Job satisfaction is an integral part of who I personally am. In 2001 I enlisted into the United States Marine Corps for an opportunity to play the flute and piccolo with the 2d Marine Aircraft Wing Band. For three years that was my job. At first I enjoyed the job, but it became more of a chore versus a love. When that happened, I knew it was time to move on.
In 2005 I had three options in front of me as my military contract was coming to an end. I could reenlist and continue to be miserable doing something I no longer wished to be doing, I could separate and return to the civilian sector (we jokingly call it 1st Civilian Division (Civ Div for short), or I could attempt a lateral move into something that I had a passion for. Fortunately, despite a few mountains that needed to be climbed, I was given the opportunity to lateral move. For the past ten years I have been a Career Planner (counselor) for Marines currently serving (both active and reserve). For seven of those ten years I thoroughly enjoyed what I was doing – until I realized one day that there was something far more greater that I wanted to achieve. Since 2009 I had a new goal in mind – get my Doctorate in Psychology and become a practicing psychologist with the Department of Veterans Affairs and help our nation’s heroes who are currently suffering from Posttraumatic Stress Disorder. While I still enjoy my job per say – I did find myself slipping into the same feelings as before where my job started to become more like a chore day after day.
Two of the biggest approaches currently used for job satisfaction are global approach, and facet approach (Schneider, Gruman, & Coutts, 2012). If I were to analyze my thoughts with job satisfaction from the standpoint of the global approach (consideration for overall job satisfaction) I would answer the question, “All things considered, how satisfied are you with your job?” I would answer around a 3.5 (Schneider et al., 2012). I am still satisfied – just not highly satisfied.
However, if I look at it from the facet approach (more sophisticated since job satisfaction is determined by feelings and attitudes regarding different key facets of the job) it would look differently (Schneider et al., 2012). I am highly satisfied multiple aspects of the job that include benefits, relationships with coworkers and supervisors, and the quality of supervision. I like standardization and structure and my supervisors give me just what I need in that area. Where I am currently struggling with job satisfaction is with promotion opportunities, and pay. For me personally – I will never see another promotion due to my own actions (I refused to extend/reenlist for orders as my plans are to exit the service next year at the conclusion of my contract so that I can continue my education at the graduate level), but that is not what is bothering me. What bothers me about promotion opportunities is seeing my fellow junior brothers and sisters miss out on promotion opportunities because of the current policies and procedures set in place to regulate the military drawdown. Good people are being sent home and released from active duty that want to remain Marine. The same principle applies to the pay. Personally, my pay is fine enough for me, however I do think the pay at the lower levels is way too low for the amount of work that we ask of the junior guys. When I hear about bill proposals to cut military pay, stop pay raises, etc – it creates the job satisfaction that I feel. As senior leadership we should be doing everything we can to help and assist the junior guys and I just feel that it is not happening – especially when bills are being proposed to lower their already low pay.
In conclusion, as I stated before, for me job satisfaction means a lot. If I am unhappy doing something it often means that it is time to move on. At this stage – the politics of the job – as explained above – are creating and adding fuel to the fire for my lessening of job satisfaction. With lower job satisfaction, I feel as though I am only hurting the Marines I am trying my best to take care of. There just comes a time when the reigns need to be passed, and I fully believe my time has come.
References
Schneider, F.W., Gruman, J.A., & Coutts, L.M. (2012). Applied Social Psychology Understanding and
Addressing Social and Practical Problems (Second ed.). Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE.
I applaud you for your goals, and I really enjoyed your blog article. I was in the USMC for eight years before I transferred to the Army. Like you, I struggled with job satisfaction in my original MOS, and I also made a couple of career changes prior to my retirement. I currently work for the DoD as a civilian, but am slowly realizing that I no longer wish to stay in my current career. I work hard because that is what I do; but I am not happy.
You are also in a position in the Marine Corps where the norms require high performance. Sure, there are Marines who perform at lower standards than others, but for the most part, everyone is required to do their jobs well. I assume you are no exception to the rule. That being the case, you are putting out considerable effort, and probably not getting as much job satisfaction as you desire. Your situation – low job satisfaction, yet maintaining high standards – is not unusual. In a qualitative and quantitative study of decades of literature regarding the relationship between job satisfaction and job performance, Judge et al. (2001, p. 391) found that “[w]here the norms indicate high performance standards, then dissatisfaction is less likely to result in reduced levels of performance because to respond in such a manner would violate the norms.” Basically, you work hard regardless of how little you get from all the time you burn at the job.
I also assume you have committed yourself to the Marine Corps ethos, exemplified by the motto “Semper Fidelis,” which means “always faithful” in Latin. You maintain the faith in the Corps, but aren’t getting much out of it. To top that off, you are a little disconcerted to see your fellow Marines being negatively affected by the military cutbacks in this time of national fiscal uncertainty. So, there must be some level of cognitive dissonance going on in your mind. The question you must be asking yourself is, “how do I continue to keep doing this despite my lack of satisfaction, and how do I find a job that makes me happy?”
I am going through this very same dilemma, and have chosen to follow a similar path to your own. I am also pursuing a psychology degree, with the hope of counseling military personnel with PTSD. Why do we think this kind of activity (i.e. helping people with PTSD) will bring us job satisfaction, and make us happy? Salancik & Pfeffer’s (1978, p. 226) theory that people “adapt attitudes, behavior, and beliefs to their social context and to the reality of their own past and present behavior and situation,” seems to underscore the idea that we derive our understanding of happiness from our schemas. As we grow, our view of the world changes, and sometimes we want our efforts to mean something. I believe this is true for me. I want to be happy, and if my job doesn’t make me happy, then I need to seek the happiness elsewhere. The psychological reason I want to change jobs to find happiness seems consistent with personality research (in the context of the Five-factor model) that says “the more [people] are disposed toward positive emotions rather than negative emotions, the more likely they are to be satisfied with their jobs” (Schneider et al., 2012). I am not disposed toward positive emotions currently, and I am not satisfied with my job.
While searching on the Internet for “happiness and job satisfaction, I found Polish psychologist Aleksandra Borkowska (2012) who characterized the ideas of an alternative career counselor named Rick Jarow. I really like what Jarow had to say, and perhaps you will relate to his message too. Borkowska said Jarow believes “[a] man finds work satisfying when he is proud of it himself, not through comparisons with the work of others but through his own well-being and awareness of being in harmony with himself.” Essentially, Jarow believes that in order to find inner peace in our endeavors (i.e. work) we must reject “mindless human activity,” focus on happiness as a goal, and invest “time, attention, [and] material resources in [our] dreams, education, and interests.” This sounds like what you are doing, and I applaud you for your motivation. Good luck to you, and all your future endeavors.
Regards,
Tony
References:
Borkowska, A. (2012). Between Professional life and personal happiness: What should managers know about the relationship between job satisfaction and psychological well-being of employees? Retrieved from http://www.europhd.eu/html/_onda02/07/PDF/20th_lab_materials/borkowska/borkowska_professional_life.pdf
Judge, T., Thoresen, C., Bono, J., & Patton, G. (2001). The Job Satisfaction – Job Performance Relationship: A Qualitative and Quantitative Review. Psychological Bulletin 2001, 127:3, 376-407.
Schneider, F.W., Gruman, J.A., & Coutts, L.M. (2012). Applied Social Psychology Understanding and Addressing Social and Practical Problems (Second ed.). Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE.