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Special offer. This is Optimal Work

1:00

Daily, Episode 1306. Four

1:03

signs you hate your job, and five things

1:05

you can do about it. Part

1:07

1 – by Kristen Wong, with Get Rich

1:09

Slowly dot org. And I'm

1:11

Dan, I'm your host here, and welcome to

1:14

another edition of Optimal Work Daily on

1:16

this Sunday. And as you heard,

1:18

this is Part 1 of 2, so we're gonna

1:20

break this post up into a couple of pieces because

1:22

it's a little bit on the longer side, so I'll

1:24

read the first half for you right now, and

1:27

then the second half in the Monday episode tomorrow.

1:29

So with that, let's get right into Part 1

1:32

as we optimize your life. Four

1:38

signs you hate your job, and five things you

1:40

can do about it. Part 1 –

1:42

by Kristen Wong, with Get Rich Slowly dot

1:45

org. Over

1:47

the summer, I read a book that likened a

1:49

miserable job to hanging onto the edge of a

1:51

cliff. I thought it was an

1:53

appropriate analogy. Like most people, I've

1:55

been there, and that's totally what it feels like. You

1:58

know you have to let go, but let it go. letting go is scary.

2:01

You can land in a better spot or you can meet

2:03

your ruin. The author argued that

2:05

sometimes letting go of that cliff is gradual,

2:08

but once you do, you usually experience

2:10

success. She had examples, but

2:12

I imagine there are plenty of letting go stories

2:14

that didn't turn out so well. Still,

2:17

I'm a fan of letting go of things that don't serve

2:19

you well. I also understand that

2:21

some don't feel this is an option, for

2:23

financial reasons or otherwise. I've been

2:25

thinking about this a lot lately. How do

2:28

you know when you are on the edge of a cliff? What

2:30

can you do about a job you hate and how

2:32

do your finances fit into the equation? Four

2:35

signs you are over your job. Number

2:37

one, you feel taken advantage of. In

2:40

my experience, this is the first sign that you are mentally

2:43

done with your job. You feel more

2:45

than just unappreciated. You feel your boss is

2:47

taking advantage of you. It's one thing

2:49

to not get a pat on the back. It's

2:51

another to feel like you are being manipulated. In

2:54

my own experience, failing to speak up for myself

2:56

has led to this situation. Some

2:58

bosses viewed me as the good little worker bee who

3:00

didn't give them trouble. Thus, if

3:02

they had outrageous demands, I was the first person

3:04

they'd go to because I was the easiest. I've

3:07

learned to slowly break myself of this meekness and

3:09

set a boundary between being a pushover and being

3:12

a hard worker. A study

3:14

from Florida State University backs up my experience.

3:17

It found that when given an unreasonable amount or

3:19

type of work, loyal, dutiful

3:21

employees became jaded. When

3:23

workers felt they were being taken advantage of, researchers

3:26

found a 50% decline in quote unquote

3:29

helping behavior and a 35%

3:31

increase in quote unquote anger

3:33

at supervisors. Two,

3:36

getting fired doesn't sound so bad. I

3:39

was once contracted on a project known throughout

3:41

its company for being completely terrible. Workers

3:44

were expected to put in 50 hours a week

3:46

for no other reason than to showcase their dedication.

3:49

The project was so miserable, even seemingly kind

3:51

colleagues would throw each other under the bus

3:53

if it meant saving themselves. My

3:56

cube mate, Ron, hated the project. Once

3:59

I went to pick something up. from the printer and found

4:01

Ron's resume in the lower tray. I

4:03

discreetly handed it back to him. Slightly

4:05

embarrassed, he laughed. Wow,

4:07

that shows you how much I care about getting

4:09

fired. If getting fired doesn't sound

4:12

too bad, it's probably time to let go of

4:14

that cliff. Side note, Ron did

4:16

let go. Shortly after he found his

4:18

dream job and moved to Hawaii. An

4:20

extreme but inspirational example. 3.

4:24

You purposely slack off. Our

4:26

Florida state study also found that hard workers had a

4:28

25% decrease in productivity when

4:30

they felt they were being asked to do

4:32

too much. I hate to

4:34

admit it, but I've been there. In the past,

4:37

I've purposely slacked off due to resentment. I

4:39

was angry, frustrated, and stressed out, and

4:42

to protest, I passive-aggressively put in less

4:44

effort. Now this is a really dumb

4:46

thing to do because it doesn't really get the point across. Instead

4:49

of being sympathetic to your dissatisfaction, your

4:51

boss is more likely to focus on the fact that

4:53

you've turned into a slacker. Also,

4:55

work ethic is something I mostly cultivate for

4:58

myself, so submitting lazy work

5:00

is doing myself a disservice. And

5:02

4. You feel stuck. It's

5:05

a terrible feeling, the desire to move forward

5:07

when your current situation is holding you back.

5:10

You feel captive, and the more captive you

5:12

feel, the more frustrated you get. To me,

5:15

this is the primary sign it's time to let go.

5:17

I don't cope well with feeling stuck,

5:20

but letting go means different things for different people. My

5:23

mom, for example, has felt stuck at her job,

5:25

and her letting go was more of an emotional

5:27

process. More on that later. 5.

5:30

Things you can do about it. 1.

5:33

Find something better. If you

5:35

feel taken advantage of, you probably feel

5:37

undervalued. If you think you have a lot to

5:39

offer a company, perhaps you can find something better.

5:42

However, you also have to consider what exactly

5:45

would make you feel valued. For

5:47

some people, that's not always funny. It

5:49

might mean a better position or more time

5:51

off, or simply more praise. Finding something better

5:53

might mean earning less, so you have to

5:55

weigh the practical factors with the emotional ones.

5:58

Example. When I was a tech technical writer, I

6:00

felt suck. I knew the chance

6:02

of switching careers and earning less money was high,

6:05

so I asked myself some questions. What's

6:07

the likely difference in the amount of money I'll be earning?

6:10

How long am I willing to earn less before

6:12

I decide to go back to a dissatisfying but

6:15

more lucrative career? What lifestyle

6:17

comforts am I willing to give up? How

6:19

hard would it be to return to that career? How

6:21

much would I earn upon reentry? And

6:24

finally, is it worth the difference in salary to

6:26

try doing something I love? My

6:28

answer's weighed more on the side of switching, so

6:30

I let go. Hear

6:33

that on tomorrow's episode. You

6:39

just listened to part one of the post

6:41

titled, Four Signs You Hate Your Job, and

6:44

Five Things You Can Do About It,

6:46

by Kristen Wong with getrichslowly.org. We're

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Get. Started today. And

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thank you so much to Kristen for this post, which is off

9:08

to a great start so far. And of course, I'll

9:10

finish it up for you tomorrow. Before

9:12

that, though, let me tell you a little bit more about Kristen,

9:14

whose name you may or may not know, depending on how long

9:16

you've been tuning into some of our other shows. Kristen

9:19

Wong is a freelance writer and journalist whose

9:21

work has appeared in the New York Times,

9:23

The L, Catapult, The Atlantic, New

9:25

York Magazines, The Cut, Lifehacker,

9:28

NBC News, and

9:30

many more publications. She's

9:32

a winner of the Society of

9:34

Professional Journalists' NW Excellence in Journalism

9:36

Award, and she's worked in technical

9:38

writing, as she mentioned in the post. She

9:40

has produced online videos and even wrote a

9:42

comedy series for Netflix. You can

9:45

learn more about her at kristenwong.com. That's

9:48

K-R-I-S-T-I-N-W-O-N-G. Okay,

9:51

that is going to do it for this edition

9:53

of OWD, but it's not the end of this

9:55

post. As I mentioned, we will have the rest

9:58

for you tomorrow. For your optimal life. Oh

10:00

wait.