Abraham Maslow and Meaningful Work

The Career Peer - Abraham Maslow and Meaningful Work

14 minutes, 51 seconds

SPEAKERS

Ryan Brown, Steve Weingarden

Steve Weingarden  00:04

The constant wonder of what am I doing? Is my career right for me? And how do I know? Are you looking out the window? And just wondering, Is this the right thing? Well, we are here, The Career Peer. That's Ryan Brown and me, Steve Weingarden. And this is where we share a closer look at career measures and help you think about how to reflect on your career. What do you want to be when you grow up? Think bigger. So for Episode One, our measure is Maslow's need hierarchy. And before we dive into that measure, we want to remind you to visit us at TheCareerPeer.com where you can find all sorts of other novelties related to this episode and to The Career Peer podcast. And enjoy. Well, let's talk about Maslow's need hierarchy. Ryan, get us started.

Ryan Brown  00:48

Thanks, Steve, really excited to be talking about this. This is a psychology staple, a topic you learn from your Psych 101 class. And you're probably still studying it and learning new things about it up until you're graduating grad school, Maslow, one of the most famous psychologists there is and he created a needs hierarchy. And this is a psychological theory, not necessarily a measurement, like we would normally be covering but still a very valuable tool. What do you think, Steve?

Steve Weingarden  01:15

Yeah, I think you just hit on all the key points there. When we're talking about Maslow, this is big stuff.

Ryan Brown  01:21

Absolutely. So this theory created in the 40s, it came about because Maslow was studying very successful people. And he wanted to see what was the progression and some of the needs that were being met from those people and how they worked with them. It's made up of five different stages. Stage one: physiological. It's basically: Do you have your food and water? Are you warm? Then you move into safety and safety is just like it sounds? Are you safe? Do you have a place to stay? And those first two stages make up the basic needs category. Moving into stage three, which is belongingness. Do you have friends? Do you have family? Is there intimacy? Do you have that in-group phenomenon that helps you out? Then there's esteem, which is your confidence. Do you have a sense of achievement? And those two, belongingness and esteem, make up the psychological needs category. And then you move into the tip-top of the pyramid, which is self-actualization, and that is reaching your full potential and understanding yourself.

Steve Weingarden  02:22

And Ryan, I think what Maslow was, ultimately, interested in was really one stage. And I think this is something that gets misunderstood with Maslow, he was almost exclusively interested in that self-actualization stage. If a person was functioning at any level other than self-actualization, he or she was said to be deficiency-motivated. What Maslow was interested in was being-motivation. And that being-motivation was at self-actualization. That's where it ties to career growth. And what we're doing here on The Career Peer.

Ryan Brown  02:54

This model helps me understand why people change jobs. They're moving more towards that self-actualizing. That's why they're driven to look outside of their current role, maybe look outside of their current organization. They want to be achieving their full potential and being the best selves that they can be.

Steve Weingarden  03:11

Yeah, I think you're right on! What we're really talking about is finding meaning in your life's work, your career portfolio. And, you know, I'm being deliberate on the word, "life's". What we do accumulates, and it identifies. You're not trying to find or do self-actualizing work, per se; you're doing the work, and you're persisting, and you're dedicating yourself to the work being of the highest quality. And then maybe later, you can observe that you went beyond your limits. That's a big phrase with Maslow: beyond your limits. Possibly you had inhibitions about doing what you did within the work. But you got past those inhibitions. That's what I think is really powerful here, it's making yourself go beyond what's possible.

Ryan Brown  03:55

And you brought up something there you said "life" very intentionally. And I think this can be used at any stage of a career lifecycle. So, I'm a little bit earlier into my career. But this tool is incredibly applicable early career, and I would imagine an executive with 30 or 40 years of experience, would probably also find this model very applicable in helping them understand, maybe their next steps, or the paths that they want to be taking.

Steve Weingarden  04:22

One of the criticisms of Maslow that I've heard over the years is it's not as useful as an organizational theory. And it's because it's so focused on the individual. I think that's a strength. I think others would agree with that too. It becomes what is it useful for and what it's really useful for is what you were just talking about the power of the individual. We can study, we can coach, we can work with someone on Where did they go to, to get the most meaning out of what they're doing, and you hit on something else too. Work as a love-like relationship with a deep connection. That's what we're trying to do when we're coaching people. And when we're trying to work around Maslow's hierarchy. And really focusing on self-actualization. I've realized I actually incorporated a lot into my own work. I don't do it formally. But it's right there, this idea of how to make individuals operate at their best.

Ryan Brown  05:12

Yeah, personally in my life, I am never more energized in a work topic than when I'm working towards my full potential. And when I'm getting to develop a new skill, or maybe I'm even in a place or a project that makes me a little uncomfortable. it creates that excitement because I know I'm making progress towards trying to be the best self that I can be. And so those projects are the type of projects that I want to be on.

Steve Weingarden  05:40

You actually talked about this, that you were ready for self-knowledge that you were ready to learn about what you can do differently to get to whatever is driving you as a mission in life. My question to you, because Maslow talked a lot about this, is how many of your... the people you know, and have worked with, do you think are ready for self-knowledge?

Ryan Brown  06:00

That's a very interesting question. Because to get that self-knowledge, and to be brutally honest with yourself, sometimes you might not like what is staring you back in the mirror right? And so how many people are actually ready for that? I think a lot of people think they want this, but then when it comes time to maybe get that feedback to help you out, all of a sudden, they no longer want that. So, a very small percentage of the people that want that are actually ready to hear what they need to be hearing.

Steve Weingarden  06:31

Yeah. And sometimes you'll find that when you're having people who aren't interested in coaching, or people get into coaching, and they realize you know what, it's really not... I thought I wanted to think bigger about this. I'm not at a point where I'm ready to do that. So, Maslow refers to this as the Jonah complex, this fear of self-knowledge. And I think it's important to keep in mind, this is one of the reasons why not everybody can self-actualize. I want to ask you one more question. Why do you think Maslow is still mentioned so much today? He passed away fifty years ago, his ideas are mostly from seventy-five years ago, the 1940s and 1950s. Why is this so different than some of the other self-help books on the market?

Ryan Brown  07:11

I think it's going to continue to be talked about for another fifty years. And I think that's because people are always looking for this kind of information and figure out how they can be their best selves.

Steve Weingarden  07:24

In Maslow theory, you can't flip a switch on self-actualization. You earn it, you experience it over time, not everyone gets there. It wouldn't be fair for me to ask you, Ryan... Hey, Ryan, are you self-actualized yet? Or Ryan... Are you feeling self-actualized today? You're actually not even trying to do the self-actualizing work. You're just trying to do the best you can. It's not fair for me to ask you, "Are you feeling self-actualized today?" I want to shift gears on you real quick, Ryan. So, you talked about Maslow looking back at famous people, a couple friends of his who he knew is where this all began, and then he went through in history and started looking at folks. He felt self-actualizers tended to share some characteristics. And one of those was they were very private, they had a small circle of friends, even though the self-actualizers were driven by mission and a social conscience. I was thinking a lot in prepping for this episode about what do you think Maslow would feel about social media?

Ryan Brown  08:23

I don't think he'd be a fan. It creates a phenomenon where people are benchmarking themselves against others. I think Maslow wants a more introspective approach.

Steve Weingarden  08:36

Yeah, it's definitely self-reflection. It's definitely introspective. It's definitely at the individual level, and connecting yourself, your individual work, to societal work. That was actually a big debate with Maslow's work... is the relevance of the iconoclast... the person who is resisting societal norms, at least at some points... versus how much culture matters. Not organizational culture, per se, but how much your... your culture matters. I don't think he'd like social media, either. I think he'd be put off by it. I'm kind of put off by it.

Ryan Brown  09:10

Yeah, I'm not the biggest social media guy ever, either Steve. So, I would agree with him as well on that, too.

Steve Weingarden  09:17

He wanted this idea of being whole, and I think social media would work against that. He wasn't against fame. This idea of trying to build out these non-meaningful relationships wasn't something that necessarily appealed to him. All right, my takeaway: do something. That's what Maslow is really getting at. It's this idea of doing your best to make society work, to make yourself work as an individual, then to link those together and to make the world a better place. It's not, "Hey, do your best." It's, "Do your best." Demand that of yourself. That's where I'm at with Maslow. What about you?

Ryan Brown  09:56

Yeah, my takeaway relating this back to career and how it can help: take this model out, kind of run through the different stages. Think about where you are. Maslow is trying to move everybody towards self-actualization. Figure out what you need to get there, if you're not already there and put things in place to help you get there, because that's ultimately how you're going to be your best self, to your point.

Steve Weingarden  10:18

Maslow's need hierarchy, add it to your career plan, we'll keep adding as we go through different episodes. Let's move on to career changes.  Okay, career changes. That's where we get to share about someone who you may have heard of before because of something they did in their career. And what we're going to talk about is what their career path was, or almost was, it's almost like we're playing with alternate history. And Ryan, today, we're going to keep it easy. We're going to stay with Abraham Maslow, who we just talked about, what do we know about his career path?

Ryan Brown  10:52

Yeah, his career path was an interesting one. Hotel waiter to law school to renowned psychologist. So how did law school go for Maslow?

Steve Weingarden  11:01

It was something he really wasn't that interested in, and one day, he just decided he didn't want to do it. He left his books, and he walked out, or at least that's how the story goes. And it wasn't his only time walking out on something. So, the waiter you mentioned, that was in the Catskill Mountains, they were not treated well, as a group of employees there, apparently. One night, they put together a fancy dessert for the customers. And then as a group, they walked out. They had a Wildcat strike, basically. And yeah, so he was willing to walk away from that, which he realized he didn't love.

Ryan Brown  11:33

Well, I'm glad that he walked away from two things because he struggled with the final one there, of becoming a renowned psychologist, creating that, the Maslow Hierarchy of Needs created in the 40s. And still rings true today and will be talked about for many years to come.

Steve Weingarden  11:48

Ryan, what's really interesting is he struggled to get a job as an academic, according to his biography, some of that was due to anti- at the time. But yeah, Maslow almost didn't become a psychology professor, and didn't put together his large theory. That's incredible. It was that close to not happening.

Ryan Brown  12:09

Yeah. And in addition to that, almost not happening. He was also on academic probation at one point, which is wild to think about. One of the smartest people most famous psychologists on academic probation, in trouble, struggling with school... it gives a lot of hope out there for people that are maybe the C student. If you work hard, you can move that grade up, maybe you're just in the wrong type of class or topic, and you just had to find that passion. And maybe that's what drove him into becoming what he was in the 40s, when he created that model. Hotel waiter to law school to renowned psychologist, believe it or not, I do see some transferable skills in that. So, a lot of people change jobs, and to change jobs, or maybe even change careers, you have these skills that come with you. They're transferable. For me, the biggest one that sticks out... critical thinking and the ability to formulate and define a position on a topic. I think that absolutely comes out in law school, and maybe he was even able to kind of learn how to formulate that. Do you see any transferable skills, Steve?

Steve Weingarden  13:14

Yeah, I think what we saw from Maslow was the living before his theory, realizing the work that he did and didn't want to do. And I think we learned a lot about Maslow and self-reflection, which then ultimately led to his development theory. And we never even touched on his family's cooperage business, where he had a chance to join them, actually ultimately did when he was not feeling well for a few years, which got into a lot of his interest in organizations and organization theory. But this is a guy who's constantly doing his best work, to try to get to some meaning in life. And I think that's ultimately the transferable skill for Abraham Maslow. So, Abraham Maslow just goes to show that career paths are not always singular or straight. Your career path may yet take another direction.  Hey, we want to thank you for listening, swimming that you did listen, hopefully we were able to provide a new reflection for your career, get you thinking a bit differently. As a reminder, check out The Career Peer podcast at thecareerpeer.com. That's p-e-e- r. We are always happy to build a relationship and make new friends. And consider leaving us a review wherever you are listening, we especially like reviews and lists on Podchaser, so help us out there if you enjoyed the episode and the podcast. Be well, be humane, be meaningful in your work and your causes.