The Forensic Examiner Articles

The Meaning of Work

During research at New York University, Wrzesniewski (2003) determined that individuals experience work in one of three distinct ways:

• Job—the individual is primarily concerned with the financial rewards of work.

• Career—the individual is focused on advancing within the occupational structure.

• Calling—the individual works not for financial gain or career advancement, but for the sense of fulfillment that work brings.

Usually individuals who view their work as just a job prior to the onset of injury or illness are less likely to return to work than individuals who consider work a career. In contrast, individuals who perceive work more or less as a calling are eager to return to work following illness or injury.

Employees who believe that work is a calling are not representatives of esteemed professions only. Just as many longshoremen, waitresses, custodians, and landscapers fully invest in their vocations as callings as do teachers, lawyers, and physicians. The meaning of work is an experience unique to the individual and not necessarily a function of how society in general might perceive the job title and the employee’s day-to-day responsibilities.

When organizational leaders can imbue every member of a work team, from the least skilled to the most highly trained, with the belief that each employee is highly valuable and important to the organization’s success, the organization will probably have fewer problems with lost time. Take for example the camaraderie of a hospital maintenance staff. The members of the maintenance staff were encouraged to wear surgical garments to work. The maintenance manager felt that without his crew’s involvement, the hospital could not operate and effective health care could not take place, no matter how skilled the staff physicians. This simple but clever gesture was, of course, designed to remind the maintenance staff members of their critical contribution to the hospital’s daily functioning. That particular hospital maintenance staff had few instances of occupational injury/illness/lost time.

The development of occupational disability or the onset of acquired vocational disability may result traumatically from a single event (i.e., the above the knee amputation in a professional football player), but as we have shown above, acquired total disability is often a process

that involves numerous contributions that are not only medical in nature, but also psychosocial. Because acquired disability is heavily weighted by psychosocial dynamics, we believe that professionals trained in determining impairment (medical authorities) should defer to vocational counselors for a total picture—or explanation—of acquired disability.

To be continued.