The Importance of Understanding Job Satisfaction in Your Job Search.

It almost seems counter-intuitive to worry about job satisfaction when you are looking for a new job. Maybe you’ve been out of work for several months or even a few years so why worry about ‘job satisfaction’

Let’s just start with the premise that understanding job satisfaction and why we achieve it may help you to target a job that will enable you to truly enjoy your work.

Job satisfaction isn’t really a static test – things that satisfy us change with age and maturity. Most senior adult job seekers, in my experience, express much less of a need for compensation and more of a need for ‘the work itself’.

I’ve been studying job satisfaction since my undergraduate days and believe that It’s the key to identifying your real path to a successful career. Anyone who has studied job satisfaction will attest that there are potentially hundreds of characteristics to measure this – but let’s simplify and focus on some that really matter.

THE EIGHT FACTORS

1. Compensation – how important is money? Some will argue that’s it’s the only true satisfier but anyone who’s managed a department knows how delicate a team is – just reorganize the cubes and you will get a feel for this. Compensation will be most important to some but without other factors, it has a limited life.

2. Chance for Promotion – do a great job and get promoted. It’s a great motivator and one of the most satisfying events of our careers. We get promoted because our achievement has been recognized. Organizations that don’t offer career path miss out on keeping high achieving employees.

3. Confidence in the Management Team – ever been to lunch with co-workers and have the conversation about the inept management team running the organization? Most of us have had that experience. What about the alternative conversation – the management team really has a great vision (I can’t recall ever having a lunch with co-workers where I heard that). That confidence is hard to achieve but critical to keeping the teams engaged. A clear statement of direction always helps and regular individual ‘skip-level’ meetings ensure a consistent message.

4. Confidence in your co-workers – different than the previous factor and it’s really more than ‘confidence’ – do you actually like and trust your co-workers? I would argue that this is one of the most important factors . . . when you really like someone, you’ll work for free! Ever send an invoice to a friend for moving their furniture or helping with a home project? Probably not and while you don’t want to go to work for free, the social factors of enjoying your co-workers as friends can trump a lot of negative factors.

5. The Work Itself – this factor is very personal . . . it’s defined by work that is either socially beneficial, work that uses your gifts or work that advances a cause. This seems to get more important with age but I don’t have any empirical proof on this.

6. Security – will you have this job next week? Nothing like a work-force reduction to kill your confidence even if you are a ‘survivor.’ Companies that go through a layoff have a tremendous drop in productivity when the focus is ‘will I be the next one to get ‘downsized’. This factor gets magnified in a tight economy.

7. Life Style – I’ve added this factor in the last few years. This includes things like travel, office/work environment, commute and flex hours. You could throw in work from home options, day care and other non-compensated perks.

8. Recognition – the most underutilized and easiest motivator that’s available to employers. Being recognized for an achievement could be a simple as an email, a plaque, dinner, or verbally letting someone know that they are a valuable contributor. Most sales based organizations know that the ‘trip’ at the end of a year for making your number is more motivating than any other factor. Everyone likes it – organizations that are stingy with recognition miss easy opportunities to motivate their teams.

So what about your job search – how well do you know what’s important to you? Take a look at these factors and try to remember organizations/jobs that provided satisfaction those that didn’t. Can you objectively know which of these are most important (hint – ask a significant other to evaluate your top choices and see if they agree).

Now that you know your key factors, be sure to explore these aspects in the interview. For example, be sure to interview with your manager’s manager, meet some of your potential co-workers and get an understanding of how they recognize achievement. Don’t kid yourself about a job – the ‘I can deal with this and learn how to handle it’ never works. You’re wired for certain expectations and don’t sell out just because you’re desperate for a job.