How do you know you are in the right job? This question will help

At a time when our smartphones can measure everything from the number of steps we take in a day to the quality of our sleep each night, it can be frustrating when certain aspects of our lives are almost impossible to collect data on. Being absolutely certain that you are pursuing the right career is on that list.

Happiness and satisfaction are, annoyingly, relative. One person’s repetitive desk job from hell is another’s dream. In that sense, the advice of friends and colleagues can fall short. Plus, as having four job changes before the age of 32 is the new normal for millennials according to recent research, how can one know if having itchy feet is a sign you're winding your way down the wrong career path or just trapped in a dysfunctional workplace.

According to John Lees, the author of How to Get a Job You Love, there are a handful of seemingly basic questions we can consider to check the health of our careers. And he believes that while there isn’t a formula for a perfect job, there are ways of measuring happiness.

“The important thing is to not look for perfection,” he stresses to The Independent. “You’re not looking for 100 per cent satisfaction. If you are, you’re setting the bar too high.

“But about 70 per cent is the level to hit in terms of how much of the working week you will spend entirely engaged and enjoying it. If you are happy three and a half days a week, that’s absolutely fine. Yes, the rest might be boring.”

Owing to the fact that we spend on average 12 years of our lives at work, being miserable for 30 per cent of it sounds pretty bleak. But this attitude can save a person from making a huge career mistake, he explains.

“All work is a compromise,” stresses Lees. “If it’s a healthy compromise then you are moving towards job satisfaction. Jobs change, organisations change and people change so you can’t think ‘I have my perfect job and I’ll hang onto it forever’, because it’s not like that.”

“There is a social trend of fomo or the fear of missing out, which people need to watch out for. People make silly moves because they think they will find a better job or have a false idea of what it will give them.”

“The diagnoses of ‘this isn’t working needs to be done with care’,” he urges. “When saying 'I’m unhappy' you need to understand if that's because you don't like your team, the organisation you’re in, the boss, or the sector as a whole.

“If work makes you miserable most of the time and you feel ill thinking about it, it’s certainly time to carefully review. It's a mistake to throw yourself at job in a state of misery." Research shows that while almost half of the UK population wants a career change, a separate study showed nine out of 10 people regret making a rushed career choice.

What unites people who are happy (enough) in their jobs, he goes on, is self-awareness. He advises compiling a shopping list of exactly what energises you. Money? The need to make a difference in the world? A stress-free existence? The next step is identifying whether your current job offers this, and then whether it’s time to consider moving on.