Job Satisfaction In Today's Work Environment
BankAmerica has a new CEO. So do the Times Mirror Co., Host Marriott, CompuServe, and ad agency N.W. Ayer & Partners, to name just a few. Robert Lowes, Burger King's new boss, is the company's third in six years. At California clothing maker Esprit de Corp., David Folkman, the fourth CEO in five years, stepped down in July. Another search party has been summoned. If the revolving door at the top of U.S. corporations seems to be spinning so fast that it's just a blur of pinstripes, you're not imagining it. A new study, co-written by headhunting firm Paul Ray Berndtson and researchers at Cornell University, has tracked the career moves of more than 1,400 senior managers and found that 42 percent change jobs (Davidmann, M., 1996, "Inflation"), either in-house or at a new company, every two years. What society is seeing is a 12-month honeymoon period, where executives experience high job satisfaction. After they begin to get involved in the nitty-gritty of the new position, that initial enthusiasm seems to fade. Then comes what has been dubbed job hangover-or, call back that headhunter immediately.
Such hopscotching will not necessarily bring happiness. By analyzing job satisfaction among the chronically restless it was found that the thrill of the honeymoon decreases with each job change, while the hangover does not. Of course, every rule has its exceptions. Look at Richard Irvine, 54, newly named president of Mikohn Gaming, a fast-growing Las Vegas maker of games, lighting, and surveillance systems for casinos. Irvine, a participant in the study, seems to defy its findings. He's a career career-hopper: Along the way he's done two stints at Disney and a few years at Straight Arrow Publishing, best known as the folks who bring you Rolling Stone magazine (Davidmann, 1996, "Inflation"). One can only ask, "where next?"
In order to address the question of job satisfaction in today's work...