during one of our monday morning learning sessions (a weekly management development program my colleagues and i undergo at work) last monday, my boss–who acted as the facilitator for the session–asked the group this question:  "what motivates you to get up every morning (night) and come to work?"  during that time, my mind was still in vacation mode as i just came from my 10-day sojourn and did not pay close attention to the question.  he added that we didn't have to answer that right away, and that we'll be discussing the answers we have on the next session.  again, during that time, like clockwork, my obvious answer would've been, "well, i won't get paid if i don't go to work now, would i?"  modesty aside, i haven't been absent or late for work since i started with my current company, which was a year and 8 months ago.  one look at that streak and anyone would say that i'm enjoying my job right now.  to be honest, i'm neither enjoying nor hating (for lack of an opposite word) what i'm doing right now.  so the question still remains.  what does motivate me to get up everyday and go to work?

for some reason, that question became a serious one as i was lying in bed last night.  call it post-vacation syndrome or whatever the hell you want to call it, i started looking back at my entire professional career; as far back as when i first got a job.  from mcdonald's back in college, to a defunct foreign exchange trading company, to innodata, then peoplesupport, teletech, and my present company.  reflecting on each stint i had with those companies, i would say that so far, my time with peoplesupport was the most fun i had, and with teletech being the opposite (hell would be the best word to describe my experience there).  looking more closely, i reflected on what made me stay with each company for that period of time.  first, ranking them from longest to shortest stay, peoplesupport would be number one (two years and 10 months), mcdonald's would be number two (two years and six months), teletech would be third (one year and six months), innodata would be fourth (10 months), and that defunct foreign exchange trading company would be last (two months).  i didn't include my current job since the rest were all in the past, but if i did, this will fall under number three (one year and 8 months).  looking at it as a whole, i guess i was lucky enough to have a lengthy stints, with majority having more than a year before i leave the company.

again, looking deeper, i reflected my time in each of the jobs i held.  i could say that the main reason i enjoyed my stint with peoplesupport is because of my teammates when i was assigned to do back-office work (fax support).  i started out as a technical support representative and i initially enjoyed it, but got tired of the routine of talking to people on a daily basis, which made my performance suffer and led to my vacation leave credits and sick leave credits being all used up even before the second half of the year starts.  luckily, i was transferred to the fax team, and that's where things started to look up.  our team really bonded and each day, we look forward to seeing each other rather than thinking of the daily fax documents we had to work on.  the atmosphere was really, really fun.  yet even if we would always crack jokes, share stories, and make fun of each other, our work was never compromised.  but as the saying goes, good things never last.  two of us then applied for higher positions and eventually got promoted and transferred to a different client and some of the others left the company as well for other reasons, thus breaking up the team.  i tried to compare that with my current job and i don't see any similarities.  obviously, the job then and now was different, yet i was looking for that camaraderie that existed between me and my teammates.  yes, at times, there were, but not like what my former team had.

with my ungraceful and reluctant exit at peoplesupport (that's another long story), teletech then came in.  in some fairness to the company, they made me open my eyes to more serious matters and in some sense, helped me be more mature in the position i was in.  unfortunately, i had to undergo a hellish treatment/environment in return.  yet despite that, i was only absent from work for a total of five days.  why?  because my team is composed of 20 associates and for me not to be there causes grave implications.  imagine handling 20 different egos on a daily basis, plus the barrage of supervisor calls (a technical client corresponds to one in five calls being a supervisor call), and the daily administrative work compiled with projects and daily deliverables, and what do you have?  hell.  good thing i was able to endure a year and a half of that before i trasferred to where i am now.  i guess it's good karma that's paying off.  going back to my roots, the reason i stayed long with mcdonald's is because i love the company itself, no commercial pun intended.  ever since i was little, i have always wondered how it was to work behind the counter everytime my parents would take me to mcdonald's to have lunch or dinner.  it was my first dream job.  i also loved the atmosphere there and it was the first time i'm earning on my own and not asking from my parents.  i learned to be independent and self-sufficient.

with all this in mind, i asked myself again, what does motivate me to come to work on a daily basis?  yes, it's a reputable, in-house financial outsourcer, that's a given.  salary is also good, and could only get better with opportunities within the company that may come around.  the department i'm in is by far the best in the company, and the people i work with are fairly good, if not better than any i could ever imagine.  then, i realized that it's not any of those.  i guess the main reason can be summed up in one word:  responsibility.  first and foremost to my family, being the eldest of three siblings.  i carried almost half of their school finances with the jobs i've had and thank god that they have all finished well and have jobs of their own.  even with that behind me, we still have our current family situation which makes me shoulder most of the family's expenses.  that is why for me, work is personal.  secondly, to my team.  as i have mentioned i have learned to be more mature in the position i'm in.  it's my responsibilty to look after their performances and develop them into the best at they can be, or in positions higher than where they're currently in.  third, to my superiors.  i have made a commitment to them from the start to deliver what is expected of me, and as much as i can, i'll try to be consistent in that regard.

there's an old saying that you have to love your job in order to be successful.  me, i don't love my job.  i'm also sure that i'm not totally happy, yet also not totally hating my current job.  yet i treat it as if it's my life on the line.  because in some ways, it is.  responsibility is something i have learned throughout my career.  i may not have realized it before, but with this recent reflection episode, it's crystal clear.  i may not enjoy waking up everyday at 1:00AM to go to work, but i need to.  i may not enjoy my rest days, but it's part of the job.  i may sometimes not enjoy the kind of work that i have, but whatever pays the bills and expenses, so be it.  and if the "enjoyment" part of the job is getting to hav
e a 10-day vacation from work once a year, it's better than having none at all.  some people may say that i have a successful and happy professional life.  actually, maybe i do, and i'm quite thankful for it.  i wish the same holds true with my personal life, but that's another story.  responsibility is my motivation.  it's not the best of reasons, and i may not be happy with it, but it's what i have.  and i guess that's enough for me.