The Longer Employees Work at a Company, the Less Happy They Are

The finding is in a new book, The Enthusiastic Employee: How Companies Profit by Giving Workers What They Want by David Sirota, Louis A. Mischkind and Michael Irwin Meltzer of Sirota Consulting. The book is based on research by Sirota Consulting, including a survey of about 1.2 million employees, mainly in large companies, between 2001 and 2004.

Enthusiastic employees outproduce and outperform. They step up to do the impossible. They rally each other in tough times. Most people are enthusiastic when they’re hired: hopeful, ready to work hard, eager to contribute. What happens to dampen their enthusiasm? According to Sirota, management, that’s what.