Well before the pandemic, employee happiness and overall job satisfaction were on the rise, indicating that a growing number of workers, managers, and executives had elevated levels of job happiness. 

However, in the last few years, research shows that job happiness has been on a steady decline. While workers are not only dissatisfied, many of them are experiencing record-high levels of emotional detachment (60 percent) and being miserable (19 percent). 

Even as the world becomes increasingly digital and hyper-connected, workers are no longer satisfied with the career paths they have chosen several years prior. As a result, we’ve witnessed droves of employees jumping ship and quitting their jobs at staggering rates. 

At the height of The Great Resignation in 2021, somewhat 48 million employees quit their jobs. It was the workplace trend that wouldn’t quit, seeing another 38 million employees leaving their jobs in 2022. 

Across an array of industries, workers are experiencing changing levels of job happiness. While this poses a growing problem for management, and retaining valuable, yet talented employees, the change is perhaps more personal than one might think it to be. 

Building a career that you will love for decades is hard to come by these days, and in an ever-changing digital economy, it’s becoming more important for workers to firmly plant themselves in something they know they will be able to grow in. 

Understanding yourself 

The first pillar to building a career that you will hopefully fall in love with requires you to understand yourself, asking yourself the hard questions only you can answer. 

Think of it as running an audit on yourself, and taking stock of your skills. The more you start to dig around the chasms of your emotional connotation with your work or career, the easier it will be to see what your natural strengths and weaknesses may be, and how you can build natural patterns that will enhance your career performance. 

Nonetheless, it’s essential to consider how you can make natural abilities work to your advantage, but more so, what possible options do you have to upskill yourself? 

Consider your value proposition 

Our values tend to change over time, and when you’re in a career that no longer aligns itself with your value proposition, you find yourself being miserable, often leading to decreased productivity, motivation, and overall engagement. 

More than this, what we value or consider priorities also tend to change the older we get and the further we might be progressing in our careers. It’s at this point that you have a choice to make in your career, either you can continue feeling unhappy in something that no longer suits your needs, or you can start making changes that can help improve your view on your career in the long run. 

It’s important to consider how well we know ourselves, and through understanding these aspects we can already start making space for adjustments. 

Preserve work-life balance 

During the early years of our careers, we tend to mitigate the need for efficient work-life balance, stewarding forward, and ignoring how in the long-term having insufficient balance will, later on, catch up with us. 

Nowadays, work-life balance has become a demanding benefit that both workers and employers are seeking in their careers. 

Those with families want better autonomy and schedule flexibility to oversee family-related responsibilities such as childcare. Younger employees want more work-life balance in the form of remote or hybrid working benefits. 

Work-life balance can be something different for every person, and during a transitional change in your career, you need to preserve the importance of work-life balance, protect your energy levels, and rebalance yourself in such a way that you can find attraction in small things that can keep your mind off work when needed. 

Know your limits

The saying that reads “exhaustion can kill passion” is perhaps more applicable than ever. Feeling that you have to work hard is a lot different than wanting to work hard because it fulfills you and helps keep you motivated. 

There comes a point in your career, and it’s different for everybody, where they are feeling demotivated, stressed, anxious, and burned out. It’s good to know what your limits are, and when you are required to take some time to properly recover. 

Having enough downtime outside of work means that you can fill the available hours you have with activities you enjoy. We’re all naturally drawn to things that we find enticing, and this is why it’s important to preserve a good work-life balance. 

At the same time, keep in consideration that exhaustion, whether physical, emotional, or mental, can be something different for every person. Ensure that you know yourself well enough to take a break when it’s needed, without feeling guilty towards your employees or employer. 

Make time for self-development 

Finally, make time for self-development, both within and outside of the work environment. There will be a time in your career when you might realize you have outgrown certain duties or responsibilities. When this occurs, you will need to consider how you can use it as a way to advance yourself into the next phase of your career. 

Learning never stops, and if you’re someone that values the importance of constantly learning new skills, broadening your knowledge, or even advancing the skills you might already have, you’ll find that a new avenue within your career will start presenting itself almost simultaneously. 

Making time for growth encourages you to become better, but also step outside of your comfort zone. Whether you find growth and development in people or through practical application, be selective of your needs and how to (re)build a career you can enjoy again. 

Whether you’re in a C-level position or have recently started your career, there’s always room for improvement, growth, and development. Having the confidence to know what you want in your career will require you to make an introspective evaluation of your current situation, and what is needed to make improvements. 

These pillars might fall in a different sequence for everyone, but ultimately building the career you want to thrive in requires you to understand yourself and consider your needs. The bottom line is that if you want change in your career, you will need to make it happen yourself. 

Try not to compare yourself to others, as progress can look different to everybody. Rather focus on where you currently are, and where you are heading. The more you start manifesting the idea of your thriving career, the easier you will find it to build towards that career.

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