Top 10 causes of job dissatisfaction

Getting the job of your dreams is not easy, because, in the same way that there is a personnel selection process to choose the best candidates who most adequately represent the business culture of a company, there is another job selection process that is more appropriate according to the needs of each person.

<<< The future of work: 8 post-pandemic work trends >>>

Many times people driven by the need to work and maintain a good quality of life endure stressful and toxic work environments that do not benefit them, with indifferent or insensitive co-workers who are not helpful but are quick to make value judgments and criticize. The same can be said of bosses who do not stand out for good leadership and only succeed in giving orders and displaying all their authority.

These variables can generate many problems that will trigger job dissatisfaction, and at the same time, job dissatisfaction will generate a long-term drop in productivity that will end up affecting not only the dissatisfied worker but the entire organization that depends on their commitment. 

Determining the main causes of job dissatisfaction will allow companies to remedy this condition by developing actions aimed at motivating employees so that the relationship with their work does not become a discouraging experience.

For this reason, the objective of this article is to identify the 10 main causes of job dissatisfaction and how to work on them in your human resources area.

1. Routine work without challenges.

Falling into a routine, monotonous job without interesting challenges is the first sign of job dissatisfaction. All people are good at something and can develop their full potential if they are truly motivated and stimulated with attractive, challenging, creative activities that allow them to get excited and strengthen their self-confidence in their abilities to successfully solve different situations.

Sometimes inflexible schedules and repetitive manual tasks demotivate and stress as much or more than work overload, but even doing the same thing over and over again can lead to work overload that is perceived as a kind of endless loop that prevents them from thinking in terms of scalable personal and professional life.

2. Reduced salary.

Although money is not the most important thing, it is the exchange value for the work done, and if a salary is low it is as if the quality and effort of that work done by an employee are not being valued. Consequently, people who receive low salaries that are not adequate for the activities and functions that they perform will feel dissatisfied with their job.

Employers should reach a salary agreement with their employees based on effort and results so that it is beneficial for both parties: the company and workers.

3. Lack of recognition.

In addition to doing an unattractive job and having a low salary, another cause of job dissatisfaction is the lack of recognition of talent, effort, and good results on the part of the worker. If committed and productive employees stop receiving recognition or never receive it since joining duties, they may feel dissatisfied and undervalued by their superiors.

So, it is not difficult to intuit that over time those workers will stop performing at the same level as at the beginning because simply nobody cares if they are brilliant workers who stand out from others who barely fulfill their tasks.

4. Lack of communication or poor communication.

For a company to work properly, it must have all the areas connected, aligned, and communicated with each other. Achieving this implies that there is the necessary communication between all teams and their departmental leaders.

Unfortunately, this does not always happen and that is when conflicts and friction between people, misunderstandings, delays in processes, and low productivity begin amid information silos and bottlenecks.

It is also possible that there is communication but that it is not satisfactory and does not generate an effective reception from the people involved. Detecting these deficiencies in communication will allow the implementation of some measures to integrate employees, promoting the necessary trust so that communication flows naturally instead of forcing it with demotivating threats and warnings.

<<< Employee experience: employee satisfaction and retention >>>

5. Conflictive work environment.

This cause of job dissatisfaction is one of the most serious because you cannot work in an unhealthy work environment where tensions and conflicts are constantly generated. Working in these conditions is counterproductive for mental and emotional health, and can cause severe stress and health problems for those who endure entire days in this situation.

The fact that some co-workers mistreat their colleagues is as pernicious as if they ignored them. For this reason, since people spend too many hours of their lives locked up in an office sharing and living with other similar people, the minimum essential is to guarantee a pleasant working environment to avoid staff leakage.

6. Lack of motivation for work.

It is also possible that a cause of job dissatisfaction is simply a lack of motivation for work. This can manifest itself in various ways: by performing a job that workers do not like because the tasks are too complex and they do not receive help, because they always perform the same tasks and get bored, or, on the contrary, there are too many tasks and little time to carry them out.

7. Instability in the processes.

Processes may be formalized but still not stable and employees cannot understand them. Therefore, when processes become tedious and complex to execute, a collaborative tool could reduce the impact of this deficiency and help workers to complete their tasks in less time.

It would greatly reduce the stress of people due to pending issues that cannot be completed within the required period.

8. Lack of executive leadership.

Sometimes business leaders may not have the characteristics of leaders in their personal and behave more like bosses or friends than as true guides for employees. Both extremes are bad, whether authority is built through fear or if the aim is to give an image that is too informal and friendly that does not inspire business vision.

9. Work overload and poor distribution of activities.

Another cause of job dissatisfaction is work overload and poor distribution of tasks that prevent workers from being able to perform their duties efficiently and successfully. No worker likes not being able to finish everything they have pending, and this situation extended over time will not only generate reproaches from their bosses, but also a growing demotivation that will influence their self-esteem, to the point that they feel that everything it's their fault.

In this sense, it must be taken into account that the workload must be adequate for each worker and feasible to carry out within the stipulated period and not rush to judge the efficiency of employees. If more than one person is having trouble completing their tasks in the allotted time, it may be necessary to modify the task list so that the goal is met.

10. Lack of a training plan.

People love what they do in their work as long as that work is worthwhile to grow professionally. It is useless to maintain a stable job over time if it does not allow you to improve yourself intellectually and face new challenges. In this sense, every company must develop training plans for each level of expertise.

In this way, the more training a company provides, the less dissatisfied employees will be and the better they will do their job. A job well done is more productive and competitive for the organization and gives many satisfactions to those who produce it.

<<< 5 tips to increase employee loyalty and commitment >>>

In conclusion, the main causes of job dissatisfaction that we list can be summarized in three fundamental aspects: lack of communication, since poor communication can generate a conflictive work environment; lack of business leadership, since bad leaders do not empathize with their employees and never give them the value they deserve; and finally, the lack of a training plan makes daily work routine and without challenges worth the effort.