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Sociologists have long been interested in the meaning workers derive from their jobs. The issue has garnered increasing academic and policy attention in recent years with the concept of "meaningful work," yet little is known about how social stratification relates to access to it. This paper addresses this issue by exploring how the meaningfulness of jobs—as rated by their incumbents—is stratified across classes and occupations in a national survey of 14,000 working adults in the United Kingdom. It finds modest differentials between classes, with those in routine and manual occupations reporting the lowest levels of meaningfulness and those in managerial and professional occupations and small employers and own account workers reporting the highest levels. Detailed job attributes (e.g., job complexity and development opportunities) explain much of the differences in meaningfulness between classes and occupations, and much of the overall variance in meaningfulness. The main exception is the specific case of how useful workers perceive their jobs to be for society: A handful of occupations relating to health, social care, and protective services which cut across classes stand out from all other occupations. The paper concludes that the modest stratification between classes and occupations in meaningful work is largely due to disparities in underlying job complexity and development opportunities. The extent to which these aspects of work can be improved, and so meaningfulness, especially in routine and manual occupations, is an open, yet urgent, question. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Growth of the platform economy has been accompanied by critiques of the fragmented, isolated and precarious nature of the employment it offers. Yet, little is known about how creative freelancers perceive the meaning of work on the platforms. Based on 40 interviews with freelancers, clients, platform owners and industry experts, this paper reveals that most freelancers are concerned about how operating through the platform, and their dependence on it, is undermining the meaningfulness of their work. Freelancers find that the platforms are eroding both the manifest (i.e. monetary) and latent (i.e. non‐monetary) meaning of their work although they are mostly concerned about the latent element of meaning. The analysis reveals that the small group of freelancers who pursue meaningful work and earn a sustainable income on platforms are those with strong entrepreneurial orientation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recurrent scandals in business ethics demonstrate that work is, on occasion, unambiguously unethical. It is not clear, however, exactly how the concept of 'meaningful work' can be applied to such work, and whether, for example, work can be both unethical and meaningful. This article explores three different conceptualisations of meaningful work: where meaningful work is considered to be subjective, primarily subjective but with objective constraints or primarily objective (adopting Alasdair MacIntyre's neo‐Aristotelian framework). These competing conceptualisations are examined in relation to the ethical failures in the Australian financial advice industry. From 2009, a range of parliamentary inquiries, including a Royal Commission, documented significant ethical failures at both individual and institutional levels across the industry, which caused substantial hardship to tens of thousands of clients. Among the subsequent reforms was a drive towards the professionalisation of financial advice through enhanced educational standards, a code of ethics and the development of a professional identity. This case demonstrates the different ways in which the conceptualisations of meaningful work can be applied. However, Alasdair MacIntyre's scheme of practices, institutions, internal and external goods is presented as a preferred conceptualisation of the case, accommodating considerations of both ethics and meaningful work and contributing towards a theory of good work in general. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Corporate social responsibility (CSR) plays an increasingly significant role in business and can impact organizational performance and sustainability. However, the degree to which stakeholders see the organization as legitimate may depend on the perceived authenticity of CSR processes and practices. As internal stakeholders, employees have a strong influence on organizational outcomes. CSR, in turn, has been found to positively influence several employee outcomes. To examine the mechanisms of this relationship, this study questioned when and how CSR enhances employees' perceptions and results in affective commitment. Drawing on a time‐lagged sample of 317 full‐time employees in Australia, we found that substantive CSR is positively associated with affective commitment mediated by meaningfulness through work and strengthened with embeddedness, while symbolic CSR is not. Through assessing and controlling for endogeneity threats in analysis, this study provides more accurate empirical insights into the importance of CSR authenticity, offers theoretical contributions to the field, and presents practical implications for organizations in enhancing their CSR planning and practice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Changes in the technological environment of work already in motion over the last few years, but accelerated by the COVID‐19 pandemic, place individuals' search for meaningfulness in their work under a new light. In this context, we draw on enrichment theory and the ego‐depletion perspective and challenge the prevailing notion that meaningfulness is always positive and hypothesize that, under certain conditions, there can be such a thing as "too much meaningfulness." A two‐wave study of 243 full‐time employees working from home during the COVID‐19 pandemic in the United States offers support for a nonlinear effect of meaningfulness of work for workaholics, such that it has a positive effect on individuals up to a certain point, but a negative effect if there are excessive amounts of meaningfulness. We discuss these findings in light of the debate around the moral duty of managers and firms to offer meaningful jobs to employees and offer practical suggestions for firms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Master's students and graduates in two Council for Accreditation of Counseling and Related Educational Programs (CACREP) clinical mental health counseling programs participated in the Role of Meaningfulness Survey. The results indicated that a sense of meaningfulness and being true to yourself may particularly be important for those who choose a high "burnout profession," as it can contribute to their resiliency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since the term appeared in 2003, popular media and academics have been interested in the phenomenon of 'opting out' - elite women choosing to leave their jobs to stay at home with their children. Although it is unclear whether the opt-out revolution actually exists, this conversation has resulted in a wealth of scholarship on women leaving successful jobs to care for their children, particularly how maternity might be a graceful time to exit gendered organizations. However, there is not scholarship considering women without children who opt out of the dominant career model. In this study, I look at three popular autobiographies of women who left successful careers to pursue alternative work (farming, baking). I found that the women sought meaning in their work, control over their labour process, and a new definition of success. These narratives provide broader insight into the constraints of the dominant career model and gendered organizations as well as the particular difficulties for non-mothers to opt out. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]