The Hedonic Treadmill of Professional Development

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Remember the pleasure of completing a training or gaining a qualification? How long does that good feeling last? For some, not long.

Once the initial pleasure is over, rather than being pleased with their progress, many people feel no better about themselves than they did before they started their most recent piece of professional development. I’ve found this to be the case with some of my leadership coaching clients who experience what I call the "hedonic treadmill of professional development."

The pleasure we take from professional development is often short-lived, which means that we return to the same level of happiness we had before we even took that course/workshop/seminar.

Clearly, many layers account for our differing levels of pleasure and satisfaction in ourselves and our work: personality, imposter syndrome, perfectionism, bias, and systems, to name a few. However, what I specifically want to focus on is the fact that some people—many of my women clients, for example—can find themselves trapped on a professional development hedonic treadmill. That is, investing time and effort in improving themselves, not receiving the effects or satisfaction they hope for, and then believing they need to keep doing more.

Hedonic Treadmill

You may already be familiar with the term "hedonic treadmill" with regard to happiness. In their article, "Hedonic Relativism and Planning the Good Society" (1971), Brickman and Campbell first coined the phrase to describe people’s tendency to maintain a relatively stable baseline happiness level, regardless of events and fluctuations in their circumstances.

Put differently, hedonic adaptation (or the treadmill) refers to humans’ tendency to become desensitized to new stimuli and quickly readjust to an emotional baseline. Hence, the stimulus needed to produce an emotion—like happiness or inspiration—needs to be more intense than the last stimulus in order for someone to feel its effects.

I’m particularly interested in this adaptation effect as applied to professional development. In my leadership coaching practice, I’ve come across many successful, educated, experienced clients who experience this adaptation effect (or trap) on their professional development journey.

One client, Olivia, a successful leader in her field, is what she calls a “professional development junkie.” She signs up for training after training; in part, for her love of learning, but also because she hopes, in her words, “it will make me truly feel like a leader—more secure, and ultimately, happier.” She also reports that these interventions “don’t fill the void," leading her to keep looking for more.

Part of Olivia’s challenge is that she has trouble seeing and accepting her full self—accomplishments included. Not only does this give her a partial and biased picture of herself, but it also leads her down an ineffective self-development path, neither tailored nor adapted to her actual needs. For Olivia, the “fix” is to sign up for everything, hoping it brings comfort. She is stuck in her own adaptation trap—in her quest to feel more comfortable, secure, and happy in her leadership role, she feels the need to “take another 10 leadership courses and read a hundred more books.” And even after those time-consuming and exhausting tasks, the pleasure is short-lived, and she “needs” to do more. How do we counteract this?

Getting Off the Treadmill

Here are three ways to change your workout:

Find out what you really need: You can do this by using self-compassion. Inventory where you are now to witness what you have and identify what is going on for you. Invite in kindness: both the fierce (which tells what you want/need to improve), and the tender (which gives you permission to be and accept yourself where you are right now). Celebrate your common humanity, recognizing that no one is perfect (whether leader, mother, or manager). Now, ask yourself: "What do I really need, in this situation?" "Do I need another leadership course? Or do I need some downtime; some time to appreciate my accomplishments, before I set off on another grueling course?"

Make it meaningful: When identifying development opportunities, find interventions that tickle your sweet spot between challenge and interest and carry you "into flow." Put differently, choose interventions that will challenge you but not overwhelm you; ones that are of interest to you personally and professionally, and that have meaning for you and help you get to where you want to go and grow. The beauty of pleasure is that it can lift your mood and leave you feeling great, but its effects are relatively short-lived and we get used to them quite quickly. The beauty of accomplishment is that its effects last longer.

Martin Seligman referred to these kinds of activities as "gratifications"—tasks that interest and challenge us and take us into flow. Gratifications, as well as activities that present a strong sense of meaning to us, are more immune to the effects of hedonic adaptation.

Keep it fresh: From healthy partnerships to professional development, variety is the spice of life. To avoid hedonic adaptation, we want to keep things varied and fresh. Where possible, add variety to activities—include different learning interventions, and be creative: e.g., training, coaching, gaming, reverse-mentoring, on-the-job training, self-directed learning, TED Talks, podcasts, etc. And add variety to how your process shakes up your development map. If you are doing online training one month, try something different next time; or pair it with a different intervention not otherwise featured in the training.

For Olivia, we worked on identifying and appreciating what she already had, and then determined what she needed. This also allowed us to make it meaningful to her specific leadership journey and bring in discernment to select interventions that complemented her already vast repertoire of skills and experiences.

As a leader in any sphere, part of your journey is to see and acknowledge the big picture and that includes seeing your wholeness and enoughness. Before you sign up for that next course, consider trusting, celebrating, and leveraging what you already know and have, and when you do add something to the mix, make it meaningful to your journey.