Or maybe you realized, through doing this work, that you want something different or something more.
Or maybe you have simply changed.
If this is the case, if you are able, take your life seriously instead of just following the inertia of ‘doing whatever presents itself to survive.’ It is time to look for the next step in your life, somewhere you can express who you are and work on shaping the world you want to leave behind for others.
For further information, please take a look at my specialty page on individual counseling.
