Anne Truitt Zelenka

Escape from Cubicle Nation’s Pamela Slim (Gen X) challenges Brazen Careerist’s Penelope Trunk (Gen Y) on the issue of fulfillment through your work.

Penelope: “the connection between your job and your happiness is overrated.”

Pamela: “the kind of work you do has a HUGE bearing on your day to day happiness.”

Web Worker Daily featured another Gen Yer, Timothy Ferriss, on the dangerous myth of the dream job this week. Tim: “I’m not saying we shouldn’t be interested in our work—we should be. I am saying that we shouldn’t expect too much of it.”

Here I thought it was the boomers who looked to their jobs for ultimate fulfillment while us Gen Xers, having arrived in the workforce during the recession of the 1990s, cynically declined to commit our hearts to work. Yet Gen Xers like myself and Pamela feel fairly confident that you can get a lot of satisfaction from work (I know I do) while Gen Yers Penelope and Tim try to disabuse their peers and anyone else listening of the idea that your livelihood offers one of your best chances for fulfillment and satisfaction.

Penelope, Pamela, and Tim have more nuanced views than can be captured in a single quote. Also, you can’t draw too many conclusions from anecdotal evidence and I’m wary of judging people’s attitudes by fuzzy generational labels. Still, it’s interesting to see the disconnect. What could be the reason? I’m not sure, but I think that being in your twenties may lend itself to a utilitarian view of work.

It’s in your twenties when you may be living on a relatively low salary, saving money for a house or other big purchase, paying off student loan debt, and still in the grips of trying to please family and society with your chosen career. So when we Gen Xers were in our twenties, we probably looked similarly cynical to boomers. And boomers looked ridiculous to us, with their idea that you can get so much happiness and satisfaction out of your work. Sure — that was fine for them to say. By the late thirties, many people have solidified their personal lives and financial lives in such a way that they can work for fulfillment not just for money.

That said, both Penelope and Tim seem to have found work that really suits them and must jazz them up… or how would they produce such insightful and energized writing? Are they speaking not of themselves but rather to their peers, who might be struggling under the economic and personal load that marks early adulthood? Or is this not generational but rather just evidence that everyone’s different — some will find joy in work and some won’t and for most of us, the joy of work comes and goes in waves over a lifetime?