Changes in the meaning of work

With relative frequency the mass media echoes the lack of people to perform certain jobs. It is easy to come across press reviews that indicate a shortage of employees in the field of new technologies, in the health field, or in agricultural and industrial. And at the same time, it is reported that there are a large number of people who increase the unemployment data, while hundreds of thousands of jobs are left vacant for lack of people who are willing to perform them.

This situation, which seems paradoxical, can be explained, at least in part, from the field of behavioral sciences. The changes in the importance attributed by people to work, in their lives, allows offer a plausible explanation for the mismatch between supply and demand for jobs job. Although there are many reasons and explanations that can be given to this effect, we intend to echo the some contributions that are being made in this area from the field of behavioral sciences.

In this Online Psychology article we are going to discover the

Index

1. Incorporation to work
2. Importance attached to work
3. Norms and beliefs about work
4. Labor values
5. Most widespread labor values
6. Changes in the meaning of work
7. Conclusions

People attribute to work a meaning that we have acquired throughout the process by which we adopt the elements sociocultural aspects of our environment and we integrate them into the personality to adapt to the society to which we belong, known as socialization.

Thebasic job socialization It is a process by which we adopt a set of values, beliefs, attitudes and norms that society transmits to its members in relation to work. The meaning attributed to work includes a set of beliefs and values ​​that individuals develop throughout the process of work socialization.

This set of beliefs and values ​​undergoes modifications depending on personal experiences and the different situations that each individual has to face. That is, they are established through education in childhood and adolescence and have a lasting effect on the personality; but individuals adapt and modify them throughout their lives as they go through different phases and situations (Drenth, 1991).

Studies carried out for this purpose have identified (Gracia et als., 2001) as the main components of the meaning of the work the following: centrality and importance given to work, norms or beliefs about it (MOW, 1987) and work values, which we will describe below. continuation.

We all grant different importance to work in our life. Thus, we hear expressions such as: "central interest in life", "involvement with the position", "relevance of the career", "relevance of work", "commitment to work ”, and others like it, which only determine the degree to which a person identifies with her work and to what extent it is central to her work. identity.

It assumes that, in some way, we value work, and the comparative weight it has with other spheres of our life, such as family, free time, or leisure. Work centrality is a belief of people regarding the position of work in their lives, and the attitudinal and behavioral implications for their performance. Therefore, it is variable between some people and others, and even different at each stage of a person's life.

When people do job appraisals, we make claims from the perspective of the individual and society. Those beliefs that we make explicit show cultural values ​​and can vary between cultures and countries. But in general, they reflect two main positions: the consideration of work with a right or as a duty.

By manifesting, we express the beliefs that as members of society we maintain on the obligations and rights of the worker, and on the obligations and rights of society with respect to the world of work. Such positions are independent and not alternative, since we can agree with the consideration of work as a right and also as a duty.

The belief of work as a obligation of the individual to society, assumes that work should be valued regardless of its nature, since it is a means through which contributes to the proper functioning of society and future security must be ensured through the saving. It involves agreeing with statements such as "it is the duty of each citizen to contribute to society with his work", "a person should value her work even if it is boring or monotonous ”,“ people should save part of their income for their future".

Work conceived as a right would materialize in the opinions of people who believe that any member of society not only has the right to have a job, but also an interesting job and with meaning, to participate in the decisions concerning it, to an education that adequately prepares him for it and to update his knowledge, when they remain out of date. This new vision emerged in the late 1960s, within the framework of a general change in values ​​in societies. Western countries and has a much broader scope, displacing, for the most part, the one that conceives work as a obligation.

The second concept involved in the study of the meaning of work is that of work values. In general, a value is a conception that a person and / or a group have of the desirable aspects that influence the selection of modes, means and ends available to carry out an action (Rockeach, 1973). By extension, labor values ​​refer to what aspects or characteristics of the job are important to a person and I would rather find him at work.

Some authors (among others, Broedling, 1977) distinguish between an intrinsic and an extrinsic assessment.

• The first, intrinsicIt would be the one caused in the individual by characteristic aspects of the activity itself, motivating by themselves, and which fall under the control of the subject; that is, all those related to motivating aspects of the content of the task, its variety and importance. In this case the activity is an end in itself and it is an expressive, valued and satisfactory activity for the person.
• The extrinsic valuation It would be caused by rewards or incentives independent of the subject's own activity and whose control depends on external events. It leads the individual to value certain aspects of the work context, be it salary, interpersonal relationships or job stability. In this case, we would be facing a work activity carried out to obtain benefits, it is not an end in itself, but a means to an end. The activity acquires an instrumental character and is carried out by a subject, because it provides them with economic income.

The evolution experienced, from a comparative perspective, by labor values ​​in a Spanish sample over a decade has been important, as García Montalvo et als. (1997) indicate in their work. The results show that the aspects most valued at work are: income, job security and good companions of work.

From the subsequent analysis of the data of the different evaluations, two aspects emerge as essential, when evaluating the work: one, related to aspects of personal development and, the second, groups the aspects related to material conditions, this being the most valued.

Comparing the results from a temporal perspective, the loss of commitment to work is verified, with the consequent departure from the objectives of personal self-fulfillment at work, importing less its social utility functions. Personal self-realization is reserved for areas other than work, although working conditions are the basic support for social actions undertaken outside of it.

By genres, men tend to demand more work than women, and they are more motivated by aspects related to labor values, especially the youngest. They value job security less and they value vacations more. They value little a well-considered job, with social prestige, and pay more attention to a good personal relationship, with a pleasant work environment and dealing with people. They indicate that young people are the ones who most pursue the personal development factor, while the 55-64 age group continues to be concerned about material conditions.

It seems obvious that labor values ​​are going to be formed through contact with the labor reality. Contact with work will allow young people to learn to assess with greater realism certain results or characteristics of it and to prefer them over others, for that reason they will present a more situational and dynamic character, especially in the first years of job. When joining a work activity, whatever it may be, there is a confrontation between the values ​​of the young person and the demands of the organization, and between his expectations and the reality of the world labor.

Will be produced changes in the individual and in the organization, in an attempt by both parties to achieve an optimal fit, either through their own or the other party's change. The study by Gracia and his collaborators (2001), referred to the changes in the components of work in the early years, point out that they negatively affect the meaning between youths.

In his words: “there is a decrease in the centrality of work and in the consideration of work as a duty, and an increase in the value they place on extrinsic and intrinsic aspects of the job. In other words, during the first years of employment, the importance they attach to work in their lives has diminished among young people, and the degree of agreement with a whole series of obligations that they perceive that as workers they may have in relation to the world of the job.

Conversely, the value they place on most features has increased who can have a job, that is, they place more value on the compensation they can receive for doing a job, surely because they have found that this is less satisfactory than they expected, as a way to restore equity " (P. 216). Along the same lines are the data offered by the Study of Labor Insertion 2003 (EIL), of the Carlos III University of Madrid (ABC, 2003). Free time and stability are the main labor values ​​among young people, relegating to seventh place the economic remuneration for the job held.

Enjoying the free time of the weekend is the priority for young people, while the possible social benefit derived from their professional work is a factor that is hardly taken into account. However, the aforementioned, Gracia and collaborators, stand out as a conclusion that nothing indicates that the meaning of the work is configure during childhood and remain unchanged for the rest of life, but each of the meanings can vary, and in different magnitude.

They warn about the importance of organizations and society taking care of the characteristics of the work that offers young people, to the extent that precariousness can cause changes from favorable to unfavorable orientations, and vice versa, and even the loss of staff discouraged by working conditions.

In sum, it seems evident that there is a mismatch between the jobs that society's economic system offers and what job seekers are looking for. Part of this situation can be explained by the changes in the meaning of the work for the subjects in working age, according to the results obtained from their study and consistent in the sample studied internationally.

The importance given and beliefs about work, either as a right of the individual or as a duty of society, and the extrinsic or intrinsic valuation that we make of our jobs, vary from one subject to another, or even in each individual, throughout weather.

The mismatch between what people expect from an activity and what an organization offers us when join it, you can explain that there are job vacancies, due to a lack of people willing to play it. It is important, especially in the first work experiences, to pay attention to a adequate work socialization, as indicated by the evolution experienced by the assessment of the job.

Loss of commitment to work or personal self-realization through work activity, frequently, they seem to give way to concern about material conditions (salaries, vacations, days off, hours, etc.), among the people who are asked for their opinion. These same people indicate that their personal self-realization is reserved for areas other than work (free time, together with a group of friends and people of their age, doing pleasant, leisure activities, etc.).

The work becomes valued as material support to carry out the social actions that are undertaken outside or outside of it.

This article is merely informative, in Psychology-Online we do not have the power to make a diagnosis or recommend a treatment. We invite you to go to a psychologist to treat your particular case.

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