Work: What it Does For Us, What We Do For It
by Francis MacNab
Published in February 1999

Read the Contents

Chapter 5
Why do we do it?

I dreamed of a world where everything is freshly created
as a wild cherry tree stippled with dew,
full of nightingales and thrushes . . .
Yevgeny

David Dawson is a specialist anaesthetist at a large hospital. He is on duty five days a week. He is regularly called late at night or in the early hours of the morning to attend emergencies. He works five weekends out of six. Some nights he gets three hours sleep. 'I'm exhausted before I start the day,' he said. Why do you do it? He knew the question was loaded. He replied, 'No one else will do it; they know I'll do it.' Why do you do it? He knew his first answer was only partially accurate. 'My wife says I do it to avoid being at home, but I like being at home. I do it because I am the doctor. I do it because I still get a buzz out of a difficult emergency. I do it because I fear what might happen if I don't do it. I do it because I love being there. I hate the sloppy work I see. I get angry at the way some of my colleagues simply don't turn up or walk away and leave it to an inexperienced junior. I do it because I want to maintain standards.'
'Yes,' he said, 'I know there is more to it than that. I enjoy being an ordinary person who can walk in and suddenly exercise enormous power and get the right results. I enjoy sitting for a few minutes on the top of the tree, and then I know it's back to being ordinary again - fighting an old ambivalent battle with my parents, pleased that they gave me the right genes and the right encouragement to become a doctor, but determined never to be like them.'
Damien Donnelly is a Roman Catholic priest. 'I decided to be a priest when I was 13. It was a decision that delighted my family and was fully welcomed by the church. But I had no idea what I was letting myself in for. Nobody told me it would be like this. It is such an abnormal existence, and the older I get the more isolated I get.' Why do you do it? 'I once thought it was what God wanted me to do. I thought to be a priest was to be something special. And so it is. But why do I do it? I do it now because I'm 52 and I fear not doing it - I fear there is no other existence for me. I keep saying this is what God wants me to do. But the truth is I fear I could not do anything else, so I stay in this job painfully longing for a normal existence of being able to talk to people without the aura of "the priest" being present, able to have normal friendships and normal weekends. Nobody told me that every Saturday and every Sunday you will be on duty. Of course we can have Mondays off, but everybody is at work on Mondays, so that's also a sign of how abnormal it is. Well, you will say, if you choose to be a priest these are the realities! Adapt and be happy. I often feel I could be putting good energy into something far more satisfying and far more worthwhile. My mother would turn in her grave if she heard me say that. But when you are a priest there are not many people to whom you can dare to say what you feel!'
Douglas Dewbury is a clerk of courts. 'I really wanted to be a lawyer and be a judge. But I did not get the right marks, so I worked my way into this job. I always sit under the judge. Now and again when nobody is in the court I slip up and sit in his chair, just to see what it would have been like. I pretend my job is where I want to be, but I always yearn to be something else.' Why do you do it? 'I do it because of the social restraints, wife, family - and no pathway to take me anywhere else. It's a safe, secure job and it meets some of my needs. I suppose we should not expect things to be perfect.'
Dorothy Dumas is an actor. She has done some widely acclaimed performances, and at 38 has a strong record behind her. Unfortunately, acting does not provide regular work, and although she is now well paid for specific performances, taken over a year her income needs augmenting from other sources. Why does she do it? 'I love it,' she said. 'I always wanted to be on the stage and now I could not imagine any other life. It is not a life I would recommend to my daughter, but my daughter is already auditioning for a part in the college play. Why do I do it? I think there is something in me that wants to get out, and when I am on the stage I'm completely different; it's absolutely exhilarating.'
Deborah Dunstan works in a department store. She is divorced and her 13-year-old son lives with her. She works five days and two nights a week. She has been in the same section for seventeen years, and is now third in charge of the section. 'It's a regular job and I'm so used to it,' she said. Why do you do it? 'First of all I need the money. But apart from that I like getting out of the house and having something to do each day. And I'm well liked and respected here. Whenever they want someone to work a little extra, they don't have to ask for volunteers - they know I'll do it. Not just for the extra money; I like to think I can be helpful and obliging and I like helping the customers make up their minds. They are spending their money and I want them to feel they are doing that wisely. In some ways I have a powerful position ensuring that people are well served.'
As we review these five people - Dawson, Donnelly, Dewbury, Dumas and Dunstan - we recognise several factors about them and some important concerns in their work content. All of them had various levels of awareness of the structures of society and the human spectrum in which they could find ways to connect with reality and be something for themselves and something for others.
David Dawson liked his work but was exhausted by it. He was not in a straightforward relationship with work; there were unconscious and undisclosed conflicts and other known conflicts that were not resolved. He had a strong and sustained ideal of who he could be, but this was often in conflict with his everyday realities and his sombre perceptions of himself. In addition, his inner constraint and self-criticisms led him to question his ideals, motives and achievements.
Damien Donnelly perceived how childhood choices might become unsatisfactory adult realities. His conflicts were controlled by the necessities of his job, his commitment to past decisions, the fear of his mother's disapproval, his desire to serve God, and his internal ruminations. Douglas Dewbury saw his energies going into a reality that was less than his ideal, but early social realities (law school quotas) joined with later structural responsibilities (home and family) to constrict his ideal to the world of fantasy. This did not threaten his necessary adaptation to the realities of his work structure.
Dorothy Dumas had an ideal and a fantasy from early childhood and was fortunate enough for it to become her enjoyable reality. She was also a realistic model for her daughter. Dorothy could see that her personality needed the stage. Her work contained a high level of narcissistic exhibitionism and eroticisation and in her work her personality needs found a warm social acceptance and acclamation. She was willing to survive on a low income because of the large compensating satisfactions her work gave her.
Deborah Dunstan had settled for a more neutralised work life. There were structures and codes of behaviour, roles and rules, and she accepted them. She was able to gain considerable satisfaction and exhilaration out of her sublimated life in the constructive and obliging service she provided. In each person there is an active psychological determinism manifesting itself in the choices they make at conscious and unconscious levels. When Damien asserted that there was nowhere for him to go, he revealed a choice he had made. When David said he had to do the work because there was no one else to do it, he too revealed a choice. They were active agents in choosing their work and the way they worked. Both David and Dorothy alluded to an early ideal or counter-ideal that led them to choose their job. Damien was influenced by a sense of God, probably masking a parental wish and an adolescent anxiety and guilt. Douglas Dewbury, however, was the product of a social system at a given time in a particular city. Circumstances at another time and place may have opened the opportunity for him to become the judge he aspired to be. Having taken the job of clerk of courts, his life was no longer hostage to the social structures. His job choice in the light of the realities was his choice.
. In this social and psychological determinism we see that both genetic (early childhood influences) and interactional factors are present. Deborah Dunstan spoke continuously of the good fit between herself and her workplace and the people within it, between her external and internal environments; that fit gave meaning and pleasure to what she was doing. Damien Donnelly was much less enthusiastic. He and David Dawson were experiencing a drain of energy. Both were tired and exhausted. Neither had activities or time to recover energy and zest. Work was often a response to their inner compulsion and unconscious defensiveness and this constant load led to exhaustion. The psychological-physiological 'temperature' in their job fit and job perspective was constantly at high and they were both vulnerable to psychological-physiological symptomatic reactions; David had identified the early warning symbols of stress and strain.
For David and Deborah, at one level work was an energiser and an energy provider. For Damien, however, work discontent was constricting the flow of energy. While some people are generous - even lavish - with their energy, others are not. Where dissatisfaction and depreciation, hurt and hostility have entered the work zone, the flow of energy dries up. This internalisation and withdrawal can be very stressful and exhausting.
Mind and body states can exhibit different reciprocal relationships. Exhaustion and mind stress may affect physical health. But low physical health and illness may play a part in a person's determination and mind state to continue working and achieve high results. Strong involvement with work activities may provide a distraction, compensations and relief from other discomforts and anxieties.
A structural and psychological point of view shows the possible ways that the structures and dynamics of the mind can affect the way people work. We are concerned here with the ego, the ego-ideal, and the super-ego.
In work situations, people can become frustrated, discontented or hurt. Hostility and aggressive behaviour can pervade the workplace, and this makes attempts to restore satisfaction and contentment difficult. On the other hand, many work situations provide ways for the expression of sexual energies through closeness, intimate behaviours, and various forms of eroticisation. Both the aggressive and sexual energies (id) come under social reality and individual ego controls, with the super-ego exerting a conscience-like and corrective influence.
In work situations a major ego function is to achieve competence that is personally perceived and socially affirmed. It provides a sense of satisfaction and pleasure, and a zest for the further pursuit of potential in that work situation and beyond. The ego-ideal holds in mind the fantasy, the possibility or the desired ambition. In the examples cited above, for Douglas Dewbury it was to be a judge; social and ego reality led him to accept a lesser ideal, but an ideal nevertheless of being a stable person for himself and his family. The super-ego demands quality, standards, moral obligation, duty, and conformity. A breach of super-ego demands evokes guilt and punitive self-criticism or it calls for some way to placate or cushion the impact of the super-ego. Damien Donnelly was especially affected because he overtly acknowledged a religious responsibility to remain at his post, but there were enticements that led him to think of a different lifestyle and alternative work. His guilt for having such thoughts drove him to stronger commitment to his priestly role, but this rearoused his discontent and anxiety.
David Dawson was also driven by strong super-ego pressures. He was not bound by priestly constraints but he had a keen sense of his work in a theological perspective which in turn affected his moral obligations and his perceptions of other people's behaviour. At times he became indignant and angry but tempered this by recognising that it did not achieve a desired objective and by re-enunciating his perception of his ego-ideal, thus avoiding unnecessary and irrational guilt. Work provides a vital arena for the expressions of aggression and power, intimacy and eroticisation, guilt and penance and paying off debts, of sado-masochism and compassion. Work can be the place to neutralise and redirect aggressive urges and sublimate or reorganise libidinal (sexualised or subsexualised) impulses to reach satisfactory and constructive outcomes. Unconscious and conscious gratifications can mitigate conscious malcontent. David Dawson's stress found some compensation in his pursuit of competence and by his inner heroic fantasy finding expression in outer behaviour and performance. Douglas Dewbury's disappointment was offset by the moral satisfaction of being a stable influence and a model provider for his wife and family.
Pruyser wrote:
The task of the governing ego is to bring the wishes and demands from the id, the super-ego, and the ego-ideal into some kind of working combination, taking reality into account in the synthesis it strives for . . . If work is to be a satisfying and life-sustaining engagement (and) . . . a growth experience . . . these internal demands need to be heeded.

Everyone has narcissistic needs that seek expression in the workplace. Ambition, excellence and social co-operation and enhancement are the positive aspects of narcissism. Negative aspects are seen in people incessantly seeking approval and acclaim, accumulating power, irritatingly placing wealth out of proportion to service and requiring audience adulation.
Deborah and Dorothy found a satisfying expression for their narcissism in their work. The men encountered some difficulties. David's inner conflict over his colleagues' behaviour and his ego-ideal pushed him towards exhaustion as his narcissism was subliminated into compassion and competence and externally accredited acclaim. Damien's narcissism remained embedded in his childhood choices (and fixations), the punitive non-accepting mother image, and the god-like unforgiving, unaccommodating super-ego. Douglas' narcissism and aggression were tempered by social realities but remained unresolved. Overall, however, the narcissism of these men found positive expression in the positions they held, their ambitions and their socially accepted status. All have to contend with psycho-social realities and the inevitable awareness that all work activity is embedded in social relations. No one works in isolation. Everyone is involved in the context of social experience, social groups and social institutions. There are roles, rituals, codes and rules that regulate behaviour and activities. There are societies, guilds and unions with their arrangements for entry and practice, their styles of dress and their special language. In all five people of our study, we see these particulars of psycho-social reality apply. David cannot elect to join Damien's or Douglas' professional group, or vice versa. Each group prescribes how work will be performed, who will do it, and within what hierarchy, context and timeframe.
Adaptation is required. There are the social and structural realities, the culture, and the position in the scheme of things; and along with all of these there are the internal desires, ambitions, stresses and conflicts of each individual in their various and multiple contexts. Work provides ways for the person to find a place in the world, ways to spend their time and ways to relate to realities. Some conformity and adaptation are necessary, as are some compensations and consolations. It appears that Douglas has made his adaptation to the structures and requirements of social reality, but Damien has found his adaptation much more difficult. Dorothy has placed her ego-ideal at such a level that she is ready to adapt to the hardships that may be involved; whereas Deborah has defined her level of ambition and aspiration in terms of social acceptance rather than position, and she has comfortably adapted her lifestyle to this. In David's work, adaptation has required continual evaluation and adjustment.
Each person will reflect on the rewards that are forthcoming from their work situation. Some rewards are clearly and overtly identifiable; others are more subtle; some may not be recognised but may be critical for a person's continued work. All five people, if asked to name three vital rewards, would do so. But what would be each person's unconscious rewards? Does David remain an anaesthetist because of professional recognition, social status or income? Or is he more critically influenced by the rewards of animation and enjoyment, being able to change parts of his world (power), being able to relieve pain and achieve heroism in the eyes of his family? The obvious and overt rewards may not always be the critical or decisive ones.
One vital part of the work situation is the enhancement and exhilaration it evokes. Work can be boring, depressing and unrewarding even if it pays a high salary. Douglas may look up to the exalted position of the judge and envy the higher salary and securities that go with the job. But he may not realise the social and professional isolation and professional anxiety the judge may experience. On reflection, Douglas may see that the freedom and exhilaration he derives from his job is not just a secondary compensation for what he might have had. People like Deborah and Dorothy enjoy going to work and derive pleasure from doing their work. They talk about their work when they go home at night, and the next day at work they talk about what happened at home. Work is not something they do begrudgingly, between 8 a.m. and 5 p.m. or between 4 p.m. and 11 p.m. Work is their identity; ideally they would like it to be exhilarating and life-enhancing. Not all work will have these characteristics and rewards. Though the work itself may provide meagre rewards, even monetarily, other rewards such as the people, the stories they tell, the environments they create, the sense of contact and meaning they provide may do a little to change attitudes, broaden perspectives and soften emotions. The work situation may also surround people with a little kindness that touches an unconscious intimacy need or arouse an unconscious desire to belong to something bigger than themselves. These could be positive transformative rewards that ameliorate some negativities and provide people with a different perspective on themselves and the time and commitment they give to their work.
The situations of the five people discussed above display the following factors that help to understand why people choose their jobs and why they stay in them, even in the face of dissatisfaction:

• psychologically determined choices;
• interactional factors affecting psychological and physiological interaction, health and illness, job fit and energy management;
• genetic factors and developmental influences affecting adult life;
• structural-psychodynamic factors of ego, super-ego, ego-ideal and id, unconscious needs and narcissistic searchings;
• psycho-social factors such as family, associations, and membership of work guilds and unions;
• adaptive factors such as resolving conflicts and settling discomforts;
• factors of reward and exhilaration that provide times of celebration and confirmation of job performance and pleasure.

Thus far
Adult life and choices are affected by:
a) childhood experiences;
b) interactional processes within the person and between the person and their various internal and external environments;
c) the various ways in which the mind works at conscious and unconscious levels;
d) the social roles, rituals, status and life-styles;
e) the ways in which the person adapts to the events and situations of life.

Contents of Work: What it Does For Us, What We Do
1 It's about the money
2 To play - if only we knew how
3 What work does to us
4 The pathology and the pleasure
5 Why do we do it?
6 Is there any pleasure in work?
7 A good place to be
8 To work or not to work? That is the question
9 Wrongdoing in the workplace
10 Do ugly people have beautiful spots?
11 Some women have choices; others do not
12 Women's access in the workplace
13 Workplace intelligence
14 Vitality discovered and sustained
15 Searching for something sacred in the workplace
16 Is there anything sacred about work?
17 An analysis of the person in the work context
18 What is the world coming to?
19 Six people in search of contentment
20 In praise of idleness