What makes people unhappy at work

Identifying why you are unhappy at work is the first step towards finding a solution. There are many reasons you may be unhappy in your job, but here are some of the most common reasons people are unhappy at work to help you get started. Troublesome coworkers. Coworkers are the people you interact with daily. They are team members, and often they are the people you will depend on to complete tasks and finish projects. Having a coworker who has a sub-par work ethic or a coworker who refuses to be a team player can lead to endless amounts of stress and frustration for those they are working with.

It causes delays, errors, and issues, which all affect productivity. To be happy in a position, you need coworkers who have a similar work ethic to your own, and you will also need to be able to socialize and get along with these coworkers. Coworkers who like to gossip, coworkers who create cliques, or coworkers who always complain are people you will not want to socialize with.

These are people who can make it challenging to develop camaraderie among team members and affect the overall morale of employees. As we mentioned, you will be around these people for a significant portion of your life, so you must enjoy being in their company, and together you make a productive team.

No performance reviews. Feedback is vital in any job, especially if you are looking to improve the overall quality of your work. This can leave you feeling left in the dark, and it can cause feelings of unhappiness in the workplace, as you are unsure of how to better yourself. Work bores you. Humans require entertainment. Boredom can also lead to feelings of emptiness in life, making it feel as though nothing can capture your interest.

Disinterest and feelings of emptiness are noted as common symptoms of depression, so while boredom may seem like an inconvenient emotion, it should be taken seriously. You should view them as intelligent, dependable, and responsible people who want what is best for their employees at the end of the day. If you, for one reason or another, cannot view your boss in this light, you will not be able to find lasting happiness at work. After all, work can feel a bit like a circus if you have a clown running the show.

The company has an uncertain future. If the company feels like it may go bankrupt or feels like you could get a pink slip at any time, you will experience heightened anxiety daily, making it nearly impossible to be happy at work.

It can also be hard to do good work when your future in a position is murky. You find yourself hanging out with these people and worse, participating in the griping. Legitimate concerns that you are actually able to address aside, if you wallow in misery and listen to unhappy, difficult people, the actions can't help but bring you down as well. Unhappiness and criticism are contagious.

Move on and stay away from these people to avoid catching the bug. Avoidance is always available when you are faced with behaviors that destroy your motivation and outlook. You stay in a job that is unchallenging, boring, and unrewarding. Day after day, year after year, you are numbing your mind and heart with work that doesn't fulfill you. And, you know it, so why not do something about it? The status quo will not help you grow and develop. Understand that you have options.

See a career counselor at your local community college, technical school, or adult education program. If a university is nearby, they often have excellent career counseling services. Or, find out if your company has opportunities for growth or other positions that interest you. Talk to your Human Resources staff to see if you have possible internal opportunities.

Seek out other job opportunities; find ways to use your current skill set differently, and take tests and talk with a mentor to identify work you might find more exciting. If you are a college grad, keep in mind that your college career services office may also be able to help you, regardless of when you graduated. You're not developing in your career and no one is giving you feedback. You feel as if you have no idea how you're doing or what you could improve.

Your manager is part of the problem as they don't seem to deal with their employees' careers, just their current jobs. You must take responsibility for your own life and career development. You can wait forever for a non-communicative boss to give you feedback about areas to improve and your personal and professional growth.

In fact, in some organizations, you can wait years for a performance appraisal or performance feedback. Why wait for someone else? No one will ever care as much about your personal and career development as you do. And no one else has as much to gain as you do from your continued growth. You hate your boss. They are clearly a bad boss, but you continue to work for them.. Bad bosses , whether abdicators of responsibility or just plain nasty people, rarely change without some life-transforming event occurring.

The event may happen, but how long are you willing to wait around complaining about how unhappy you are at work? Even with feedback, bad bosses rarely change. Cut your losses, transfer or move on to something better. You work for a company that has business practices you don't respect. Managers lie to customers and make promises to employees that are never kept. Bail as quickly as you can. The culture that enables those practices is a tough one to change—if any of the leaders even want to change the culture.

Since executives and company founders largely drive the culture, don't hold your breath. There you are, an employee with a plan or a great idea, and the corporate rule book is holding you back against common sense and everything you know to be right.

I knew that I was being harassed and bullied, I felt like I was being forced in to resigning. Every reasonable step I took to resolve my situation was refused or worse I was totally ignored, all the time my treatment seemed to get harsher, I was given totally menial tasks, which when complained about would result in me being given physically impossible tasks. To cut a long story short I eventually suffered a breakdown.

This not only devastated me but all my family too. Bullying is fortunately fairly rare, but when it happens the effects are devastating. People break down mentally and physically, and can take years to recover. But most people only notice that the wrong behavior and the wrong attitudes are being rewarded.

I read one article that I found very interesting. For Best Results, Forget the Bonus. Ups… sorry. I start reading this chapter first, and then the others. I agree with Alfie Kohn on his resistance to bonuses, raises and other prizes. It is about software development projects, productivity and, well, happiness — too!

The Semco illustration was great, but way to short. My boss is an unbelievable snob and the other ladies in the office have voiced their dislike of her, yet, they lunch with her and participate in outside activities with her. The minute she leaves the office, they proceed to bash her. I cannot do this and ultimately have become the outsider.

How can anyone work in this environment? What you re telling is true but I am personally unhappy at work because I am bored which is the opposite of the chapter about overwork and stress which would be uncool as well. Bullying is NOT uncommon at all in the workplace! On the contrary! We could not function in such environments and had to start our own company. I am at Gamestation which apparently is in the entertainment sector of retail.

Myself and other colleagues are so unhappy at how the company seems to disregard our rights to go home at a reasonable time which to me is around 15 to 30 minutes AFTER the offical paid part of the contract hours stops. This is not the case and the long hours culture has encroached so deeply into our personal time that staff are just desiring to leave rather than progess with the company.

It could be because high street retail is feeling the squeeze in the dire state of our economy and are trying to survive by working harder and longer for less money and less rest. I have resorted to asking for hours cut which will automatically mean less pay, however the company seems to have a real problem letting me do that even though they want to cut staffing in some stores. This is in an industry that will not pay bonuses, pay rises or sick pay. How can anyone feel happy when their purses, family time and recovery time are seriously short changed.

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