The Happy at Work Podcast

The Dark Side of Meaningful Work with Andrew Soren

• The Happy at Work Podcast • Season 6 • Episode 5

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In his second appearance on Happy at Work, Andrew Soren explores the complex relationship between meaningful work and well-being. 

Drawing from recent research, he reveals surprising findings about how highly meaningful work can sometimes lead to decreased well-being, and discusses practical ways to balance purpose with personal sustainability.

In This Episode, You'll Learn:

  • Why meaningful work doesn't always correlate with increased well-being, particularly in highly purpose-driven professions
  • The six different motivations people have for finding work meaningful, according to researcher Michael Pratt
  • How diversity in work motivations can strengthen teams and organizations
  • Why an ecosystem approach (individual, team, organization, society) is necessary to address burnout in meaningful work
  • The importance of regular check-ins about how work aligns with personal meaning and purpose

Quotable Moments: 

"Half of everything that's been written about meaningful work has been published basically in the last year... The amount of people writing and thinking about this topic is just doubling basically every single year."

"If we go to them and are just like, 'hey guys, you just need to develop some more self-compassion here... you need to build your resilience skills'... there is nothing that will result in more moral outrage than kind of saying like, 'just take another meditation class.'"

Practical Takeaway: Consider implementing regular check-ins with team members about how their work aligns with their sources of meaning, whether that's utility, status, passion, service, kinship, or mastery. Remember that these motivations can change over time and that having diverse motivations within a team can create stronger organizational dynamics.

Resources Mentioned:

  • "The Call of the Wild" study by Bunderson and Thompson (2009) about zookeepers - link
  • Michael Pratt's research on meaningful work motivations - link
  • Carol Riff's model of psychological well-being - link

Connect With Our Guest:

To stay connected and continue the conversation, be sure to follow us on LinkedIn.

And don't forget to check out our previous episodes for more tips and strategies to boost your workplace happiness. You can find them on your favorite podcast platform or on our website.

If you have any questions, comments, or topic suggestions for future episodes, please reach out to us. We'd love to hear from you!

Stay inspired, stay motivated, and stay happy at work!

Laura Hamill:

Music, welcome back for another episode of the happy at work podcast with Laura Tessa and Michael.

Tessa Misiaszek:

Each week, we have thoughtful conversations with leaders, founders and authors about happiness at work.

Michael McCarthy:

Tune in each Thursday for a new conversation. Enjoy the show.

Tessa Misiaszek:

Welcome to the happy at work podcast. We are so excited to be joined today again by Andrew Soren, who is the CEO of eudaimonic by design. Andrew was with us, gosh, I think it was a little over a year ago, and we're so excited to catch up with him, hear more about what he's been doing, as well as talk about a topic that's very close to my heart, which is really around meaningfulness of work. So without further ado, welcome Andrew to the happy at work podcast.

Andrew Soren:

Thank you so much. Thank you so much. Tessa. Thank you so much, Michael. It's so great to be here.

Tessa Misiaszek:

Awesome. So Andrew, we haven't we haven't seen you in a year. Well, I think maybe Michael's talk to you, but I haven't seen you in a year, so I'd love to hear about what you've been up to.

Andrew Soren:

Yeah, sure. Well, it's been quite a busy year. There's been lots going on, but probably for the purposes of this podcast, the thing that that has been occupying a lot of my mind has been the topic of meaningful work, meaning and purpose at work, the good, the bad and the ugly of it, I have been spending a lot of time thinking, Writing, Publishing spun off a whole entire other podcast about this topic. Like, there's, there's, there's a lot that is in my head right now around this topic of

Michael McCarthy:

meaningful so tell us what's the what's what's on top of mine? Why is this timely? Why is this important, and how can we benefit from it? Yeah,

Andrew Soren:

sure. So I'll give you the Cole's Notes version of how I started thinking about this probably about two and a half, three years ago. Now, I was having this conversation with this extremely important person in the psychology of well being space. Her name is Carol riff, and she's probably like the godmother of positive psychology, although she probably wouldn't say that. What she would say is that she has spent her whole entire career thinking and really wrestling with what have psychologists been saying for, you know, hundreds, if not 1000s of years, what a good life is, and about how that actually translates into the way that into the way that we think about how we feel, think and do. And her model of psychological well being is probably like one of the two most important models of psychological well being period, like most studied, most researched, most published around like it's it's pretty it's pretty extraordinary. And as we were taught, in a big part of that model is meaning and purpose. Specifically, a sense of purpose for Carol is, like, a really, really big thing. And what was interesting for us is that when we started to look at the literature on, like, what's the relationship between a sense of purpose or meaning and work, we started to see that there was just an enormous amount being published, and then in this, like, really vast exponential kind of curve, so much so that basically half of everything that's been written about meaningful work has been published basically in the last year. Wow. It's like just doubling basically every single year. The amount of people writing and thinking about this topic is, we're like, Well, what are they saying and, and here's, here's the bottom line of like, of what they're saying. Do you want me to go in there? Do you ask any questions before I jump in? Okay, so there's just, like, just hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of articles that, at this point have been written, and most of them trumpet meaningful work as something that is really, really good. It's good for performance, it's good for motivation, it's good for loyalty at work. Like, I mean, all the things that, if you have a skew of talent metrics you're wanting meaningful work, should deliver upon. Like, it's great for like, organizational behavior. It's great for kind of pro, social, kind of mentalities at work. It's it generally tends to increase creativity and innovation. It definitely increases apps like lowers absenteeism. It lowers people's propensity to quit and look for another job. Like these are all really, really good things, and you would think that if that's true, it's also going to be increasing well being, and all the people who kind of research this, especially because, like, meaning is such an important part of what well being is all about. And a lot of the people who research this kind of just assume that it's kind of like a spillover effect, right? Like, they don't necessarily see a direct relationship between happiness and meaning, but if all those other. Things are going well, if you're liking your job, if you're like, really into it, if there's lots of creativity, if there's lots of collaboration, if you're generally more productive when you're involved in meaning, obviously your well being is going to go up, right? Except, dot, dot, dot. And so this was the interesting thing in the research. What we started to see was that, in some ways, the more meaningful the work, the less people were experiencing well being. And so, like, that was kind of like a wow, what's what's going on here? And like, when I say the more meaningful the work, I mean, like, think about the most meaningful work that you can possibly imagine. Well,

Tessa Misiaszek:

that's what I'm thinking of. Immediately. What comes to mind is the pandemic and healthcare workers healthcare, right? So, if you're, if you're on the front lines of saving lives, and, you know, there's so much riding on this, and then how could you, I mean, we saw the burnout that happened across, you know, the entire healthcare field. You got it as a result of just, you know, the sense of urgency, and many of them never taking a day off. And then, as a result, you see the collapse of these workers. So you're

Andrew Soren:

totally, you're totally going in the direction of what this dark side of meaning literature says. And healthcare is a great example. I think healthcare is great. We could also add educators to that. We could include social worker, basically, like anyone in a caring profession, probably strikes pretty high in the meaning. But nonprofits, you know, international aid, like, really, the more meaningful the work, right? Like, the more likely this scenario is going to happen where the work is really, really important. The best, like, the best study around this is actually with zookeepers. It's a beautiful study came out in 2009 called the call from the wild. Bunderson and Thompson, fantastic study. Basically, it looked at zookeepers and zookeepers totally like their work is a calling, like they are they. They are so passionate about the work they the work that they do makes a really big difference. I mean, animals live or die based on their work. Often, the animals who they are looking after are, like, at the cusp of extinction. And so like, if they drop the ball, they might be responsible for the like, elimination of an entire race of species right on the planet. And and like, that's a big deal. They they work hard. They say they love this work so much they would probably do it even if they weren't paid, and they're often not very well paid, like this is the interesting thing about this research is that zoo sports are notoriously underpaid. They're asked to work more. They're asked to come on a nights, on weekends. They they kind of get, you know, the short end of the stick a lot when it comes to their fundamental decency work and zookeepers are kind of miserable. I mean, not all of them, you know, this is, this is distribution curves. So some are totally able to, like, figure out a way to survive. But like many, have a fair bit of career regret. They feel alienated and exploited by their jobs. They they often kind of do that to themselves to a certain extent. Like they, they care so much about this work that they go into it expecting to be paid less as many people in deeply meaningful work do. They're like, I'll trade off the salary for this job. Like, that's literally the thought that they'll go going into an interview. So, like, they're kind of doing it to themselves before the organization does, but the organization's definitely exploit. I mean, I've been in jobs where the boss has literally said, you know, this is purpose driven work. You should expect to be paid less than you would at McKinsey or anywhere else, right? I mean, this is, like, fairly common that

Tessa Misiaszek:

you just, you just use the opposite of purpose filled work as we

Andrew Soren:

could have, like a wonderful we could have a whole conversation about, quote, unquote, bullshit. I know a

Tessa Misiaszek:

lot of people who work at McKinsey, so I'm not saying anything about that. That's right, but I do have a question. So I do, because I had the privilege of working with a neuroscientist at a bass general for a few years who really studied the neuroscience of empathy. Kind of empathy, similar, I would imagine, to meaningfulness of work, is that you can kind of go too far, right? And if you give too much, and you give too much of your energy away, and you're so empathetic that you just you can feel the pain of other people all the time, that then you can be burnt out by that. But it really started with self empathy. And if you weren't paying attention to yourself, it's really difficult to give empathy to other people. So if you truly wanted to be empathic in your nature and in your communication, it really like the first rule was pay attention to yourself first. So I'm curious, when it comes to to meaningfulness of work, if there is that balance that people have to have, and yes, you can work and give yourself, but you're actually not. You're doing a worser job for the purpose the good of the situation that you're in, if you're not taking care of yourself. So I'm just, I'm assuming that it's aligned, but I'm curious,

Andrew Soren:

totally aligned. Totally aligned. Tessa, and, like, I think, you know, like the research that you're talking around empathy is sometimes the way that people describe the difference between compassion and empathy, right? Like, empathy is, I'm going to step inside the shoes of the other I'm going to feel their pain. And that is, I mean, these are really good thing, but if that's the kind of way that you're thinking about empathy, it's going to destroy you, and it's going to destroy you really, really quickly, whereas compassion is a much more cognitive way of thinking about somebody else's but like, I'm I'm going to appreciate that person, like, what they're going through, but like, I'm not stepping in their shoes, as I do that sometimes. There's this researcher whose name is Carrie olberger, who works a lot with social workers and and people in those professions, and she kind of describes it as, like, human accompaniment, like, I'm gonna walk beside the person, but I'm not gonna actually step inside their shoes. And that's like, that's a huge element of difference, which is super important. Now I like I just want to say I think compassion, self, compassion, all of those things are hugely important. And if there's one thing that I've learned from all of this research, it's that the individual is not the whole location of the problem. So and I think that what we can see in healthcare workers, especially is if we go to them and are just like, hey guys, you just need to develop some more self compassion here, like for yourself, right? Like you need to build your resilience skills to be able to get through them. There is nothing that will result in more moral outrage than kind of saying like, just take another meditation class. Here's a yoga program, right? Let's have someone

Tessa Misiaszek:

still placed on them. That's right.

Andrew Soren:

That's right, because, you know, one of the reasons why it's so crappy is because of the organizational context in which they find themselves, and that organizational context is influenced by societal factors that are often well outside any healthcare organizations, kind of, you know, sphere of influence. And so thinking about this problem in a bit of an ecosystem approach is really, really important. And by ecosystem I mean, like, we need to think about the individual, but we also need to think about the team that that individual is part of. We need to think about the organization that that team is part of. We need to think about the societal structures that that organization ultimately lives within. And only kind of, when we think about all of those different pieces of the system and how they fit together, are we able to start to approach what something different might be here. So

Michael McCarthy:

it sounds like, in correct me on this one, it sounds like they're caring too much. They're putting the other person in front of them. They're not creating boundaries, and they're getting burned out. And I'm wondering if there's a call for the organization and supervisors to be on the lookout for your burning out. You're getting way too into this, take care of yourself. I'm curious if there, if you feel that there's a need for someone to be looking out for that person, that might be a little bit too, too much into into the caring part. What

Andrew Soren:

do you think? 100% 100% I think that there's definitely a call for manager and and you know, you know person responsible for others within an organization to be looking at for these things. And there is probably the biggest influence on an individual's well being in an organization like the biggest lever you can pull are the behaviors of their direct manager and supervisor. And so that is absolutely important. And I would still say you can't, like, if you are a manager, and especially if you are a frontline manager or a middle manager, how much control do you really have over the things that you are asking people to do? Like, I mean, there's absolutely some, but you still are part of systems that need to change, which kind of goes back to, well, how are we thinking about, you know, the human resources of our organizations. You know, are we thinking of them as humans? Are we thinking them as resources? And like we're often than not, most of the organizations that we're part of, they are resources. They are not necessarily humans. And so, yeah, sorry,

Tessa Misiaszek:

sorry to interrupt, but I have a question for you, because I work in a consulting company, and we have a lot of clients that are we have lots of clients that are in healthcare and pharma and biotech and doing amazing work around the world, but we have a lot of clients that are in other industries and and, you know, making cars and making widgets and and so what do you say to to those managers who really, actually are proud of the companies they work for. They feel like it's a good brand, it's providing for their family, but how do they really help their teams feel that connection to meaningfulness if it's not the. Life Saving work like what what are you finding in the research? What tools can managers leverage to really make everyone, no matter where you work, to feel some connection to meaning and purpose? That's

Andrew Soren:

great, and it's a great question. And I think that one of the mistakes that we make in any of this research is flattening it out. And so, like, I'm talking about people who are deep, like, find deep, deep senses of meaning and calling in their work. But those aren't the only kinds of people that, like, we could be talking about. And so another guys that that is, like, a really important researcher in this field of meaningful work. His name, His name is Michael Pratt, and he talks about the different reasons why somebody might find their work significant and worthwhile, and that, by the way, is like often the definition of meaningful work, like, meaningful work is work that we personally think is significant and worthwhile. And what he says, based on his research, is that there's probably, like six different reasons why people might find their work significant and worthwhile. One of them is just for very utilitarian reasons, like this, work allows me to make an income so that I can live the life that I want to live outside of work, and that's like, that makes work really, really meaningful, like work can be for many, probably the vast majority, of, workers around this globe, work is the vehicle that allows them to be able to live the lives that they want to be able to live, right? And so we can think about what the organization's responsibility is to ensure that those people have the opportunities to be able to do that. But that's not the only reason why people find their work meaningful. Other people might think that their work is really meaningful because it gives them an opportunity to have status, right? So climb a ladder. This is a career. I'm trying to raise. I'm trying to go up higher, I'm trying to make more money. I'm trying to, like, have more power in this organization, like that. That's a good reason why people might come to their work. But those aren't the only reasons. There's four other reasons,

Michael McCarthy:

any like, I guess, like ranking on your reasons that when you when you mentioned the first one to me that popped up was I'm here for the money, I'm here for the paycheck. And is there any measurement between I'm here for the money or the lifestyle, etc, versus I'm here to help people? Is there like a qualification? This is a better reason, a better version of meaning, or no, is it just whatever?

Andrew Soren:

I guess, like better involves a big value placement that somebody else is placing upon that reason? Yes, I guess I don't have a direct answer, but let me just tell you the other four reasons that Michael would say are really important. Michael proud would say are really important, because I think it gets to even what you're saying. So one is passion. I'm here because the work I just, like, I care so much about it, right? It's like a little bit of the zookeepers. It would be a little bit of an example of the passion. And that's usually, like, sometimes we say calling, like, job, career, calling as kind of like, the three reasons why someone's interested in work and stop there, but, but Michael's Michael's response is, like, no, it's actually deeper. So passion is one service, which I think is kind of what you're getting at. Michael is another, like, I'm here to serve, right? Like, this is often where we see kind of nurses or educators or or people in those caring professions, but those are the only reasons, either kinship. I'm here for my brothers and sisters, like we think about that, like military or firefighters, like it's it's the people that are surrounding me that are the reason why I'm doing this, like, they're really important. Or the last one, I'm here for mastery. I'm here to grow right? I'm here to become, like, the best that I can possibly be in this specific domain. Like, think of like the engineer who just wants to get better and better and better at kind of what they're trying to do. I

Michael McCarthy:

love these differences. And I remember from all the guests that Tessa and I and Laura have interviewed some of the best organizations, what I found a common link is that they hire really well. They're really thoughtful about the hire. And I wonder what you think about this interview question, because I'd love to get your thoughts on it. What do you think of an interview question that would say, How does working here fit your meaning and purpose in life? That's

Andrew Soren:

a beautiful question. I think it's a really, really important question. And I actually think that it's, it's probably one of the most important things that we can do period, not just in an interview, but as managers of people in general, is check into that and recognize that it changes. Right? So, like Michael would say that those motivations for working probably evolve and change over the course of a lifetime. Like, maybe I get into it for service, but maybe that changes over time to be more about mastery. Or maybe I have kids and a mortgage and a whole bunch of things that I need to pay for, and that you that, like, status becomes really important. Or just, frankly, the utility, like, maybe other things are going on in my in my worlds, and I just, I just need to earn a paycheck so that I can, like, focus on them. Like, those things are probably going to change over time. One other thing that Michael PRI. Said in this, in this wonderful interview that we can link to if folks are interested, was that, as you're hiring, like, my instinct would be, okay, great. Like, if I know this, I'm gonna I'm in kind of a more service oriented job, I should hire people who have service motivations. And he's like, Well, think about it, and maybe a different way. Think about it as, like, a perspective diversity thing, right? Like, we know that diversity can be really important and good in any kind of an organization. So can, so can diversity of motivation. I kind of want someone on my team who's thinking about kinship, because they're the people who are gonna, like, you know, invite everyone out for drinks on Friday, and remember when your birthday is Michael, and, like all those kinds of things, you want somebody who's there for mastery because they're gonna, like, they're gonna build, you know, the excellence of this team. You want somebody who's there for service because they get the client. They get what we're trying to do, they they want to be able to serve. You. Want someone who has a very utilitarian focus, because they're gonna say, hey, Tessa, why are you working like it is six o'clock on a Friday night, get out of here. Like, Surely you've got a life, right? And even you even want someone with a status orientation to be like, Hey Michael, you know what? Like, you really deserve a promotion at this point. Like, why aren't you trying to, like, do more than we like you want all like, a great team has a mix of all of those motivations, which is just like a wonderful, different way of thinking about kind of job fit I

Tessa Misiaszek:

was. I absolutely love that point. I mean, I, I love that point so much I'm going to think about that for the rest of the day only because I've, I've spent a lot of my career in the diversity, equity, inclusion space and kind of defining what is, what our diverse teams and its ways of thinking, I mean, be way beyond race and ethnicity and demographics, the ways of thinking and so forth, education and experience. But what is, what is your motivation to kind of create meaningfulness in your work? Is life changing? Bomb like huge light bulb moment for me. And it's interesting because, of course, I'm self evaluating as you're talking, right? And I'm thinking about, you know, I made a job change about three years ago out of academia back into corporate, and immediately, when you said utilitarian, I was like, Well, I mean, to be honest, a little bit only because I had a son heading off to college, and the tuition was extraordinary, extraordinarily expensive. But then, like, as you move through it, I was like, No, well, my job is definitely mastery. I'm learning every day. I have an amazing team I work with that's kinship. So I would imagine that you can also kind of start to layer these kind

Andrew Soren:

of like bubbles, totally, this kind of like, Venn Diagram of things that are important, that evolves and changes. And therefore it's like, so like, whatever you hired for, this is kind of getting back to your original question, Michael, like, Would I just hire for that? Or, like, how often do I need to be checking in on those things? And then how often do I need to be helping someone craft their job to be able to take advantage of those things? And I think that's true, whether I'm blue color or white color, whether, you know, I'm doing, you know, whether there's this whole entire wonderful sphere of people who study like dirty work, you know, people who are like janitors or garbage men, or, you know, folks like that, like, there's all like any job, like, there's room for these questions about meaning and purpose. This is a

Michael McCarthy:

nice elevation, or addition to job crafting to add on that, that extra layer of there are six different reasons, six different types of meaning and purpose. According to Michael Pratt, I think it's really interesting that I think we should all check in. You know, every once in a while, at least once a year, should I still be here? Am I here for the right reason?

Tessa Misiaszek:

Totally, I'm like spinning right now because it just I need to read more about Michael Pratt research, and just want to continue the conversation with you. Sacked with insights. So very excited for others to hear it.

Andrew Soren:

I've been so obsessed with these ideas that, like, I've spun off a whole entire podcast series, actually, with your producer, Ariel. So thank you very much, Ariel, and thank you happy at work for helping me come to Ariel. She's She's changed but, but like, there's, we now have, like, over 35 different episodes of of different scholars talking about different facets of meaningful work and the way that it shapes so if you're at all interested in this topic, I really encourage you to go check out that podcast. It's called meaningful work matters.

Tessa Misiaszek:

Yeah, we'll definitely link it. Thank you so much, Andrew, it was great to speak with you again. Bye for now.

Michael McCarthy:

Bye for now. We'll see you soon. Thanks again. We hope you've enjoyed this episode. If you'd like to hear future episodes, be sure to subscribe to the happy at work podcast and leave us a review with your thoughts.

Tessa Misiaszek:

Are you interested in speaking on a future episode, or want to collaborate with us? Let us know. You can send us an email at admin. At happy at work, podcast.com,

Laura Hamill:

and lastly, follow us on LinkedIn or Twitter for even more happiness. See you soon. You.

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Laura Hamill, PhD

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Michael McCarthy

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Tessa Misiaszek, PhD

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Ariel Folkerts

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