Why Everyone Hates Their Job

This post by Roomthinker and several Twitter conversations with Peter Nduati and Fred got me thinking about our system, and the kind of workers it releases into industry.  I want to use a personal story to demonstrate why I think the 8-4-4 system is to blame for the fact that 90% of the people I encounter, go to work because they have to. They hate Mondays, love Fridays, and believe there’s a separation between ‘work’ and ‘life’.

I don’t remember the point at which Ideveloped a liking for medicine as a career. Growing up in a farm, we slaughtered animals regularly as food (chicken, rabbits, goats etc), and animal parts fascinated me. On noticing this, my father who was then a high school teacher got me a jar of Formalin to preserve the parts and a high school Biology text book so I could study and name the parts. I was around 8 years old then. In a year, my ‘lab’ held a most fascinating collection of dead animal parts; goats’ eyes, rabbits’ digestive system, chicken digestive system, rabbit lungs and heart, dead fish etc.

I remember him inviting me to lecture a Form 3 class on digestive and respiratory systems and how they worked, I was about 10 years old then. For 2 hours, I drew, labelled and explained to students how each of the systems worked and took questions! In my mind, there was no question I was going to be a doctor. My first business was collecting, cleaning and disinfecting old glass bottles, which I’d then sell at the local dispensary. I must have been around 5 years old then.

Fast forward to high school, and the passion for biology didn’t die. Instead of using school text which I found too shallow, the teacher had lent me a huge book on human anatomy, which I’d read using a torch under my covers after the lights were switched off in the dormitory. I also understood that biology alone wasn’t going to get me into med school, so I developed an interest in chemistry, and tried to like physics (which I hated).

Why did I want to be a doctor?

Well, I found the human body fascinating, and I wanted to help people get well. I also wanted to work for the government, since in my mind, that’s where the best doctors worked. I didn’t have illusions about government pay since both my parents are teachers, but money was not an issue. I didn’t even know how much a doctor earned, and actually that could explain why I didn’t understand doctors striking. To me, it would have been an honour to be allowed to work on a human body.

In February 2001, the results came out and I’d aced my sciences. Straight As in Biology, Chemistry, Physics, English and History (I loved history). I had a B in Swahili which depressed my mean grade slightly, but I wasn’t too worried, after all, looking at my results slip anyone wouldn’t think twice about having me in med school right? Wrong! A few months down the line, I got notified that I didn’t qualify for med school, and I needed to revise my university choices.

I was heartbroken. My whole family was heartbroken.

I remember my elder sister who was in college then, pleading with the Dean School of Medicine Nairobi University to give me a chance. I deserved to be a doctor. Well, the Dean informed my sister that I was more than qualified for med school, but they’d reduced the number of regular student admission to a quarter the number they usually admitted, to take in more self-sponsored students. He said if we had the money to pay for the self-sponsored program, he was more than willing to admit me, after all, he was taking in students with scores much lower than mine.

To cut the long story short, I didn’t get into med school. My family couldn’t afford Kshs 2.5M to put me through the course, even if they sold all they had. I remember talking with my mentor, who then told me “Since we missed our dream, let’s go for the money”. And money we did! Bachelor of Commerce, CPA etc and here we are today. We got the money.

By God’s grace, I love what I do today. My career has morphed from accounting and finance, to entrepreneurship, which is something that fascinated me from an early age too.

I did a quick poll in the office this morning; my colleague wanted to be a pilot, it was too costly, he’s an accountant, another one wanted to be a Pastor, a third colleague wanted to design clothes, but it wasn’t an acceptable career choice then.

I’m told children are no longer doing crafts in primary school. What happens to those kids who are gifted in interior design or carpentry? Music is no longer an examinable subject. How will the next musician discover his talent? After school? Well, after class, all they do is read some more.

Something’s got to be done.

Is your job in any way a reflection of what you are passionate about?