The Good Enough Job
But you can make it great.
Imagine the different jobs you’ve held over time. How would you rate them on a scale of 1 to 5 (1 low and 5 high) on these dimensions?
I enjoyed the work I did every day.
The job fed my curiosities and allowed me to learn and grow.
I was able to do what I do best.
I loved the people with whom I worked.
I felt purpose in my work.
I felt valued.
I was encouraged to reach my ambitions.
The company culture was a great fit for me.
I believed in the company.
Take an average of your ratings. If you rate on average a 4-5 for most of your past jobs, you are a lucky one! You’ve found great fits across many factors of your work. You’re doing something right!
Most of us, however, end up in the 1-3 range. It’s likely more typical that we find the “good enough job.” It can be difficult to find the right fit across all the dimensions one seeks in a job—the right role and responsibilities within the right company.
So, what should we do? Just accept our fate and accept work as work? No, the answer is to make the good enough job great for you. It’s time to craft your job into something great, to paint your masterpiece.
How? Try these actions to help you make the good enough job great:
Get clear on your strengths and how you like to apply your energy at work. Then seek ways to bring this into your good enough job. Approach your boss and talk about this directly. Hear some tips on how you might do this in this HBR Ideacast podcast with Dan Cable, a professor of organizational behavior at London Business School, in which he offers insights on how to make work a more engaging experience. By taking these actions, you can add more value to your organization, while also bringing aspects of what you like into your work. A win-win.
Think about something you’re newly curious about or something you want to learn. Ask for a stretch assignment where you can take on a new project, learning in the process and feeding your curiosity.
Define a purpose around your work if your company doesn’t already have a clearly defined purpose. What is the bigger meaning to what you do and how you contribute? You can read more about Purpose in this blog post.
Get clear on your ambition. What do you want to strive for next and by when? This will give you a focus and perhaps renewed energy. If you are gunning for the next rung, make sure to make your ambitions known. Ask what you need to demonstrate to get to the next level and ask for assignments that will allow you to demonstrate your capabilities. By the way, you might find that you actually want to “cruise” for a while because of outside demands. This is an okay ambition. Yes, there’s all the talk about “leaning in,” but sometimes life actually needs to allow for our ebbs and flows of ambition to maintain sanity and balance. Being clear if you are in one of these stages can also reframe your current work and make you realize it could be great just as it is, because it’s serving the purpose you need now in your life.
If the company culture isn’t quite working for you, what are micro-adjustments you can make in your own part of the organization that can make it more of what you want? Are there things you can bring into your day-to-day experience that could change the cultural experience for you? This may seem hard, but there really are small things you can likely do that can make a difference. For example, if you feel people don’t connect with each other much but you want more friendships at work, initiate coffee dates with people you want to get to know better. Make it happen even if it isn’t a norm already. Don’t let that stop you.
If you want to be working with different types of people (e.g., more creative, more analytical), seek out those in your company in other departments who can stretch your thinking or expose you to personalities you prefer. Or, create a group of people outside your company who can feed you with inspiration and the connections you might be seeking to feed your current work.
The Insight: Most jobs out there, especially these days, are just “good enough” jobs. As much as we all seek to make a career or find our calling, we often set the bar way too high in expecting a job to be great from the start. Perhaps the learning is that we need to take the good enough job and put the task on us to make it great. Too often we don’t speak up and ask for what we want to make our work environment work for us. It does a disservice to us and our employers. For us, we minimize our motivation. For our employers, we minimize our engagement and our contribution. It’s time to start taking responsibility to turn our good enough jobs into great jobs. It’s a more empowering approach to know that there are things we can do to make the job we’re in great for us. So, take your job into your own hands and add the color you’re seeking to make your job as bright as it can be.