According to data from the National Longitudinal Surveys of Youth, some people have worked in more than 10 jobs in a lifetime; men held 11.8 jobs while women had 11.5.
Interestingly, the study also found that the younger generation are more likely to change jobs than their older counterparts, “men held 5.7 jobs from age 18 to age 24, compared with 2.4 jobs from age 40 to age 48”.
While some of us are happy to stay in our jobs for life, others find it hard to stick to even one. So what makes us feel satisfied with our jobs and stay on while others feel the opposite? Is it the environment or is it us?
Research by Wendong Li, assistant professor of the Department of Management at the Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK) Business School has shed light on the interplay of genetic (i.e. the person) and work environment and how they influence the relationship we have with our job.
“Traditionally, people believe that it is primarily the work environment, such as managers and organizations, which influences our job characteristics, such as the tasks we perform and the amount of autonomy we have at work,” says Li.
He continues, “But accumulating research on person-environment fit has revealed the indispensable role of the person in influencing individuals’ job characteristics.”
Professor Li has been participating in extensive research in the genetic influence on work behavior.
“People are not randomly assigned to work environments; instead, they select themselves, and/or are selected into compatible work environments to garner the optimal level of person-environment fit,” he explains.
We can all relate to the fact that when looking for a job, apart from considering the salary and perks, we would also consider whether the job nature suits our personality.
“This is a form of manifestation that genetic factors shape our work attitudes and behaviors,” he says.
However, it doesn’t mean the environment plays no part at all. While the role of genetic influences is indispensable, environmental factors still play a role in affecting work characteristics.
Li’s another study examined how a dopamine genetic marker, DRD4 7 Repeat allele, interacted with early life environmental factors (i.e., family socioeconomic status and neighborhood poverty) to influence job change frequency in adulthood. The gene is closely related to human motivation, reward, and self-regulation, which in turn may affect educational achievement and job changes.
“In our findings, higher family socioeconomic status was associated with higher educational achievement, resulting in higher frequency of voluntary job changes and lower frequency of involuntary job changes; such relationships were stronger (i.e., more positive or negative) for individuals with more DRD4 7R alleles.
“The results also told us the importance of providing a supportive environment to children and adolescents, which will have a positive influence not only on their immediate education outcomes but also on their long-term careers later in life.”
To find out whether genetic and environmental influences are stable over time, Li conducted another research, entitled “Are Genetic and Environmental Influences on Job Satisfaction Stable Over Time? A Three-Wave Longitudinal Twin Study,” involving 712 same-sex twin pairs, with their educational attainment and career development assessed at approximately 21, 25, and 30 years of age.
The researchers looked into three individual differences: general mental ability, positive affectivity, and negative affectivity in mediating genetic influences on job satisfaction through early adulthood.
The study results show that as people accumulate more experiences when they develop into adulthood, genetic influences on individual characteristics become less important—but still significant—throughout early adulthood.
“During early adulthood, employees’ job satisfaction levels may be more shaped by environmental factors such as organizational practices (e.g., leadership, performance management, and reward systems) and economic situations, and these external factors may become increasingly important over time,” says Li.
With these findings, Li suggests that firms should try to tailor their practices according to individual differences.
“Organizations should pay more attention to the importance of employees’ personality traits in customizing their practices, as it shows in our study that positive affectivity is important in boosting job satisfaction. This is similar to personalized medicine,” he posits.
*Read the entire article at www.bschool.cuhk.edu.hk