Negotiating Passion: How White-Collar Workers Define Self-Worth Beyond Fulfillment

• In Event: 50220 - Section on Organizations, Occupations, and Work Roundtables
  In Refereed Roundtable (60 minute): Table 21: Meaning, Legitimacy and Professions

Abstract

A growing body of research suggests that white-collar workers rely on the “passion schema”—the cultural belief that work should be personally meaningful and fulfilling—to make career decisions and construct their identities. But what happens when their lived experiences do not align with this ideal? Drawing on interviews with seventy-six white-collar workers in high-paying, highly secure employment at large Korean firms, this study examines how workers make sense of and respond to the cultural imperative when they do not feel passionate about their work. In contrast with past studies that show how workers embrace passion or otherwise cope with unfulfilling work by seeking alternative jobs, I find that respondents define passion as nonessential and irrelevant, reframing work as a purely instrumental means to self-fulfillment outside of work and wealth-building. Moreover, workers engage in what I term the “new second shift”—extra-work activities such as investing, side hustling, and parenting—through which they assert control over their lives and validate their moral worth. Together, these discursive and behavioral strategies allow them to maintain a sense of autonomy, recasting their continued employment not as dependence but as a strategic act of “taking advantage” of their employers to sustain fulfilling lives beyond work. These findings highlight that negotiating passion is not only about the access or ability to pursue it but also about whether it is worth pursuing itself.

Author

• Sejin Um, University of Pennsylvania