5. Handout 3: What Are Work Needs?
Excerpt from Handout 3: What Are Work Needs?
Work Needs are simple to identify, and many workers will be able to pick up the concept quickly. Even for people who struggle to identify their own needs, the concept is not particularly difficult.
Here I’ve listed the five rules to fully outline What Are Work Needs, and to a lesser extent, Work Wants.
Rule 1: Work Needs and Wants are subjective, and differ between individual workers
Money (or wages) is a universal need, a resource which workers can utilize for their own individual needs, and typically will always benefit from having more of.
Outside of this exception, all other Work Needs and Work Wants are up to the individual worker.
One worker may prefer to work in an office, another outdoors, another to work from home, and another may prefer a hybrid workstyle between an office and their home. This is a matter of preference and opinion, and no one of these workers is right or wrong.
Rule 2: Because they are subjective, there is no such thing as a “Wrong” Work Need.
To call a work need “wrong” is like calling a person’s favorite food or color “wrong”. It just doesn’t make sense, and in its extreme forms, a person repeatedly labeling a person’s needs as “wrong” is likely committing the act of Gaslighting, an indicator of abusive relationships.
Work Needs may be categorized as “presently achievable” or “achievable in the future”. An extremely unlikely to achieve work need could be called “unreasonable” or “unlikely" to be met”.
In order to be “wrong,” the work need the worker identifies would need to be factually impossible, such as wanting to work on the surface of Jupiter. A job simply does not (presently) exist that would meet this need.
Rule 3: Unmet Work Needs/Wants lead to the worker suffering hardship, pain, distress, worry, or other unpleasant emotions or experiences until the need is met.
As discussed in Handout 1, Unmet Work needs will lead to the worker suffering unpleasant experiences, here often referred to generally as “suffering”.
If we look at a worker who has the identified work need of remote or hybrid work and is placed in a job that is 100% in an office, are they suffering? They are identifying a need of theirs, and it is unmet, in an ongoing daily basis. There are reasons this worker says they need remote or hybrid work, perhaps they have a physically aversive reaction to the workplace lighting.
In addition to the need being unmet, the worker is actively supporting the employer with their labor, while simultaneously minimizing their own needs. The act of working for an employer who is not meeting the worker’s needs is literally one of putting the employer’s needs above the worker’s own needs. There is a subjugation here, and a pain from this unequal relationship. Worse, the employer is not even a living being, there would be more dignity in feeding another human before yourself, or even a dog.
Of course, this is only IF the employer is not meeting the worker’s needs. The employer can take action to meet the worker’s needs (if the worker communicates them), and the worker can take action to meet their own needs, typically by engaging in job seeking.
Rule 4: Only the individual worker can identify their own Work Needs
To be clear, the individual worker is the only party that can identify their own needs. Asking another party to identify your needs would be like asking someone to tell you what your favorite color is.
The burden is on each individual worker to identify their needs. The worker cannot take action to meet their needs without first identifying them.
Rule 5: Only the individual worker determines what qualifies as a lesser Work Want
If we are splitting Work Needs into two categories - Needs and Wants - What differentiates them?
All answers to this question will ultimately give this control to that individual worker identifying their needs.
It may be useful to look at the relative “degree of suffering” experienced as a result of the missing need/want. A missing need hurts more than a missing want.
