Is meaningful work a myth?

Subscribe

Employee engagement is at a low. Only 30 per cent of full-time employed Americans are engaged at their job, according to the 2024 Gallup Employee Engagement Report. And, if we widen the lens to include workers from around the world, that number drops to less than 20 per cent.

Low worker engagement is bad for both the employee and the employer, said Mike Ross on the McGill Delve podcast. He’s a McGill University MBA graduate and a current PhD student at Concordia University, studying the meaning of work.  People who feel unfulfilled have less attachment to their organisation, are less likely to propose creative solutions to problems, and have less desire to help improve processes, he explained.

“It’s tragic, the number of people who are unhappy in their work in this modern time,” he said.

Indeed, it would be nice if work brought some degree of personal fulfilment to every worker. But this might be a fleeting prospect for those who don’t believe meaningful work can exist in the first place. After all, they receive a paycheck in exchange for their labour, which they can use to fund other priorities in their lives. But when you spend an average of 8.4 hours per day at your day job, wouldn’t it be better if you gained some meaning out of it?

Mike Ross thinks so. He spent the bulk of his career searching for meaning in his own work, which led him away from financial law and towards education and research. He believes that meaning can take different forms for different people. And, like plants in a garden, every person must cultivate it carefully based on their personal needs.

“You plant something, you water it, and you help it grow,” he said.

Meaning comes from paying attention to what gives you energy at your job. Then you can try to grow it in your current role or go to a different workplace where you can.

Working out the meaning of work

As a consultant, Ross works closely with companies to help them improve worker engagement. He often starts by setting a framework based on three kinds of meaning:

• Meaning at work: meaning that comes from the environment in which someone works. For example, an insurance broker might not find his tasks particularly engaging. But volunteering for staff social events and seeing his colleagues might give him the energy to show up every day.
• Meaning in work: meaning that comes from the tasks themselves. A graphic designer might find meaning in the creative process of rendering compelling images with strong messages.
• Meaning of work: in a broader sense, the purpose of work for human beings. What does it mean to work at all?

Each of these categories captures a different aspect of work life. Understanding them and weighing them against your own personal experiences can help chart a path towards fulfilment.

Ross’s personal search for meaning spanned many years and jobs. But the picture became clearer when he started auditing his time. For a couple of weeks, at the end of each day, he would track how he spent his time and what gave him energy throughout.

He discovered that what made him happy was not necessarily his job as a finance lawyer, but rather supporting his younger associates in their careers. This became a source of meaning for him at work, which he would go on to cultivate more consciously in the rest of his career. First, by taking advantage of the opportunities available to him in his current organisation. Then, by taking on new jobs with bigger teaching components.

“It’s almost like an additive process,” he said.

Meaning happens through experimentation, self-awareness, and small but frequent steps towards what gives you energy.

Beyond the paycheck

There’s perhaps an irony in searching for meaning within the very social structures that extracted meaning from us, Ross concedes. Atomised, task-based work often leaves workers burned out, stressed, and feeling like cogs in a machine. To find meaning in such conditions seems counterproductive.

But, as major companies look seriously at artificial intelligence to cut labour costs, human labour as a purely financial activity may one day come to an end.

Does that mean people will lose all desire to work, and all meaning that comes with it? Ross thinks not. AI might change the landscape of labour, but it won’t replace humans’ innate need to struggle and achieve something.

“I don’t think it’s going to mean the end of work, and I don’t think it’s going to mean the end of a quest for a sense of purpose,” said Ross.

On the McGill Delve podcast, Professor Saku Mantere – Delve’s editor-in-chief and expert in strategy and organisation – interviewed Mike Ross in depth. Ross shared more of his personal journey from finance lawyer to educator, discussed essential readings on the pursuit of meaning at work, and debated the merits of chasing meaning at all. Search “McGill Delve” wherever you download podcasts.