UNSATISFIED employee

UNSATISFIED employee, who is it?

Before 80s in India, when literacy rates and amount of exposure to western world were significantly lower, employees in general were very happy with their work life. They seem to work for longer in the same company without having an irk towards work. But today, when i interact about work life with my current & former colleagues, friends or any other person working in a multi-national company, they seem like either they are stressed out, morally worn out or we can just say “Unsatisfied!”

When enquired, employees just responded - "It's lower pay". But is this the only reason which drives you to your work, everyday?

In retrospect, if we look deep into this very common yet complicated issue, the prime reasons of this issue as outsourcing, growing social pressure, unclear career trajectory, lack of authority and dis-engagement.

As India started to provide a high value location to a lot of big MNCs, we only saw the creamy outcome of country's increasing importance in the world. But today, the precedent history have a lasting effect on all our jobs. Most of us could seldom disagree that majority of our jobs are primarily "outsourced" from western countries. As an outsourced job holder, you always have the benefit of gaining a global exposure and present your work to a global audience but there is a major challenge which overrides all these advantages, which either gets ignored or felt silly about - the inevitable challenge of time zone difference with your peer!

This leads to hampered knowledge transfer, failure to effectively communicate, descending confidence and trust among peers. All these factors stand in your way to make significant career progress and gain authority. This tend to generate a sense of negligence by you towards work, towards peers and growing self proclaimed esteem.

Although an employee is very confident about his/her position, both financially and socially; each one of us do face increasing sense of pressure mainly due to our very usual behavior of comparison. Though you disagree, we unknowingly evaluate once and again, our self career growth with that of people you come across in life. Other challenge you face is - visible stagnation in the earning power as compared to increased expenses.

These reasons may be the very obvious but we can avoid this by regular introspection and open communication to gain some clarity on individual’s career path. This degree of transparency on our career growth could be achieved only through clear communication and mentorship.

Again, it cannot be achieved overnight because of the same challenges we come across as an outsourced employee. Though we can’t root out this bottleneck, we can reduce the impact by maintaining a constant interaction through ongoing email chains and scheduled regular catch ups with your peers. Also, engage your mind by regular participation in various social activities and effective social networking.

We can never be too dissatisfied nor should we be too satisfied on any one thing. Try and focus on today’s work and give your best shot to maintain a healthy and justified state of satisfaction.

"To be too dissatisfied with ourselves is a weakness. To be too satisfied with ourselves is a stupidity."

-Shiv