Work as a Life Task in Contemporary Times

Alfred Adler (1931) is known for his emphasis on Gemeinschaftsgefühl (social interest), which is necessary for the health of individuals as well as society. Social interest, the concern for and commitment to improving the well-being of the human community of which one is a part, is a requirement for healthy human functioning. This is integrated into Adler’s idea of life tasks.

Work as a Life Task

Adler (1969; see also R. R. Ansbacher, 2011; Dreikurs & Mosak, 1966) described three life tasks that individuals need to meet; he described them in terms of friendship, work, and love. As is true for the other two life tasks, Adler described the life task of work as requiring collaboration with and concern for others. In The Science of Living, Adler (1969) noted that each person:

Has to meet what we have called the three great questions of life—the social question, the question of occupation, and that of love and marriage. These questions arise out of the relationships bound up in our very existence. . . . As regards occupation . . . [it] is difficult to find a position where one will not be subordinate, or where one will not have to work with others. . . . In general we may say that success in an occupation is dependent on social adjustment.

(p. 100)

Rowena Ansbacher (2011) pointed out that life tasks “imply an inescapable obligation, or demand, which is put to earthlings by the very necessity of staying alive” (p. 10). That is, we “must make our living on this earth; we must cooperate constantly with one another” (p. 10). She also pointed out that work is a means of contributing to society and that “in the best cases, the realization of one’s capabilities through work is self-rewarding” (p. 10).

Regardless of what work a person does, the effort and its outcome provide a contribution to others. For some, work provides fulfillment of talents and the development of enormous capability. Such fulfillment can indeed lead to self-satisfaction and a feeling of completion, especially if it is integrated with social interest and directed toward contribution to the human community.

McClelland (1978) is well-known for his research and training on the need to achieve. Achievement motivation plays an important role in how individuals approach their work. The need to achieve orients a person more toward seeking accomplishments rather than avoiding failures, and it focuses on high accomplishment by means of one’s own efforts. This kind of motivation differs from the motivation for power in terms of how the individual approaches problems and relates to other people, as well as the kinds of goals the individual seeks. People with high power motivation differ from those with high need to achieve in their patterns of alcohol consumption. People with a power motivation “don’t want to ‘do better’; they want to ‘have impact’” (McClelland, 1978, p. 203).

In some managerial circumstances, the need for power can be helpful, as the need for achievement may not be adequate for managerial effectiveness. Of importance is whether task skills are needed or whether having impact is required. As McClelland and Boyatzis (1982) stated, “People with high n Achievement are primarily interested in how well they are doing, not in influencing others to do well” (p. 738). The net effect is that various types of motivation are needed for work effectiveness. From the Adlerian perspective, none of these motivations is sufficient if social interest is not well developed.

The literature on the “need to achieve” (Ferguson, 2000) comes from a different perspective from that of Adler and is not related to the questions of life tasks. Many people appear to have high achievement motivation, and yet they fail to function well because they strive for personal recognition rather than for social contribution. Heinz Ansbacher (1981) describes an extreme example of this with his documented case of the world-famous ballet dancer Vaslav Nijinsky. This dancer, to whom Alfred Adler provided psychiatric consultation, had been successful in striving for fulfillment of his talents and for extraordinary achievement. At a critical point in his...