Like what you've read?

On Line Opinion is the only Australian site where you get all sides of the story. We don't
charge, but we need your support. Here�s how you can help.

  • Advertise

    We have a monthly audience of 70,000 and advertising packages from $200 a month.

  • Volunteer

    We always need commissioning editors and sub-editors.

  • Contribute

    Got something to say? Submit an essay.


 The National Forum   Donate   Your Account   On Line Opinion   Forum   Blogs   Polling   About   
On Line Opinion logo ON LINE OPINION - Australia's e-journal of social and political debate

Subscribe!
Subscribe





On Line Opinion is a not-for-profit publication and relies on the generosity of its sponsors, editors and contributors. If you would like to help, contact us.
___________

Syndicate
RSS/XML


RSS 2.0

Monday to Fridayitis

By Jane Caro - posted Tuesday, 3 May 2005


Why is it that almost everyone I know in their mid 40s to mid 50s, hates their job? Whenever two or more of us are gathered together it seems the universal response to the universal question “How’s work?” is to complain about the often highly skilled and highly paid work we do between Monday to Friday.

This work-a-day misery seems to affect people who work in all sorts of capacities, from commercial business, to the public service and academia. Apparently we all failed to take notice of the advice Carole Bayer-Sager gave us in our youth, “Don’t wish too hard for what you want, because then you might get it, and then when you get it, you may find you didn’t want it all”.

This is not a phenomenon limited to my own narrow circle of friends and acquaintances. Recently I heard a life coach remark he makes most of his money working with middle-aged people who are trapped in jobs they no longer enjoy. But don’t feel too sorry for them, he went on to say, such people are trapped because they are too highly qualified, too highly paid and too highly committed to chuck it all in and start over. Perhaps he could have added they also feel too damn old, tired and disillusioned to muster the necessary enthusiasm.

Advertisement

Hugh Mackay talks of an emerging culture of disengagement, a turning inwards, a sense of being powerless and out of control in the wider world. In The Weekend Australian’s feature (March 26-27) “Are We Having Fun Yet?” Sarah Edelman, a research psychologist at UTS and author of the best seller Change Your Thinking, is quoted as saying, “Many complain of feeling trapped in soul destroying jobs where the pursuit of status and wealth has, paradoxically, created huge amounts of stress and unhappiness”.

These jobs may be “soul destroying” but they are not necessarily mundane or boring. Often they are seen as glamorous, exciting and are highly coveted. Perhaps one of the reasons people feel trapped in them is they also know that if they walk away, there may be no going back.

So what has gone wrong? Are my generation, as many claim, really just a bunch of self-indulgent whingers who don’t know when they are well off? Have they simply spent their youth and energy chasing false gods? Or is there something actually wrong with the world of work?

All of the above, I think, with the additional proviso that a sense of disillusionment, a realisation of limitations around middle age is probably nothing new. (Another irritating characteristic of my generation is a tendency to think they are experiencing everything - sex, childbirth, parenthood, menopause and now, ageing - for the first time.)

But the complaints my friends make are new. In essence their theme is that there is no longer room for them, as individuals, in their jobs.

Because of the obsession with accountability (essentially a culture of who is to blame), nothing that cannot be counted is seen as actually existing: experience, talent, flair, wisdom, warmth, wit, humour, compassion cannot be plotted on a graph so they are worth nothing. As Donald Horne said, “We now live amongst fantasies of exactitudes instead of tangible achievements - talk of progress now comes in graphs and tables”.

Advertisement

The world of work, reflecting the world at large, has become a scary and inhuman place. Recently I went to a business seminar on creativity. We were addressed, as is usual at such things, by a panel of creative luminaries. To a man (there were two women) they claimed creativity and success were due to never resting, never relaxing, to remaining one step ahead of the other guy, eternally. As I listened, I didn’t feel motivated or inspired, or even impressed, I just felt tired. What was the point of success, I wondered, if you were never allowed to enjoy it?

In fact, success in business seems to have become just another stick to beat ourselves with. If a company has an exceptional year due to one off circumstances, as many did during the Sydney Olympics, this is not taken into account when the next year’s targets are set. Employee after employee has been given yearly targets that ask for unrealistic and unachievable percentage increases on past performance. Far from being motivated, they know they have been set up for failure.

The unrealistic expectations we now place on ourselves are one of the reasons CEOs receive such huge payouts when they leave their jobs. They know they are being asked to perform tasks beyond the reach of ordinary mortals, so they build big termination payouts into their contracts.

But if even CEOs are victims of the unrealistic goals that are making us all so miserable, who is setting them?

Well, it is us, of course. CEOs and boards are answerable to shareholders and now that virtually all of us have superannuation, we are all shareholders. As shareholders we demand continuously improving returns on our investments, a constant, upward trend.

As nothing in real life actually increases like this, we, as shareholders, are placing inhuman demands on ourselves as workers.

The pressure is circular, of course, we are miserable in our jobs so hope to earn enough from our investments to escape from them one day. To that end we keep demanding more from the companies we invest in, which leads our bosses to demand more from us, as employees, and the whole damn cycle starts again.

What keeps us on this treadmill, when so many of us are so much richer than any other generation in history? Some say greed, but I think greed is a symptom not a cause. I think it is fear. We are suffering from free floating anxiety, the most dangerous kind. We don’t know what we are afraid of, so we don’t know how to fix it, instead we surround ourself with possessions, arm ourselves with prestige and status, in the hope that safety is a commodity like everything else, and can be bought.

The solution? I reckon we’ll all be waiting a long time if we think someone or something outside ourselves is going to come along and make us feel safer and happier. Perhaps my generation has finally reached the point in our lives where we need to face up to our own individual misery and risk doing something to change it.

  1. Pages:
  2. 1
  3. 2
  4. All

First published in New Matilda April 1, 2005.



Discuss in our Forums

See what other readers are saying about this article!

Click here to read & post comments.

Share this:
reddit this reddit thisbookmark with del.icio.us Del.icio.usdigg thisseed newsvineSeed NewsvineStumbleUpon StumbleUponsubmit to propellerkwoff it

About the Author

Jane Caro is a Sydney writer with particular interests in women, families and education. She is the convenor of Priority Public. Jane Caro is the co author with Chris Bonnor of The Stupid Country: How Australia is Dismantling Public Education, published in August 2007 by UNSW Press.

Other articles by this Author

All articles by Jane Caro

Creative Commons LicenseThis work is licensed under a Creative Commons License.

Photo of Jane Caro
Article Tools
Comment Comments
Print Printable version
Subscribe Subscribe
Email Email a friend
Advertisement

About Us Search Discuss Feedback Legals Privacy